Fighter Radar in The 1990s

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NO SECTION, Japan
Date Posted: 01-Aug-1992

International Defense Review
FIGHTER RADAR IN THE 1990S

TEXT: a spectrum of progress
TEXT: The radar systems that are shortly to make their debut in the next generation of fighter
aircraft will be far superior to their forebears of the 1960s and 1970s. Technology has in some
ways nearly reached the limits of development, since the fundamentals of wave propagation and
transmission cannot change due to the laws of phusics. The real revolution in radar systems has
been, and continues to be, in signal and data processing. Over the last decade, there has been a
tenfold increase in processing power for radar applications. Moreover, power generation efficiency
has improved dramatically with a better conversion of raw to radiated power. This has improved
radar range capabilities, however, even this has limits: a doubling of range requires a sixteenfold
increase in transmitter power.
Yet it is the numbercrunching advances that are delivering the quantum leap in system capability.
Veryhighspeed integrated circuit technology, higher conductivity inb substrate materials (such as
gallium arsenide), among other achievements, is allowing more useable data to be extracted from
radar returns, data that until recenlty was lost because of capacity limitations. finally, packaging
advances have allowed more system capability in smaller space, especially important when
designing retrofit systems for older fighters.
One major difference in nextgeneration radars will be the use of electronicallysteered active and
passivearray antennas. Electronic arrays scan the radar beam without mechanical means such as
a gimballed dish antenna. The array itself is comprised of hundreds of tiny transmit/receive (T/R)
modules each functioning as a miniature radar in its own right. The triggering of these modules in
a particular sequence provides beam steering. While not actually new, design complexity has
made such units expensive, unreliable, and overly large. The first such equipment fielded in an
operational fighter was the Zaslon passivearray radar in the Russian MiG31 interceptor. While
Zaslon is a highpower unit with 200km range inlookdown mode, its design has been described as
"technically inelegant" by some Western experts, and is said to embody chiefly 1960s technology.
Speaking to IDR, one Russian aircraft designer said that CIS avionics currently have the same
capabilities as Western counterparts but not the same level of compactness. CIS design bureaus
are hoping to integrate Western avionics technology into future airframes in order to close this
gap.
Western efforts in electronic arrays have followed two paths: active arrays and passive arrays. The
main benefit of electronicallysteered beams is scanning agility, as the cone of radiated energy is
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Article 1 Page 1 of 9
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not dependent on mechanical gimbals to steer it. Trackwhilescan mode is quicker for multiple
targets, a wider frequency range is available, and graceful degradation is inherent bvecause of the
independent T/R modules. The main disadvantages of such antennas are that they suffer from a
limited scan angle as the radar cone is narrower (although faster moving) and that overall system
reliability (other than the T/R modules) could be a problem, at least in firstgeneration designs.
For the moment, cost is actually the largest stumbling block to fielding electronicallysteered
systems. The European Fighter Aircraft (EFA) radar, the ECR 90 system developed by GEC
Ferranti, FLAR, and INISEL, for instance, will still contain a mechanicallysteered planar array.
Both the US F22 and the French Rafale, however, will use electronic arrays. The USAF has opted
for activearray technology in its radar while the French have pursued passivearray technology
instead. No more ghosts Due to make its first flight in 1995, and to enter service around the end
of the century, the USAF/Lockheed F22 Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) will have the first fighter
radar to be based on an active electronically scanned array (AESA). Program officials say that all
the data continue to support the choice of the AESA, despite the technical and cost challenges of
such a radically new approach.
The USAF has pursued Xband AESA technology since the early 1980s for three main rasons:
power/weight ratio, agility and reliability. With more than a thousand transmit/receive (T/R)
modules, each capable of generating around 10W of power the F22 radar has a peak power in
the megawatt range, should that be required.
The agility of the beam its ability to change in direction or waveform is better than any other
type of radar. "We can do things with parallel processing that you simply cannot do with a moving
antenna or a singletransmitter radar," says deputy ATF program director Tom Graves. The F22
radar will operate in interleaved modes, switching from one to another so rapidly that they will
appear concurrent to the avionics system. "It will act almost like two different radars," says
Graves.
