Design of 1x5 Planar Array Microstrip Antenna with Edge Weighting to Increase Gain

— Research on improving the performance of microstrip antennas is continuously developing the following technology; this is due to its light dimensions, cheap and easy fabrication, and performance that is not inferior to other dimension antennas. Especially in telecommunications, microstrip antennas are constantly being studied to increase bandwidth and gain according to current cellular technology. Based on the problem of antenna performance limitations, optimization research is always carried out to increase the gain to become the antenna standard required by 5G applications. This research aims to increase the gain by designing a 5-element microstrip planar array antenna arrangement at a uniform distance (lamda/2) with edge weights at a frequency of 2.6 GHz, Through the 1x5 antenna design with parasitic patch, without parasitic, and using proximity coupling.This study hypothesizes that by designing an N-element microstrip planar array antenna arrangement at uniform spacing (lamda/2) with edge weights, a multi-beam radiation pattern character will be obtained so that to increase gain, parasitic patches contribute to antenna performance. This research contributes to improving the main lobe to increase the gain performance of the 1x5 planar array antenna. Based on the simulation results of a 1x5 microstrip planar array antenna using a parasitic patch and edge weighting, a gain value of 7.34 dB is obtained; without a parasitic patch, a gain value of 7.03 dB is received, using a parasitic patch and proximity coupling, a gain value of 2.29 dB is obtained. The antenna configuration with the addition of a parasitic patch, even though it is only supplied at the end (edge weighting), is enough to contribute to the parameters impedance, return loss, VSWR, and total gain based on the resulting antenna radiation pattern. The performance of the 1x5 microstrip planar array antenna with parasitic patch and double substrate (proximity coupling), which is expected to contribute even more to the gain side and antenna performance, has yet to be achieved. The 1x5 planar array antenna design meets the 5G gain requirement of 6 dB.