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3D printable replica of SATCOM / MILSAT antenna AV 2040

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In spring 2019 I was asked to build an antenna which should be similar to equipment which is used by US Army and what more it should work.

After some research through sources of US military contracts and pictures there was a hot candidate for MILSAT or SATCOM antenna build: AV 2040 UHF Satellite Communication (SATCOM) Antenna from ULTRALife corporation [1]

There are STL [2] and OBJ [3] files for anyone who would like to print own atenna. The design is for 449,550 MHz but by adjusting lengths of active parts of the antenna it can be tunder in wide range, see below on Fig. 5

Fig.1 – First design in Tinkercad.com
Fig.2 – Detail of RG58 coax cable prepared for soldering SMA connector
Fig. 3 – Detail of SMA connector
Fig. 4 – SWR (Standing Wave Ratio) of antenna
Fig. 5 – The antenna lengths

There are three formulas considering f as frequency in Hz need to be calculated to get three dimensions which are mandatory for best results:

red = (299792458 / f / 2) * 0.92 [meters]
blue = red * 1.05 [meters]
green = 299792458 / f * 0.225 [meters]
Fig. 6 – First bunch of antennas
Fig. 7 – Picture from outdoor testing
Fig. 8- Making of the antenna and QSO on 102 km
[1] TDS_AV2040.pdfDownload
[2] OK1BT_wannabe_milsat_satcom.stlDownload
[3] OK1BT_wannabe_milsat_satcom.zipDownload