Reliability is still the AESA's most important advantage. A physically fixed antenna eliminates
components such as rotary waveguide joints, "which cause a lot of nokidding failures," according
to Graves. Because the array is physically locked into the aircraft, boresight angles and grazing
angles with the radome cannot change in flight, so less time is spent "chasing ghosts," as Graves
puts it.
These advantages also apply to passive ESA like those on the B1B and MiG31, but, says Graves,
research still shows superior reliability for the AESA. "We've done trade studies all the way from a
single travellingwavetube to the AESA, including a radar with 50 ganged transmitters that was
the worst of all worlds," and the AESA comes out on top. Ultimately, a maintenancefree life of
20,000h the lifetime of the aircraft is possible.
The F22 radar springs from several stages of development, starting with the USAF's Ultra Reliable
Radar (URR) and Common Signal Processor (CSP) programs. The URR was an array only, with
only very basic radar performance; there were some plans to marry the URR and CSP for more
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complex radar tests, and even some ideas of installing them in an aircraft, but these did not take
place.
URR team members Westinghouse and Texas Instruments were selected to build radars for both
ATF Demonstration/Validation (Dem/Val) teams, using further improved T/R modules. Both teams
tested the radars in the air, and performed some basic detection and tracking tasks.
Neither the URR nor the Dem/Val radars was anything like a prototype for the ATF radar. Rather,
they showed that an AESA fighter radar could be made to work and could be controlled by a
common processor. The radar being developed in the engineering and manufacturing
development (EMD) program is completely new.
Since the selection f the F22 in April 1991, the USAF and industry have been working to reduce
risk in the development process and to make the resulting radar affordable. Like the rest of the F
22 system, the radar is being subjected to a discipline known as "integrated product development"
to ensure that every feature of the design supports the required operational capability of the
system. "We need to make sure that we have a solution to every requirement, and that we don't
spend time on a solution for requirements that don't exist," says Graves.
At the same time, however, care is being taken to ensure that the design provides for
improvements to meet future requirements. This will be the focus of a design review later this
year. This discipline has imposed some conservatism on the program. For example, the radar is
not required to have a much greater search range than the current F15 radar. "After a while, you
get data or information overload" with increasing range, says Graves.
Originally, the ATF radar was to have included sidelooking auxiliary arrays to provide an
extremely wide field of regard around the aircraft, but his feature was deferred in a 1989 review
of the avionics requirements. "The operational advantage was not enough to justify the cost and
risk which we anticipated in making the switch between side and front arrays transparent to the
pilot," says Graves.
However, space, weight, power, cooling and CIP capacity will still be reserved for side arrays
the question, for the program managers, is how much. "We're trying to improve our
understanding of what the side arrays need to do and can do, whether you need to transmit and
listen on different antennas, and what kind of power they require," says Graves.
Most of the 17 baseline radar modes will be airtoair, says Graves, but the basic system will be
able to do much more. Synthetic aperture radar (SAR), for instance, "is not in the baseline, but
the hardware can do it and we have an idea of what the software would need to be." The overall
design reflects the need to incorporate SAR later in the program. Because SAR modes "are very
sensitive to knowing what the antenna's doing," says Graves, the F22 inertial reference sysem is
mounted on the back of the radar bulkhead, for the highest posible fidelity between the two
systems.
The critical element in controlling the cost of the F22 radar is the cost of the T/R modules. The
target set at the start of Dem/Val was $400 in baseyear (1985) dollars, but the USAF is now
pushing for $400 in thenyear dollars.
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The war on T/R module costs has been fought through a series of designproducetest cycles. In
each cycle, TI has made enough modules to validate its predictions of manufacturing costs and
yields. Then, the costs have been analyzed, says Graves. "We ask, where are the costs? Then we
attack each area, to see if we can either design the cost item out of the module, or automate the
tooling, assembly, or test processes."
