4th Year Electrical Engineering Project
Antenna Design and Construction for a Radio Telescope

The Physics Department at The Australian Defence Force Academy has a Radio Telescope that they wish to use for undergraduate laboratories. The labs will involve mapping the centre of our galaxy using a frequency of 1.42GHz (ie Hydrogen lines). The project has been split into two parts.

1. The analysis, design, construction and testing of the feed horn for 1.42GHz. I will be involved with this part of the project, and

2. The analysis, design, construction and testing of a low noise pre amplifier also for 1.42GHz. Another student from the University of Newcastle will be doing this. His name is Upendra Singh.

You can view my project proposal, which has been submitted to the University of Newcastle.

Various bits of information that I have collated to do with my project will be available on this site as I complete them.

Project Information:

1. Background Information.
2. Specifications.
3. Yagi-Uda Antennas.
4. Helical Antennas.
5. Helical Coordinate Generation.
6. Cavity Antennas.
7. Summary - 19 Mar 98.
8. Summary - 15 Jun 98.

The report for the project was handed in for assessment on 15 June 1998. The completed report is available below.

1. Introduction.
2. Chapter 1. Introduction.
3. Chapter 2. Determination of Specifications.
4. Chapter 3. Antenna Theory.
5. Chapter 4. Design Procedure.
6. Chapter 5. Analysis of Antennae Simulations.
7. Chapter 6. Antenna Testing.
8. Chapter 7. Conclusion.
9. References.
10. Annex A. Program Listing for Helical Parameters and Coordinates.

Interesting sites to go to are listed below:

1. 5.2m Radio Astronomy Project for 1420MHz.
2. Ammeter Radio Astronomy Society.
3. David Jeffereis Antenna Page.
4. Zen and the art of Stacking.
5. Yagi Antennas.
6. Computer Design of Very High Gain Yagi-Uda Antennas.
7. Helical Antennas Spirit River - Australia.
8. The Carrol College Radio Telescope.
9. Antenna Information.
10. TACO Communications.
11. NASA Antenna Image Gallery.
12. Yagi-Uda Antenna Computations.

Email me at kxm@phadfa.ph.adfa.oz.au if you want to communicate with me.

Please come back soon and visit me.