Aerosol jet printing (AJP) is gaining attention in additive manufacturing as a method that can be used to fabricate small and precise radio frequency (RF) components. Although work has been done to prove the usefulness of this manufacturing method up to D-band, most of that work has been done using highly conductive inks for transmission lines and radiators. Currently, no reliable method exists to fabricate resistive components for use in high-frequency circuits. The work presented here undergoes the process of characterizing a commercially available ink for that purpose. It will be shown that resistors can be fabricated small enough and with low enough resistance to be used in RF components. A Wilkinson power divider that operates in Ka band as well as one that operates in V band are fabricated. A set of loaded microstrips is fabricated to show how the printed resistors operate when they act as terminations.
Read