Through this process, the USAF and TI found that they could remove a complex integrated circuit
set from the T/R moudle and make it both cheaper and easier to test, without affecting its
operational capability. Then, in the second EMD iteration, the modules were redesigned so that
the transmit and receive components were physically separated, on opposite sides of the module.
This means that the microwave monolithic integrated circuitry (MIMIC) on one side can be
completed and tested before the other side is built up, so that less work is lost on those which fail
the test.
The decision not to use side arrays hurt the module program, because its costs are very
dependent on numbers. However, says Graves, "we're still projecting good things on cost."
The first F22 is due to fly in August 1995, 48 months after the contract was awarded, but the
sixth EMD aircraft, to fly in 1996, will be the first with radar. (The radar itself will make its first
flight in 1995, aboard the Boeing 757 used as the flighttest laboratory for Dem/Val.) Says Graves;
"We recognized that it would take us five years or more to develop the radar."
The first four F22s, used for structural, performance and handling tests, "will have enough
avionies aboard to fly"; the fourth willb e the first twoseater. The fifth will have communications,
navigation, and identification (CNI) avionics on board.
The seventh aircraft will have the Integrated EW System (INEWS), and the eighth F22 will be the
first with complete mission avionics; the fifth and sixth aircraft will be retrofitted with full avionics
during the test program. The ninth and tenth F22s will be used for integration and armament
trials, and the eleventh EMD aircraft will be configured for radar crosssection tests. Rafale's
passive nature The RBE2 electronicallyscanned radar, developed jointly by ThomsonCSF and
Dassault Electronique (under the GIe Radar consortium), made its first flight on 10 July at the
Bretigny flighttest centre in France. The RBE2 will eventually equip both French air force and
French navy variants of the Rafale fighter. This first flight took place according to schedule and
only three years after an order from the government to the consortium. The flight marked the
beginning of a series of tests of the RBE2 in flight on a Mystere 20 test aircraft specially equipped
for evaluation. First flight on a Rafale prototype is scheduled for May 1993.
The RBE2 is the first electronic sweep radar for fighters to have been developed in western
Europe, and will be one of the first in the world to be put into service. In comparison to current
radars, which use a mechanical sweep antenna, the RBE2 will offer the opportunity to fulfil a
variety of functions simultaneously such as trackwhilesearch and terrain monitoring. The RBE2
has the same sweep sector as most other military airplane radars, that is 120 degrees, but scan
speeds are 50 to 100 times faster than even the best mechanical antennas, whose speed is 100
degrees/s. Direct comparison is misleading, however, since the beam does not sweep in the usual
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sense of the word, but literally jumps from one position to another within the sweep angle. This
also helps in maintaining radar discretion, as there is no steady sweep of the beam, it merely
jumps from point to point. The acquisition range of the RBE2 is in the order of 50nmi on non
stealth targets, and at least 35nmi on moderately stealthy contacts. Average power emission is on
the order of 1kW.
The radar differs from the US ATFbound system in that the beam is passively scanned through a
radant or phaseshifter in order to steer it. A fixedbeam Xband antenna transmits a waveform
directly into a threestage electronic "prism" (radant) that bends the beam in the desired direction.
The first stage scans in the vertical plane, the second acts as a polarization rotator, and the third
scans in the horizontal. While passive scanning is as technically sound as active scanning, the
benefit of graceful degradation is lost because a phaseshifter malfunction would mean a total
system failure.
The RBE2 is a fully multimode radar and its capabilities have been adapted to the wide range of
missions that Rafale will be taksed with:
airtoair, to detect at longrange approaching aircraft, with multitarget tracking ability and track
whilescan;
airtoground, ground target tracking and terrain avoidance with ordnance delivery despite ground
clutter;
airtosea, to detect and track targets at longrange against surface clutter with effective ordnance
delivery.
