Development Of A Miniaturization And Multichannel Ka-band Transceiver Front-ends

With the widely use of millimeter wave technology in radar, communication,electronic warfare and other fields, the technique specifications, interfaces, structure andinstallation requirements of different system’s transceiver module are quite differentfrom each other. Traditional integrated design pattern, which designs different moduleindependently, has a lot of shortcomings like long development time, high cost, hard todebug, poor reliability and so on.This paper aims at finding a kind of design pattern that can used for masscustomization of the Ka band transceiver module. This design pattern solves thecontradiction between diversity of demand and cost and period, meets the customrequirements with mass production which means short developing cycle and low cost.This design pattern, called modular design, is standard design, oriented to the productsystem, from up and down, from total to part. Modular design is advanced thantraditional integrated design which only does specialize design for one kind of product,but it is more complex and difficult in achieving.In this paper, for the first time in China, modular thinking in Ka band transceivermodule design is indicated. Based on system engineering theory, standardization theory,modular theory, combined with the special characteristics of the Ka band transceivermodule, we do some study on modular method in the design of Ka band transceiver.The main subjects of modular design for Ka band transceiver module include:modular system establishment of Ka band transceiver, research on standard module,connecter development and modular design flow.The Ka frequency transceiver can be divided into four modules according to thedemand of each field, based on function independence: transmitting module, receivingmodule, mixing module, power amplifier module. That is called module system. Using“Generalization, serialization, modularization” as guidelines, the standard modulecovers the whole Ka band. Various specifications of connecters are designed for moduleinterconnection, considering of all kinds of connection between modules andconnections between module and extern components. Modular design flow, directed bydecomposition principle and combination principle, is given to guide the designer in the process of Ka frequency transceiver module design.At last, the designs of two typical Ka frequency transceiver modules are taken asexample to show how to use this modular design pattern. The transceiver moduledeveloped has the same functions as modules designed with traditional integratedthinking, while the volume increase slightly, but the developing cycle shortens for morethan a half. These two examples have verified the effectiveness of the module systemand the available of modular design.