Paolo Fino

Overview on Additive Manufacturing Technologies

This paper provides an overview on the main additive manufacturing/3D printing technologies suitable for many satellite applications and, in particular, radio-frequency components. In fact, nowadays they have become capable of producing complex net-shaped or nearly net-shaped parts in materials that can be directly used as functional parts, including polymers, metals, ceramics, and composites. These technologies represent the solution for low-volume, high-value, and highly complex parts and products.

Enhanced Topology of

A new E-plane filtering structure suitable for very high-power telecom satellite applications is presented. The conceived configuration exploits the design flexibility provided by cascading highly integrated step/stub resonators with pseudoelliptic frequency responses. Several design examples of filters and diplexers in Ku-, K-, and Q-band are reported and supported by experimental tests campaigns. The components have been designed with a full-wave 2-D spectral element method. Prototypes have been realized in aluminum clam-shell technology. Excellent agreement between the models and the experimental results has been achieved. An alternative manufacturing of the proposed architecture based on the selective laser melting technology is also reported. The attractiveness of the structure in view of this emerging additive manufacturing solution is demonstrated. The main advantages of the proposed filter configuration suitable for components operated in heavily loaded multi-carrier environment are: compact design, very low losses, high rejection, and high power-handling capability.

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Claudio Badini1, Claudia Milena Vega Bolivar1, Andrea Antonini1, Sara Biamino1, Paolo Fino1, Diego Giovanni Manfredi2, Elisa Paola Ambrosio2, Francesco Acerra3, Giuseppe Campanile3 and Matteo Pavese1 1Politecnico di Torino, Dipartimento di Scienza dei Materiali e Ingegneria Chimica 2IIT, Italian Institute of Technology, Center for Space Human Robotics @ PoliTO 3Alenia Areonautica S.p.A., Materiali e Processi, Italy