Characterization of electromagnetic properties of polymeric composite materials with free space method

The introduction of microwave radars during the second World War altered the air defense scenario significantly, and this led to the development of the stealth techniques. By reducing the detectability of aircrafts or warships, of which the radar cross section (RCS) is a measure, they could evade radar detection, which affected not only the mission success rate but also survival of them in the hostile territory. In the very early stage of the research on stealth techniques, many researches were mainly concentrated on the reduction of RCS and development of radar absorbing materials (RAM), but nowadays studies on investigating the radar absorbing structures (RAS) using fiber reinforced polymeric composite materials are becoming popular research field. In this study, electromagnetic characteristics of unidirectional E-glass fiber reinforced epoxy composites were tested with free space methods, which can overcome drawbacks of conventional cavity and waveguide methods. Complex relative permittivities of low-loss composite were measured with respect to the angle between the fiber orientation and the electric field vector of EM wave in X-band frequency range. From the experimental data, empirical relation between the dielectric properties of composites and test variable was suggested and verified. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.