Performance of a remote steering antenna for ECRH/ECCD applications using 4-Wall corrugated square wave-guide

For the upper ECW launcher on ITER, the use of a “remote steering antenna” based on the imaging properties of rectangular waveguides is planned. To characterise launchers of this type, low-power experiments on a 4-side corrugated square waveguide with a scanning mirror at the input of the waveguide were performed in the frequency range of 140 to 160 GHz. It is shown, that elliptical polarisation needed for ECCD can be transmitted without depolarisation. The usable steering range of the antenna is at least -10” < cp 5 +lo”. Experiments with the scanning plane in the diagonal of the square waveguide led to a negligible increase the scanning range, and lobes in the upward and downward direction are detected at larger scanning angles. Mitre bends can be integrated into the waveguide without prohibitive extra loss, which is demonstrated by far-field measurements. Detailed calorimetric measurements for this set up confirm this statement for the polarisation perpendicular to the scanning plane, whereas extra loss is measured for the parallel polarisation. Results are discussed and are compared to theory.