Radio telescopes striving for orders of magnitude more sensitivity in the cm-wave band require reflector antennas with high performance at low relative cost compared to conventional approaches. The Composite Applications for Radio Telescopes (CART) programme at the National Research Council's (NRC's) Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory, near Penticton Canada has been investigating ways to build such telescopes since 2005. In 2010 a collaboration between NRC and the US-Technology Development Project (US TDP) was formed to develop a prototype 15m Gregorian offset antenna for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA). The telescope uses NRC's composite carbon fibre reflector technology to implement the highly optimized shaped optics design and innovative mechanical concepts developed by the US TDP. The result is Dish Verification Antenna-1 (DVA1), a next generation antenna that has exceptional sensitivity (> 9 m <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> /K), with low monotonically decreasing far out sidelobes (< −50 dB), and high stability over environmental conditions. As well, it is modular, highly reliable, and can be produced at competitive cost using mass production techniques.

Radio telescopes striving for orders of magnitude more sensitivity in the cm-wave band require reflector antennas with high performance at low relative cost compared to conventional approaches. The Composite Applications for Radio Telescopes (CART) programme at the National Research Council's (NRC's) Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory, near Penticton Canada has been investigating ways to build such telescopes since 2005. In 2010 a collaboration between NRC and the US-Technology Development Project (US TDP) was formed to develop a prototype 15m Gregorian offset antenna for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA). The telescope uses NRC's composite carbon fibre reflector technology to implement the highly optimized shaped optics design and innovative mechanical concepts developed by the US TDP. The result is Dish Verification Antenna-1 (DVA1), a next generation antenna that has exceptional sensitivity (> 9 m2/K), with low monotonically decreasing far out sidelobes (< −50 dB), and high stability over environmental conditions. As well, it is modular, highly reliable, and can be produced at competitive cost using mass production techniques.

The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) requires roughly 2000+ 15m reflector antennas to implement a radio telescope with a collecting area equivalent to 1 million square metres. The cost and performance of these antennas impact the telescope significantly. In this paper we report the results of developing the SKA Dish Verification Antenna-1 - a novel 15m dual offset Gregorian design using single-piece rim supported primary and secondary reflectors made of carbon reinforced plastic which yield cost and performance advantages.

Summary form only given. The cost of an antenna element is a key parameter in maximizing the performance per cost ratio of an array. Most current radio telescope array antennas were not designed for high-volume production but generally “only” for performance since typically the production numbers were not large enough to (a) justify the additional design effort and (b) qualify for discount production in terms of amortized tooling costs and quantity purchase. The Allen Telescope Array (ATA) was one of the first radio telescope antenna arrays to be designed for high-volume antenna production.

This paper will give an overview of the unique mechanical and optical design of the DVA-1 telescope. The rim supported carbon fibre reflector surfaces are designed to be both low cost and have high performance under wind, gravity, and thermal loads. The shaped offset Gregorian optics offer low and stable side lobes along with a large area at the secondary focus for multiple feeds with no aperture blockage. Telescope performance under ideal conditions as well as performance under gravity, wind, and thermal loads will be compared directly using calculated radiation patterns for each of these operating conditions.