Predicting RF Coupling to a UAV Wiring System Using the Equivalent Circuit Approach

Developing a full-wave electromagnetic model of the complete wiring system of a practical device is computationally challenging. In this work, we show how the Equivalent Circuit Approach (ECA) can be used to develop a computationally efficient representation of the RF coupling to the complete wiring system of a quadcopter UAV. The ECA is based on modeling the direct coupling to the wiring system with a Thevenin equivalent circuit. We show how the equivalent circuit could be updated to account for variations in the environment of the wires such as the metallic enclosure where the wiring system is housed. The coupling results from the equivalent circuit show excellent agreement with the full-wave simulations at a fraction of the computational time. The developed UAV model and the corresponding equivalent circuit can be used to guide RF coupling to UAVs and other practical devices.