Ridged Waveguide Magic Tees Based on 3-D Printing Technology

In this article, full-metal ridged waveguide magic tees are designed and fabricated based on 3-D printing technology. Two kinds of prototypes with different structures and performances are proposed and compared. First, a wideband design based on double-ridged waveguide (DRWG) transmission lines was proposed, and it achieved a measured operational bandwidth of 27%. However, this component has to be split into two parts that are printed separately and then assembled together by screws because the overhang structure cannot satisfy the 3-D printing rules. To overcome this problem, a novel magic tee based on pyramidal ridged waveguide (PRWG) is proposed. In spite of a narrower bandwidth of 8.6%, this design requires a simpler fabrication method and has a lower profile. To the best of our knowledge, the PRWG prototype is the first full-metal magic tee that is fabricated as a whole part without involving any assembling or tuning and, thus, saves processing time and manual work. © 1963-2012 IEEE.