Radar

Basic radar theory

Ref: Moir & Seabridge 2006, Chapter 3

OUTLINE
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.

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Principles of radar
Radar antenna
Radar modes
Pulsed radar
Doppler radar
FM-CW (Frequency Modulated, Frequency
Wave) radar
Exercises

1. PRINCIPLES OF RADAR

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[4]

1.1 A RADAR OPERATOR VIEW

[4]

Simplified animation of a
Plan Position Indicator (PPI)
radar display
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1.2 BRIEF HISTORY OF RADAR

Conceived as early as 1880 by Heinrich

Hertz
Observed

that radio waves could be reflected

off metal objects.

Radio Aid to Detection And Ranging

1930s
Britain

built the first ground-based early

warning system called Chain Home.
Radar used to monitor shipping traffic

1940
Invention

of the magnetron permits high power

transmission at high frequency, thus making
airborne radar possible.
In WWII, used to detect aircraft
After WWII, radar used for weather too
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1.2.1 BRIEF HISTORY OF RADAR

Currently
Radar

is the primary sensor on nearly all military

aircraft.
Roles include airborne early warning, target
acquisition, target tracking, target illumination,
ground mapping, collision avoidance, altimeter,
weather warning.
Practical frequency range 100MHz-100GHz.

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HOW
DOES
IT
WORK?

Radar creates a very strong (~1 megawatt)

pulse of electromagnetic energy (or
radiation)
Antenna (or dish) focuses beam and it travels
through the atmosphere
Anything the beam hits is called a target
Target scatters radiation back (some straight
back at the antenna)
This reflected radiation is measured
You can figure out distance with speed beam
travels at and the time the process takes.

PROPERTIES OF TARGETS

Amount of energy reflected back is called

reflectivity.
Reflectivity depends on the number of
targets in an area and their size
Problem: a few large drops can reflect the
same radiation as a bunch of small drops
Thats why radar is not an accurate tool for
measuring rainfall

RADAR IMAGES

Reflectivity images show the location and

amount of reflectivity on a display.
This is what you see on TV
Velocity Images - product of Doppler radar
Shows component of the wind towards or
away from the radar
This is useful for detecting rotation in storms
(tornadoes), & damaging winds

REFLECTIVITY IMAGE

Typical reflectivity image on next slide

Color scale tells you what the image means
Can tell if returns are light, moderate, heavy, or
severe
Earth curves away from beam so you see below
clouds close to the radar site and above clouds
far away
Farther away, you get less resolution since beam
spreads out

TYPICAL REFLECTIVITY IMAGE

DOPPLER RADAR

Doppler radar can measure winds towards

and away from the radar. But how?
Because of the same reason why a train
whistle sounds louder as it approaches you
than as it moves away
Doppler radar measures the change in
frequency of targets (actually measures
change in phase which is related to freq.)

TYPICAL VELOCITY IMAGE

VELOCITY IMAGES

Color scale is again important.

Winds toward the radar are usually
negative & winds away from radar usually
positive
There are limitations in the maximum
wind speeds you can detect.
In event of very strong winds, can get
velocity or range folding (where it goes
off one extreme end of the scale and onto
the other)

NEXRAD WSR-88D

This is what the National Weather Service

calls their radars.
NEXRAD stands for: NEXt generation RADar
WSR-88D stands for Weather Survillance
Radar 1988 Doppler
For short, you can use one or the other to
describe the current NWS radar network

PHASED ARRAY RADAR

This is the next step

in Radar
development

Originally developed
for use by the Navy

Currently being
tested at the
National Severe
Storms Laboratory

HOW A PHASED ARRAY WORKS

Unlike conventional radar, phased arrays
Use

multiple beams
Use multiple frequencies
Controlled electronically

Advantages
Up

to 6 times faster scanning atmosphere (3-D

view)
Can track multiple targets (several storms at
once)
Potentially increase tornado warning lead
times from 12-22 minutes

1.3.1 AIRBORNE RADAR BANDS

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RADAR BANDS:
ILLUSTRATED

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1.3.2 AIRBORNE RADAR BANDS

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1.4 BASIC PRINCIPLE OF RADAR[1]

target

range, R = ct / 2 [m]
c: speed of light (3x108ms-1) (at which all
electromagnetic waves propagate)
t: time

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1.4.1 BASIC PRINCIPLE OF

RADAR[1]

Two common transmission techniques:

pulses
continuous

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wave

2. RADAR ANTENNA

A basic principle of radar is that it directs

energy (in the form of an EM wave) at its
intended target(s).
Recall that the directivity of an antenna is
measured as a function of its gain.
Therefore antenna types most useful for
radar applications include parabolic and
array antenna.

