JUE-60KA

The THOR 7 High Throughput Satellite (HTS) provides regional coverage with a favorable look angle over the main European shipping lanes and utilizes relatively small spot beams, which provide unprecedented high-power performance for maritime applications. Supported by the iDirect next generation Velocity© platform, the iDirect platform offers automatic and seamless spot beam hand over – a necessity for a market that relies upon continuous connectivity. The THOR 7 HTS delivers downlink speeds anywhere between 512kbps and 20Mbps and uplink speeds between 128kbps and 3Mbps. 

The design of a lightweight but ultra strong radome for the Ka-band environment has been a particular challenge. JRC engineers used a 3 layer sandwich Fibre Reinforced Plastic (FRP) with a special resin-honeycomb structure for the core of just a few millimeters. The honeycomb structure gives the radome high strength and is extremely lightweight. The radome is dipped in a bath of resin and shaped in an oven, so as to achieve a curved structure without excessive mechanical force or heating. Installation is quick and easy. With such a lightweight antenna the vessel’s downtime is minimal, no crane necessary for installation, and the onboard setup will be by web browser GUI.