Patent ID: 7532170

Claim:
A conformal end-fire antenna, comprising: a high impedance ground surface structure, comprising an array of metal protrusions formed as metal plates connected to metal sheets by vertical posts, the metal protrusions arranged in a two-dimensional lattice, wherein the high impedance ground surface structure is a magnetic conductor surface at an RF frequency band of interest, said ground surface structure functioning as a D.C. short and as a mirror which reflects an RF field in said frequency band with virtually no phase reversal; an array of wide band flared notch radiating elements positioned adjacent the ground surface structure, said array of radiating elements comprising a plurality of radiating elements arranged end-to-end along a common end-fire axis and spaced apart along the axis by separation distance wherein a thin gap filled by a thin layer of dielectric material is maintained between a surface of each of the radiating elements and the high impedance ground surface structure; and a true-time-delay corporate feed network connected to the radiating elements, wherein time delay differences in contributions by the individual radiating elements to a composite array signal due to the separation of the elements along the axis are equalized by the true-time delay corporate feed network, wherein the true-time-delay corporate feed network includes a plurality of combiner/dividers and a plurality of coaxial transmission lines, wherein the lengths of coaxial transmission lines of the corporate feed network provide a true-time-delay network so that signals on receive are combined coherently and the signals on transmit coherently form a beam in the forward direction.