This article presents in detail the design and analysis of a 3D printedring resonator operating for bluetooth applications. To develop accurate and useful products, 3Dprinitng technology has come out as a very attractive method over conventional etching and chemical processes in developing complicated structures while maintaining the same performance with respect to the conventional ones. Thus, this article presents a systematic approach for designing and developing 3D printed ring resonator with the help of flexible Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene (ABS) material using the 3D printing technology. It is also termed as 'Additive manufacturing' because the final product is made by adding on layers of material one on one in the additive process. In this article, a ring resonator has been designed using ABS material as substrate and copper tape as the conductor for the patch and ground plane. The designed prototype resonates around 2.45GHz having S21of -43.68 at the first resonance which is in good agreement with the simulated results. Also, an extensive bending analysis of this antenna for convex as well as concave configurations has been analysedwhichsupports that an appreciable S21 value can be achieved for its utility in various conformal Bluetoothapplications.
In the recent few years there has been an extensive increase in the design of 3D printed structures
for RF applications in industry as well asinacademia since it offers reasonable cost, fabrication
easiness and conformability.Newer advances in wireless communication applications have imposed
unequalleddemands for antenna circuitrieshaving the capability of operating in various wideband
spans of frequency with small sizes and thin form factors[Mirzaee et al., 2015]. Primarily, 3D printing
technology has evolved out to be a Silicon Valley start-up, Carbon Inc, that enabled various shape and
size objects to risefrom a liquid media continuously, therebyframing a new approach to additive
manufacturing[Srivastava, 2017].This technique reduces the consumption of adhesives that are
required for combining parts so as to get a finished product, hence supporting a nimble production
which is difficult to achievethrough the use of conventional techniques of manufacturingthatsurely
involves the usage of costly materials and extortionate machinery set up [Kaur and Saini, 2018].As
3D printing involves the plastic based packaging of products, various issuesthatcome up
withsuchpackagings are: (
This article initially starts with a brief description of the antenna 3D printing based antenna design methodology followed by the discussion of materialswhichare used to fabricate such products. Following section includes an in depth discussion of results preceded by the viable challenges and there probable solutions for future enhancements in this new field.
Basic concept in this article is to model a flexible ring resonator that is 3-D printed through the technique of fused deposition modelling (FDM) using ABS material.
The overall structure’s dimension is calculated using the standard equations [Yang et al., 2017]. The microstripstructurehasbeenchosen due to its low profile structure and ease of design realizability.ABShas been used to 3D print the substrate.For the final assembly, the ring resonator and the ground plane were cut out of 0.08 mm thick copper tape. The antenna is designed using CST Microwave studio 2019. The fabricated prototype is fed using microstrip edge mounted F R/A (Female right angle) connector. Figure 1 shows the design of a ring resonator in CST microwave studio. A detailed view of the fabricated antenna prototype is shown in Figure 2.
The technology used for 3D printing the substrate is fused deposition modelling (FDM). The substrate is printed on Ultimaker’s 3D printer. Figure 3 shows a detailed systematic process flow for the ring resonator’s design and its flexibility analysis. Initially the structure is dimensionally analysed in CST microwave studio suite 2019 where it is designed for optimal performance in terms of its S21 characteristics. Subsequently, the procedure for 3D printing is followed which includes ABS filament preparation on Twin screw extruder and 3D print the design using the model designed in CAD. For experimental verification of results, the prototype is fabricated and tested on VNA.
designing using CST microwave studio
of ABS filament using
extruder Preparation of CAD model of the substrate design
Vector network analyser (for S21 measurement)
Through Table 1, It can be observed that the antenna’s performance doesn’t deteriorate even on bending it at various angles (50,100,200), thus confirming its application to the Bluetooth range. Also, the simulated and experimental results show good agreement with each other. 4. Conclusion and Future scope
3D printing has emerged as an attractive new technology which has the ability to turn up as a quantum leap to meet the high end expectations and presumptions of the research and technology community. This article, therefore, reports on the flexibility analysis of 3D printedantenna applications. A 3D printed substrate to be used for designing of antenna for Bluetooth applications has been analysed for bending effects. Also, the prototpye presents good agreement between the simulated and experimental results for all the convex and concave bending analysis. Hence this article supports the utility of such substrates for Bluetooth based applications. In future experimentationscan be included that pose the usage of 3D printing techniques that are hybridised for high dimensional precision and better finishing. Therefore the future visualizessuch kind of antennas which can be integrated in 3D stacked packageswith digital and analog components andcombinatorialserveas a 3D printed package for various industrial utilities.
Experimental results 1st resonance (GHz)
f1 2.55
2nd resonance (GHz)
f2 5.11 2.55 2.55 2.55 2.55 2.50 2.55 2.55 5.11 5.11 5.11 5.11 5.01 4.95 5.11
Authors feel privileged toexpress indebtedness to MoE, Govt. of India for the sanction of TEQIPIII grant to Guru Nanak Dev Engineering College. Also, authors express their heartfelt thanks to Dean RIC,I.K. Gujral Punjab Technical University (IKGPTU), Kapurthalaand Principal, Guru Nanak Dev Engineering College for providing necessary facilities to carry out this research work.