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2.1 PARABOLIC (DISH) ANTENNA

Early airborne radars typically

consisted of parabolic
reflectors with horn feeds.
The

dish effectively directs the

transmitted energy towards a
target while at the same time
gathering and concentrating
some fraction of the returned
energy.

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2.2 PLANAR (PHASED) ARRAY

ANTENNA

Recent radars more likely

employ a planar array
It

is electronically steerable as
a transmit or receive antenna
using phase shifters.
It has the further advantage of
being capable of being
integrated with the skin of the
aircraft (smart skin).

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2.3 RADAR ANTENNA BEAM

PATTERNS

The main lobe of the radar antenna beam is

central to the performance of the system.
The

side lobes are not only wasteful, they provide

electronic warfare vulnerabilities.

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3.

AIRBORNE RADAR MODES

Airborne radars are designed for and used

in many different modes. Common modes
include:
air-to-air

search
air-to-air tracking
air-to-air track-while-scan (TWS)
ground mapping
continuous wave (CW) illumination
multimode

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3.1 AIR-TO-AIR SEARCH

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3.2 AIR-TO-AIR TRACKING

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3.3 AIR-TO-AIR TRACK-WHILE-

SCAN

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3.4 GROUND MAPPING

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3.5 CONTINUOUS WAVE

ILLUMINATION

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3.6 MULTIMODE

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4. PULSED RADAR

A pulsed radar is characterized by a high

power transmitter that generates an
endless sequence of pulses. The rate at
which the pulses are repeated is defined
as the pulse repetition frequency.
Denote:
width, , usually expressed in sec
pulse repetition frequency, PRF, usually in kHz
pulse period, Tp = 1/PRF, usually in sec
pulse

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4.1 PULSED RADAR

ARCHITECTURE [1]

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FIGURE EXPLANATION

Synchronizer: determines when a pulse

should be generated.
Modulator: shapes the pulse to be
transmitted.
Transmitter: amplifies the waveform and
feeds the antenna / antenna waveguide
system via the duplexer.

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FIGURE EXPLANATION

Duplexer: allows for both transmitted and

received waves to processed by a single
antenna.
Antenna: directs energy towards the target
and collects the returned energy. Note that
the antenna will receive energy through its
sidelobes, and is susceptible to noise.
Receiver:amplifies the returned signal,
demodulates it, and filters out noise.

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FIGURE EXPLANATION

Video / Receiver Processor: the transmitted

and received signals are coordinated in the
processor by the synchronizer, thus allowing
for range information to be extracted and
displayed.

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4.1.1 A LAB-BASED PULSED

RADAR [4]

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4.2 PULSED MODULATION

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[1]

4.2.1 PULSED RADAR

BANDWIDTH

In the frequency domain, the transmitted

and received signals are composed of
spectral components centered on the
radar operating frequency, f0, with a
sin(x)/x shape.
The practical limits of the frequency
response is f0 1/,
and therefore the bandwidth of the
receiver must be at least:
BWRx 2/

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4.2.2 PULSED RADAR AVERAGE

POWER

Since a pulsed radar only transmits for a

small portion of the time, the average
power of the radar is quite low:
Pav = Ppeak / Tp
example a pulsed radar with a 1 sec pulse
width and a medium PRF of 4 kHz that
transmits at a peak power of 10kW transmits
an average power of:
Pav = (10000 W) (0.000001 sec)/(4000 /sec)

For

= _____ W
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= _____ dBW

4.3 PULSED RADAR RANGE

RESOLUTION

The range resolution of a radar is its

ability to distinguish two closely spaced
targets along the same line of sight (LOS).
The range resolution is a function of the
pulse length, where pulse length, Lp = c.
example, a 1 sec pulse width yields a
pulse length of 0.3 km.

