CN112490616A

CN112490616A - Novel solid surface expandable antenna structure

Info

Publication number: CN112490616A
Application number: CN202011233800.XA
Authority: CN
Inventors: 蔡建国; 李明; 王玉涛; 周鑫; 张骞; 马嘉; 冯健
Original assignee: Southeast University
Current assignee: Southeast University
Priority date: 2020-11-06
Filing date: 2020-11-06
Publication date: 2021-03-12
Anticipated expiration: 2040-11-06
Also published as: CN112490616B

Abstract

The invention discloses a novel fixed surface deployable antenna structure, which is characterized by comprising: a central disk base having N sides distributed in a regular polygon; the folding units are circumferentially distributed on the periphery of the central disk base, and the number of the folding units is N; hinged on each side of the central disk base; the panel comprises a first panel, a second panel and a third panel, wherein the first panel and the second panel are intersected to form a first crest line, and the second panel and the third panel are intersected to form a valley line; the first panel of one folding unit of two adjacent folding units is intersected with the third panel of the other folding unit to form a second peak line; and the extension lines of the first crest line, the valley line and the second crest line all penetrate through the corners of the regular polygon of the central disk base. The fixed surface deployable antenna structure has the advantages of simple integral device, light weight, high antenna storage rate, particularly the storage rate in the height direction, simple control and operation of the deployment process, capability of maintaining the deployed configuration of the antenna and the like.

Description

Novel solid surface expandable antenna structure

Technical Field

The invention relates to the field of design of an expandable antenna structure, in particular to a novel fixed surface expandable antenna structure driven by a torsion spring.

Background

With the development of science and technology, the information transmission requirements of satellites become higher and higher due to the rapid increase of the demands in the fields of communication, navigation, remote sensing and the like, and the information transmission of the satellites not only requires that antennas adopt high-frequency-band electromagnetic wave transmission, but also requires excellent performances such as high bandwidth, high gain, high signal-to-noise ratio and the like, which requires that the antennas have larger apertures, higher profile accuracy and the like. However, due to the volume limitation of the fairing of the space vehicle, the antenna with a larger caliber must be folded to be stored in the satellite housing when the satellite transmits. The deployable antenna can be folded when the satellite launches, and when the satellite enters the orbit to a specified position, the antenna automatically deploys by a power source provided by the antenna, so that the problem of space limitation of an aerospace vehicle can be effectively solved.

The reflector antenna has the characteristics of high gain and wide frequency band of a single antenna, and is widely applied to occasions such as satellite communication, microwave communication relay, mobile communication base stations, vehicle-mounted stations and the like. The reflector antenna can be divided into an inflatable reflector antenna, a mesh reflector antenna and a solid reflector antenna according to different working surface composition media. The expansion aperture and the accommodation rate of the solid reflector antenna are slightly poor, but the surface density, the profile precision and the working frequency are higher than those of the other two reflector antennas, and the solid reflector antenna is more suitable for satellite antennas with high requirements on the working frequency and the profile precision. The earliest solid reflective surface deployable antenna was a Sunflower antenna developed by TRW corporation of america, but the overall storage rate, particularly the storage rate in the height direction, was not high. To improve the accommodation ratio in the height direction, Toshiba/NASDA in japan adopts a more complicated double-layer folding design on the basis of the Sunflower antenna, which makes the entire antenna system apparatus very complicated. The conventional solid reflecting surface deployable antenna generally has a high accommodation rate in the diameter direction, but the accommodation rate in the height direction is generally low.

Disclosure of Invention

The technical problem to be solved by the invention is as follows: in order to solve the problems of complex device, low accommodation rate in the height direction, difficult unfolding control and the like of the conventional fixed surface unfolding antenna structure, the fixed surface unfolding antenna structure has the advantages of simple device, light weight, high accommodation rate of the antenna, particularly the accommodation rate in the height direction, simple control operation of the unfolding process, capability of keeping the unfolding configuration of the antenna and the like.

In order to achieve the purpose, the invention adopts the technical scheme that:

a solid-surface deployable antenna structure, comprising:

a central disk base having N sides distributed in a regular polygon;

the folding units are circumferentially distributed on the periphery of the central disk base, and the number of the folding units is N; hinged on each side of the central disk base; the panel comprises a first panel, a second panel and a third panel, wherein the first panel and the second panel are intersected to form a first crest line, and the second panel and the third panel are intersected to form a valley line; the first panel of one folding unit of two adjacent folding units is intersected with the third panel of the other folding unit to form a second peak line; and the extension lines of the first crest line, the valley line and the second crest line all penetrate through the corners of the regular polygon of the central disk base.

