Antenna Modeling Software
Overview
Antenna modeling software runs on a laptop and tells you what an antenna will do before you cut wire — a NEC-2 sweep on a modern laptop finishes in seconds and covers the performance space that would take a full weekend of bench iteration to sample. This dive covers the NEC family (NEC-2 / NEC-4 / NEC-5 history, availability, and licensing), the 4nec2 free Windows frontend with its genetic-algorithm optimizer, EZNEC Pro+ (the de-facto amateur standard with ground-model options), MMANA-GAL (free NEC-derived modeler), the FDTD-method openEMS for frequency-domain full-wave problems, and the commercial CAE tier (CST Studio Suite, HFSS, FEKO). The NEC card stack input syntax is given as a working reference. Two worked examples close the dive: a 2 m Yagi optimized in 4nec2's GA optimizer across a 6-dimensional parameter space, and a 14 MHz magnetic loop modeled and bench-validated against a NanoVNA impedance sweep.
Context
The closed-loop workflow this dive teaches — sketch → segment → run → interpret → adjust → build → measure with NanoVNA → compare → iterate the model — separates antenna builders who understand their designs from those who cut wire and hope. The 4-orders-of-magnitude speedup (a 5-minute NEC optimization vs a full-weekend bench iteration) makes modeling economically mandatory for any design that is not a direct copy of an established geometry. This is the last measurement-cluster dive before the synthesis cluster opens; the per-antenna chapters throughout the series link here for the model-source pointer and bench-validation cross-check.