For

Two targets can be resolved in range if:

Lp < 2(R2 R1)

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4.3.1 PULSED RADAR RANGE

RESOLUTION [4]

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4.3.2 PULSED RADAR RANGE

RESOLUTION [4]

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4.4 PULSED RADAR RANGE

AMBIGUITY

The PRF is another key radar parameter

and is arguably one of the most difficult
design decisions.
The range of a target becomes ambiguous
as a function of half the pulse period; in
other words targets that are further than
half the pulse period yield ambiguous
range results.
Ramb = c / (2 PRF) = cTp / 2

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EXAMPLE

At a low PRF of 500 Hz, a pulse radar is

unambiguous out to a range of 300 km.
R = (300,000,000 m/s)/((2)(500)) = 300,000
m = 300 km
At a high PRF of 100 kHz, a pulse radar is
unambiguous out to a range of 1.5 km.
R = (300,000,000 m/s)/((2)(100,000)) =
1500 m = 1.5 km.
amb

amb

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4.4 PULSED RADAR RANGE

AMBIGUITY [1]

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4.4.1 RANGE AMBIGUITY

Ramb

return time
PRF

A target whose range is:

R

< Ramb = c / (2 PRF) = cTp / 2

0

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10

20

30

4.4.2 RANGE AMBIGUITY

Ramb

return time
PRF

A target whose range is :

R

> Ramb = c / (2 PRF) = cTp / 2

0

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10

20

30

4.4.3 RANGE AMBIGUITY

Ramb

PRF

Problem: Which target is which?

0

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10

20

30

4.5 ANGLE RESOLUTION[4]

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5. TARGET TRACKING

A target that is tracked is said to be

locked on; key data to maintain on
locked targets is:
range,
azimuth

and elevation angle.

A frame of reference using pitch and roll

from aircraft attitude indicators is
required for angle tracking. Three angle
tracking techniques are:
sequential

lobing
conical scan
monopulse
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5.2 ANGLE TRACKING

SEQUENTIAL LOBING1

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Sequential lobing is an early angle tracking

technique. Lobes squint off boresight, the
LOS of the target when tracked.
Continual error correction in both azimuth
and elevation maintains the track.
This technique is sequential and the design is
cumbersome and prone to losses. It is also
slow depending upon the PRF, causing slow
update rates and tracking errors.

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This technique is also prone to detection by

an RWR, and is susceptible to jamming.
Lobe on receive only (LORO) is one countercounter measure.

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5.4 ANGLE TRACKING CONICAL

SCAN[1]

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This technique is faster than the sequential

lobing and the implementation is cleaner as
there is only one lobe.
The major disadvantage of conscan is that
targets can detect the coscan frequency and
then use this to jam the radar and break
lock.
A CCM known as conical scan on receive only
(COSRO) masks the fact that a target is being
scanned.

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5.5 ANGLE TRACKING

MONOPULSE[1]

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Most modern pulsed radar now employ

monopulse due to its high tracking rate,
higher accuracy, and simultaneous reception
of the return signal in all four channels, thus
eliminating variations in echoes.
May use phase or amplitude comparison.
Three RF channels are formed that allow for
range measurement, as well as azimuth and
elevation differences simultaneously.

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REFERENCES
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)

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Moir & Seabridge, Military Avionics Systems, American Institute of

Aeronautics & Astronautics, 2006. [Sections 2.6 & 2.7]
David Adamy, EW101 - A First Course in Electronic Warfare,
Artech House, 2000. [Chapters 3,4 & 6]
George W. Stimson, Introduction to Airborne Radar, Second
Edition, SciTch Publishing, 1998.
Principles of Radar Systems, student laboratory manual, 3854200, Lab-Volt (Quebec) Ltd, 2006.
Mark A. Hicks, "Clip art licensed from the Clip Art Gallery on
DiscoverySchool.com"