Helical Antenna Design for Automated UAV Tracking System

Abstract

Digital Object Identifier 10.32754/JMT.2018.1.04 25 Abstract—Recently, the use of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) has increased dramatically in the civilian and military environments. The current paper is mainly concerned with the limitations of radio communications between a UAV and ground control stations. A new approach will be presented by creating a dynamic ground control station that can automatically and real-time track a UAV that has a 5.8 GHz video transmitter on board. To do that, an axial mode helical antenna is proposed. The antenna is simulated and the performance analysis is presented. Helical antennas play an important role in establishing communications for UAV. Also it describes a portable tracking antenna system that is used for line of sight communications with the small UAVs. Our antenna is mechanically rotated in an elevation and azimuth mode in response to the tracking signals derived from the UAV video link transmissions. The antenna tracking system with 7 turns and a pitch angle of 18o has achieved good results. This satisfies the requirements for establishing a reliable communication in UAV applications.