A slotted waveguide setup as scaled instrument-landing-system for measuring scattering of an A380 and large objects

At an airport the instrument-landing-system (ILS) provides aircraft on landing approach with both the lateral and vertical guidance to the runway. It is known that the lateral landing course information (localizer) can be disturbed due to reflections on large aircraft taxiing near the runway. Investigating such disturbance scenarios in a scaled setup requires an accurate and flexible modelling of a scaled ILS. This paper presents an antenna setup consisting of two slotted waveguides as scaled localizer of the instrument landing system. The design itself allows individual pattern forming to be applicable to various ILS at different airports. Measured antenna patterns correspond well to simulations demonstrating the feasibility of this approach. Additionally, measurements of ILS disturbance scenarios with large objects, such as an A380, a B747 and a sphere are presented for landing approaches. This paper compares the scattering behaviour of the mentioned aircraft and focuses on how to specify the influence of individual scatterers, e. g. the fuselage or the tail fin.