And a polygonal convex angle is adopted for transitional connection at the junction of the adjacent sides of the central disk base, the polygonal convex angle is provided with at least three vertexes, and the first crest line, the valley line and the second crest line are respectively positioned on one vertex.

The polygonal lobe further has a vertex located on an extension of the first crest line.

The first panel, the second panel and the third panel in the folding unit are hinged by adopting driving hinges respectively; the folding units are hinged by adopting a driving hinge; the folding unit is hinged with the edge of the central disk base through a driving hinge.

The driving hinge comprises a rotating shaft, a torsion spring and two connecting parts, and the two connecting parts are connected to the rotating shaft; the torsional spring sets up in the axis of rotation, the adapting unit of both sides is fixed respectively at the both ends of torsional spring, drives the torsional spring tip and rotates the energy storage when adapting unit rotates, and torsional spring restoring force can drive two when the antenna expandes adapting unit winds the axis of rotation rotates.

A locking device for keeping the antenna in a configuration state after being unfolded is also arranged on the driving hinge.

The locking device comprises a locking hole and a telescopic pin shaft, wherein the locking hole and the telescopic pin shaft are respectively positioned on different connecting components, and after the antenna is unfolded, the pin shaft extends into the locking hole.

The locking holes are formed in the positions, close to the rotating shafts of the connecting parts on the two sides, springs are placed in the locking holes on one side, and the outer sides of the springs are connected with the pin shafts; when the antenna did not expand completely, spring and round pin axle were compressed in the locking hole of one side, and after the antenna expanded completely, the locking hole position on the adapting unit of both sides aligns, and the one end of the round pin axle of the downthehole connecting spring of one side locking gets into the locking hole on the adapting unit of opposite side this moment, and it is fixed to carry out the locking to the drive hinge, and the antenna keeps in the state of expanding completely.

The invention relates to a fixed surface deployable antenna structure, which comprises an antenna panel, a central disc base, a driving hinge, a locking device and the like. The antenna panel part comprises antenna panels of three types, and the number of the antenna panels of each type is six; the central disk base is positioned at the central position of the deployable antenna and is fixed on the satellite platform; the driving hinge comprises a torsion spring, a rotating shaft and a connecting part, wherein the rotating shaft penetrates through the torsion spring, and two ends of the torsion spring are respectively fixed on the connecting parts at two sides; the adjacent antenna panels are connected with the central disc base and the adjacent antenna panels through two hinges with driving; connecting parts on two sides of the driving hinge are respectively arranged on the surfaces of adjacent antenna panels or the surfaces of the bases of the central disks and are fixed; the central disk base is subjected to bulging treatment at the junction position with the plurality of panels; after the antennas are unfolded, two adjacent antenna panels are locked through a locking device, and the locking device comprises locking holes, springs and pin shafts, wherein the locking holes, the springs and the pin shafts are arranged on the connecting parts on the two sides and near the rotating shafts. Before the antenna can be unfolded on the fixed surface to be transmitted, the antenna panel is folded according to the arrangement mode of the creases in the crease graph, the antenna is stored, the driving hinge rotates at the moment, the torsion spring in the driving hinge is driven to elastically deform, and the force for restoring the original shape is generated in the torsion spring. After the satellite is launched to the preset working orbit, the constraint on the folded state of the fixed surface deployable antenna is released, and the antenna is driven to be deployed by the restoring force of the torsion spring in the driving hinge. After the antenna is unfolded, the torsion spring still keeps a certain pretightening force, and the locking device is locked, so that the fixed surface expandable antenna can still keep the configuration state after being unfolded. The solid reflector antenna can start to enter a working state after the solid deployable antenna is deployed.

The antenna panel is made of a solid reflecting surface antenna material, the shape of the antenna panel is processed according to a fold drawing, and part of relevant parameters of the shape of the antenna panel can be optimized and adjusted according to antenna parameters.

