AUTOMATIC VSAT ANTENNA POINTER WITH ADJUSTMENT FEATURE FOR INCLINED PLANE

• Main Author: AMMAR WIBISONO (NIM: 23215092), MUHAMMAD
• Format: Theses
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/23193
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

VSAT is a satellite technology that uses geostationary satellites with an earth station antenna diameter less than 2.4 meters. VSAT antenna on the earth station must be directed precisely to the satellite to obtain a good quality signal. The process of directing the VSAT antenna appropriately to the satellite can take considerable time and effort if manually done, especially when the VSAT antenna is positioned on inclined plane. Hence, an automatic system is required to automatically align the VSAT antenna to the satellite despite the antenna is mounted on inclined plane. In this study, an automatic VSAT antenna pointing system featured with adjustment on inclined plane has been designed and implemented. The system consists of an ATMega16A AVR microcontroller as a main controller. The system has been tested on horizontal plane to be directed to the Palapa-D satellite located at the 113oE longitude position. The average rotational speed in the azimuth and elevation direction is 6.3o with load of antenna and reflector of 30 kilograms. System test results on the inclined plane indicate that the system can direct the VSAT antenna at inclination of 3.5o with azimuth inclination direction of 180o. The obtained SQF value is 60. The difference between the azimuth and elevation angles from the measurement and the calculation result is 1.9o and 0.4o, respectively.