6. Effect of faults

Unlike a mechanical antenna, which is internally inert, an active antenna contains a large number of active circuits that are liable to fail.

A binary-controlled phase shift, delay or amplitude control cell is statistically, during antenna operation, 50% in each of the 0 or 1 states. A failure on such a cell leading to the permanence of a state 0 or 1 whatever the command can therefore be described as a zero error for 50% of the values to be obtained and an error equal to the p _e value of the step in failure for the other 50% of the values.

A complete failure on an amplification chain can be described as an a _n error equal to – a _n .