The antenna panel is folded and stored according to a crease arrangement mode in a crease graph, a valley line is represented by a dotted line in the crease graph, two adjacent antenna panels are folded inwards, namely, the included angle of the outer normal direction vectors of the two adjacent antenna panels is reduced, a peak line is represented by a solid line, the two adjacent antenna panels are folded outwards, namely, the included angle of the outer normal direction vectors of the two adjacent antenna panels is increased.

The driving hinge, the antenna panel and the central disk base are fixedly connected through welding or bolts.

The folded antenna self-unfolding realizes that the antenna can be unfolded by providing driving power by means of the restoring force of the torsion spring in the driving hinge after the constraint of the folded antenna is released.

The locking device is characterized in that locking holes are formed in the connecting parts on the two sides of the hinge near the rotating shaft respectively, a pin shaft with a spring is arranged on one side of the connecting parts and protrudes out, the pin shaft is pressed in the locking hole on one side in the folding process, the pin shaft with the spring protrudes into the locking hole on the other side after the antenna is unfolded, and the stability of the unfolding configuration of the antenna can be kept after the locking device is locked.

The unfolding configuration of the unfolded antenna is kept after the unfolded antenna is unfolded, and the unfolding configuration is achieved by driving the pre-tightening force of the torsion spring in the hinge and locking the locking device, wherein the pre-tightening force of the torsion spring is pre-applied when the torsion spring is installed.

The torsion spring is made of elastic materials meeting certain rigidity requirements, deformation occurs under the action of external force, and after the external force is removed, the torsion spring materials can automatically restore to the shape before stress.

Compared with the prior art, the invention has the following beneficial effects:

(1) the solid surface expandable antenna structure provides an effective solution for realizing the expandable antenna, the panel of the antenna is partitioned by the optimized design of the structure configuration, the interference of the antenna in the expanding and folding processes is avoided, the antenna has higher receiving rate in the height direction, and the carrying space is fully utilized.

(2) The unfolding drive of the deployable antenna is realized by the restoring force of the torsion spring in the drive hinge, the motor drive control is not needed, the unfolding drive is simple, and the reliability is high.

(3) After the deployable antenna is deployed, the configuration shape of the deployable antenna is kept through the pretightening force of the torsion spring and the locking of the locking device.

(4) The antenna panels in the deployable antenna are connected through the driving hinge between the two adjacent panels, and rotate around the adjacent panels relatively in the movement process without complex kinematic pair control, so that the whole antenna system device is relatively simple, and the weight of the device is light.

Drawings

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a fixed-surface deployable antenna structure according to the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of six rotationally symmetric folds of a fixed-surface deployable antenna according to the present invention;

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of five rotationally symmetric folds of a fixed-surface deployable antenna according to the present invention;

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of four rotationally symmetric folds of a fixed-surface deployable antenna according to the present invention;

FIG. 5 is a top view of a fixed surface deployable antenna of the present invention;

FIG. 6 is a bottom view of the fixed surface deployable antenna of the present invention;

FIG. 7 is a side view of a face mountable antenna of the present invention;

FIG. 8 is a schematic view of the hub base of the present invention;

FIG. 9 is a schematic view of panel type I of the present invention;

FIG. 10 is a schematic view of panel type II of the present invention;

FIG. 11 is a schematic view of panel type III of the present invention;

fig. 12 is a schematic view of the antenna with the deployable surface in a folded state according to the present invention;

FIG. 13 is a schematic view of the drive hinge of the present invention;

FIG. 14 is a schematic view of a torsion spring in the twist hinge of the present invention;

FIG. 15 is a schematic view of the rotary shaft of the drive hinge of the present invention;

FIG. 16 is a schematic view of the relative positions of the rotary shaft and the torsion spring in the drive hinge of the present invention;

fig. 17 is a perspective view showing a positional relationship of a rotary shaft, a torsion spring and a connecting member in the driving hinge of the present invention;

fig. 18 is a schematic view showing the positional relationship of the rotary shaft, the torsion spring and the connecting member in the driving hinge of the present invention;

FIG. 19 is a schematic view of a locking device side link of the present invention;

FIG. 20 is a schematic view of the other side connecting part of the locking device of the present invention.

