A Study on Reliability Analysis Methods of the Active Electrically Scanned Array Antenna

능동위상배열 안테나의 신뢰도 분석 방안 연구

Purpose: The accuracy of reliability prediction for the Active Electrically Scanned Array (AESA) type antenna is limited due to the antenna’s complex structural and functional characteristics. This study focuses on those characteristics to achieve a more accurate reliability prediction.Methods: A design analysis of the AESA antenna preceded the reliability prediction portion of this study. The antenna’s functional diagram was schematized through structural and functional analysis. Also, because the AESA had a redundancy of multiple Transmit Receive Modules (TRM), we calculated the failure acceptance criteria by basing it on the failure characteristic and the required performance on detection range.Results: Based on the functional diagram and the failure acceptance criteria, several reliability analysis methods derived from the k-out-of-n model were applied to calculate the reliability metric of Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) for the AESA antenna.Conclusion: The concepts and results of each reliability analysis method were discussed and compared. Through the consideration of each method, the most appropriate analysis method was suggested.