Aerosol Jet Printed Antenna for Vehicular Communications

A planar, dual-band antenna for vehicular communications is presented. The antenna is fabricated on the Liquid Crystal Polymer (LCP) flexible substrate and attempts are made to develop it on a rigid Acrylonitrile-Butadlene-Styrene (ABS) piece taken from an automotive part using Aerosol Jet Printing techniques. The radiation patterns and return loss coefficient (S11) of the fabricated antenna are compared to the simulation results. The antenna is operating at the cellular and C-V2X bands. It has an omnidirectional radiation pattern at the cellular frequencies where its average realized gain on H-plane, as simulated in the ANSYS EM software, is 0.2 dBi at 836 MHz and -4dBi at 5.9 GHz. The manufactured antenna is measured in the Satimo chamber. The average realized gain of the developed antenna on H-plane is -1.8 dBi at 800 MHz and -3dBi at 5.9 GHz.