Detailed Description

The invention will be described in further detail with reference to the accompanying drawings and embodiments:

the invention provides a novel solid surface deployable antenna structure form by applying the related theory of paper folding on the basis of the traditional solid reflecting surface antenna, thereby realizing the functional requirements of folding and containing the antenna in the transportation process and automatically deploying the antenna in the outer space, ensuring that the device has lighter weight, higher height direction containing rate, maintaining the unfolding configuration of the antenna, fully playing the advantages of the solid reflecting surface antenna and ensuring the requirements of high working frequency and high surface precision of the antenna.

The whole deployable antenna can be composed of a plurality of rotationally symmetrical parts, and the deployable antenna structure of the invention is described as an example in six-part rotation pairs.

As shown in figure 1, the novel fixed surface deployable antenna comprises a central disk base 1, a type I panel 2, a type II panel 3, a type III panel 4, an inner side driving hinge 5 and an outer side driving hinge 6 between two adjacent panels and other parts, and can be folded and deployed through the rotation of the inner side driving hinge 5 and the outer side driving hinge 6 between two adjacent panels.

Fig. 2 to 4 are schematic diagrams of rotationally symmetric creases of six, five and four parts of the novel fixed-surface deployable antenna of the invention, respectively, where the creases are distributed the same in each part. In the invention, the antenna is folded and unfolded according to a fold drawing, wherein a dotted line is a valley line 11 which indicates that two adjacent antenna panels are folded inwards, namely the included angle of the external normal direction vectors of the two adjacent antenna panels is reduced, and a solid line is a peak line 12 which indicates that the two adjacent antenna panels are folded outwards, namely the included angle of the external normal direction vectors of the two adjacent antenna panels is increased.

Fig. 5 to 7 are a top view, a bottom view and a side view of the novel fixed surface deployable antenna of the present invention, wherein two adjacent antenna panels with a valley fold are respectively provided, and each of the two adjacent antenna panels with a valley fold includes a center panel base 1 and a type i panel 2, a type i panel 2 and a type ii panel 3, and a type i panel 2 and a type iii panel 4, and the two adjacent antenna panels with a peak fold, i.e., the type ii panel 3 and the type iii panel 4, are connected by two inner driving hinges 5 at the same axial position, and the two adjacent antenna panels with a peak fold are connected by two outer driving hinges 6 at the same axial position.

The whole antenna structure of the novel solid surface deployable antenna consists of a plurality of rotationally symmetrical parts, and the number of the rotationally symmetrical parts can be changed. Each rotational symmetry part comprises antenna panels in three shapes, and an intersection line between the antenna panels and a straight line where the center disk base and the corresponding side are located intersect at one point. The central disk base is located at the central position of the deployable antenna and fixed on the satellite platform, the main body of the central disk base is in the shape of a regular polygon corresponding to the number of rotationally symmetrical parts, a hexagonal protruding area is arranged at each vertex position, and the vertexes of the hexagonal protruding areas are respectively connected with the shared edges of the antenna panel I and the antenna panel II, the shared edges of the antenna panel II and the antenna panel III, and the shared edges of the antenna panel III and the antenna panel I. The antenna panel has a corresponding shape adjustment in the hexagonal protruding area of the central disk base. The shape of the central disk base 1 of the antenna structure consisting of six rotational symmetric parts is shown in fig. 8, the shape of the type i panel 2 is shown in fig. 9, the shape of the type ii panel 3 is shown in fig. 10, and the shape of the type iii panel 4 is shown in fig. 11.

Fig. 12 is a schematic diagram of the novel fixed-surface deployable antenna after being folded when six parts of the antenna are rotationally symmetric, wherein the folding of the antenna is performed according to the crease distribution in fig. 2. The position of the fixed center disk base 1 is unchanged, two adjacent antenna panels are correspondingly rotated and folded according to a valley line 11 and a peak line 12, namely, the included angles of the outer normal direction vectors of the center disk base 1 and the type I panel 2, the type I panel 2 and the type II panel 3, and the included angles of the outer normal direction vectors of the type I panel 2 and the type III panel 4 are respectively reduced, and the included angles of the outer normal direction vectors of the type II panel 3 and the type III panel 4 are increased. The deployable antenna of the present invention always maintains a folded and stored state, i.e., the antenna state shown in fig. 12, during the transmission and transportation process.

