Abstract

With the fact that Satellite Communication (SATCOM) market size is projected to reach $41.33 Billion by 2026, tremendous demand for small satellite utilization in energy, oil & gas, defense, and other industrial sectors is noticeably rising. Satellites are not cheap business and they can cost a lot of money to design, construct, launch and monitor. Well-known factors that drive the cost of satellites are the equipment and materials used to build them. Other factors may be associated with the cost of putting them into orbits. In addition, the growing utilization of these small satellites in the defense sector for applications such as tactical communication, medium resolution imagery, and geospacer/atmospheric research will eventually introduce tremendous opportunities for the satellite communication market share in the forthcoming years. Finally, satellite will play an important role in providing global IoT connectivity as only 10% of earth is covered by terrestrial communications (cellular, Wi-Fi). The number of connected IoT devices worldwide will grow to nearly 125 billion in 2030. The 5th generation (5G) mobile networks promise a revolution in the way we connect. With faster data transfer and the capacity to support a higher density of users, 5G is expected to offer high speed internet, high definition video streaming, efficiency and real time connectivity to IoT enabled devices, thus promising ubiquitous connectivity at three times the speed of 4G. Additionally, mm-wave communication has become one of the most attractive techniques for 5G systems implementation since it has the potential to achieve these requirements and enable multi-Gbps throughputs. With that in mind, the increased demand for building complex RF passive components at microwave and millimeter-wave frequency bands allows to explore the usability of 3D printing technology in the manufacturing process for various applications. This development allowed engineers to re-think the RF design space and explore various unrealizable design characteristics and aspects. It is always challenging to maintain precise mechanical construction of passive RF components with their dimensions held to tight tolerances especially at high frequencies up to 300GHz. Specifically, when we consider the filtering section for RF systems, an early design decision comes from choosing between on-chip, integrated into the RFIC, and off-chip, filtering outside the RFIC with surface mount components or connectorized solutions. In this paper, the design flow of mm-wave waveguide filter assemblies will be studied. Authors will explore different optimization techniques to maintain the design specifications. Various 3D printing experimental work has been done on manufacturing metallic waveguide components for satellite communication. Several additive manufacturing techniques proved to be efficient for reproducing repeatable and low-loss waveguide components at microwave and mm-wave frequencies such as the E- & H-plane waveguide junctions. Moreover, additive manufacturing technologies facilitate the implementation of monolithic waveguide subsystems allowing the integration of multiple RF functionalities in a single mechanical part. This advantageous manufacturing capability enabled the exploration of unique and optimized RF design characterization as well as assembly consolidation.