The inner driving hinge 5 and the outer driving hinge 6 according to the present invention are constructed as shown in fig. 11, and include a rotation shaft 9, a torsion spring 10, and a coupling member 13. The torsion spring 10 and the rotating shaft 9 are shown in fig. 14 and 15, respectively. The positional relationship between the torsion spring 10 and the rotating shaft 9 in the driving hinges 5 (6) is shown in fig. 16. The relative positional relationship of the torsion spring 10, the rotating shaft 9 and the connecting member 13 is shown in fig. 17 and 18. Both ends of the torsion spring 10 are fixed to the connecting members 13 at both sides, respectively. When the torsion spring 10 is initially installed, a small deformation is preset, so that after the antenna is unfolded, a certain pretightening force is still kept in the torsion spring 10 to maintain the unfolded state of the antenna. In the process of folding and containing the antenna, the inner side driving hinge 5 and the outer side driving hinge 6 which are connected with the antenna panel rotate, namely, the connecting parts 13 at the two sides rotate relatively around the rotating shaft 9 to drive the torsion springs 10 on the connecting parts to elastically deform and store energy, and the torsion springs 10 tend to restore the original shape to generate a restoring force action. The elastic material used for the torsion spring 10 can generate enough driving force when the torsion spring is deformed again, so as to drive the whole antenna structure to be unfolded.

As shown in fig. 19 and 20, the locking device of the present invention has locking holes 14 formed in the both-side link members 13 at positions near the rotation shaft 9 in accordance with the rotation angle of the drive hinge 5 (6), a spring 8 placed in one of the locking holes 14, and a pin 7 connected to the outside of the spring 8. When the antenna is not fully unfolded, the spring 8 and the pin 7 are compressed in the locking hole 14 on one side. After the antenna is completely unfolded by the driving provided by the restoring force of the torsion spring 10 in the driving hinge 5 (6), the locking holes 14 on the two connecting parts 13 are aligned, and at this time, one end of the pin 7 connected with the spring 8 in the locking hole 14 on one side enters the locking hole 14 on the other connecting part 13 to lock and fix the driving hinge 5 (6), so that the antenna can be kept in the completely unfolded state.

Claims

1. A solid-surface deployable antenna structure, comprising:

a central disk base having N sides distributed in a regular polygon;

2. The structure of claim 1, wherein a polygonal lobe having at least three vertices is used to transition at the junction of adjacent sides of the central disk base, and the first peak, the valley and the second peak are located at a vertex.

3. The structure of claim 2, wherein the polygonal lobe further has a vertex located on an extension of the first peak line.

4. The fixed-surface deployable antenna structure according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the first panel, the second panel and the third panel in the folding unit are hinged by a driving hinge respectively; the folding units are hinged by adopting a driving hinge; the folding unit is hinged with the edge of the central disk base through a driving hinge.

5. A solid deployable antenna structure according to claim 4, wherein the drive hinge comprises a rotation shaft, a torsion spring and two connecting members, the two connecting members being connected to the rotation shaft; the torsional spring is arranged on the rotating shaft and can drive the two connecting parts to rotate around the rotating shaft.

6. The structure of claim 5, wherein two ends of the torsion spring are respectively fixed to the two connecting members, the connecting members rotate to drive the ends of the torsion spring to rotate for storing energy, and the restoring force of the torsion spring drives the two connecting members to rotate around the rotating shaft when the antenna is deployed.

7. A solid deployable antenna structure as claimed in claim 4, wherein locking means are provided on the drive hinge to retain the antenna in the deployed configuration.

8. The fixed surface deployable antenna structure of claim 7, wherein the locking means comprises a locking hole and a retractable pin, wherein the locking hole and the retractable pin are located on different connecting members, and wherein the pin extends into the locking hole when the antenna is deployed.

9. The fixed surface deployable antenna structure of claim 8, wherein the locking holes are formed at positions near the rotating shafts of the connecting members at both sides, a spring is placed in the locking hole at one side, and the pin is connected to the outer side of the spring; when the antenna did not expand completely, spring and round pin axle were compressed in the locking hole of one side, and after the antenna expanded completely, the locking hole position on the adapting unit of both sides aligns, and the one end of the round pin axle of the downthehole connecting spring of one side locking gets into the locking hole on the adapting unit of opposite side this moment, and it is fixed to carry out the locking to the drive hinge, and the antenna keeps in the state of expanding completely.

10. A solid deployable antenna structure according to claim 4, wherein N is from 4 to 10.