In addition, to respond to the requirements of modern air combat, the functioning of "airground"
and "airair" modes can be simultaneous. This, it is claimed, affords crews both a certain security
during lowlevel air combat and the capability for selfdefense against interceptors without
interrupting lowlevel flight.
ThomsonCSF and GEC Marconi (lead contractor on the EFA ECR 90 radar) signed an agreement in
May 1991, to cooperate on research and development for the next generation of radar to equip
the successor or successors to Rafale and EFA. The new joint venture company, called GEC
Thomson Airborne Radar, will concentrate on activearray antenna technology. The move is an
indication of the expense of such research and shows European concern that such technology is
not lost to the US or Japan in the next decade. A prototype for the radar is not expected to make
an appearance before 2005, and development costs are put at FFr5 billion (US$925 million) over
the next 12 years. The AngloFrench effort wants to eventually bring in a German partner.
Benefits for the retrofit market While not all radar manufacturers are actively pursuing active
arrays, the flurry of cuttingedge research is bestowing residual benefits for systems on the retrofit
market. GECFerranti's work on the Iband Blue Vixen radar for the Sea Harrier FRS.2, has led to a
powerful unit designed for a relatively confined space. Performance growth potential is already
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planned for with ample processing capability availabel for software upgrades without hardware
modifications. One such benefit would be the addition of Doppler beamsharpening for very high
resolution radar imaging. Moreover, work on the ECR 90, itself based to a large extent on Blue
Vixen, could be applied retroactively for Blue Vixen upgrades or perhaps even Blue Fox (on Harrier
FRS.1 in Britain and India). One of ECR 90's features will be a superagile antenna pedestal to
improve scanning capability.
A more direct effort was recently announced by GECFerranti with the unveiling of its Blue Hawk
program, a modular family of combat radars specifically developed for the retrofit market. Blue
Hawk, offered as a lightweight, lowcost system for fighters, is a multimode pulseDoppler radar.
It will afford lookup and lookdown capability, ground mapping, and a high degree of missile
compatibility. Modular and air cooled, it consists of four LRUs plus the antenna unit.
Swedish manufacturer Ericsson, currently at work on the JAS.39 Gripen multimode radar, the PS
05/A, is already looking at integrating the system into other airframes, although company sources
would not elaborate. Ericsson has begun flight tests of the I/Jband radar in the Gripen and
verification of specifications is expected to continue through mid1993. Ericsson is using an
antenna platform gimbal from GECFerranti which is in turn using Ericsson exciter modules for the
Blue Vixen radar. Ericsson's D80 signal processor (used in the PS05/A) had been a shortlisted
candidated for the ECR 90 radar but in the end was not selected by Ferranti. It is capable of
selecting low, medium, or high PRF modes depending on conditions and contact range and
altitude.
ThomsonCSF's multimode RDY radar, developed for export on the Mirage 20005, could now find
its way into service with the French air force, if the proposed acquisition plans for the 20005 go
through. The RDY could also be retrofitted to existing Mirage 2000 aircraft in French service. With
superior processing to the current RDM radar, the RDY also features a planar array, lowinertia
aperture antenna more capable than the RDM's that will eventually be replaced by an
electronicallyscanned one. These growth factors could make the RDY highly desirable to the
substantial number of Mirage operators around the globe.
Elta Electronics Industries is a subsidiary of Israel Aircraft Industries, various divisions of which
have experience of modifying and upgrading older aircraft. IAI maintains the third prototype of
the nowcancelled IAF Lavi fighter program as a technology demonstrator. Tested on this platform
is the Elta EL/M2032 multimode firecontrol radar, which can be customized to specific
requirements.
The 2032, one of the EL/M2000 family of radars, is tailored to fighter/attack aircraft. Because of
its modular hardware, MILSTD 1553B avionic interface and allsoftware control, it is suitable for
the F5, F4, and the Mirage, among other airframes. The EL/M2035 is for less specifically
oriented, multimission fighters, while the EL/M2011 is optimized for close air support operation,
for advanced trainers and lightattack aircraft. All three basic radar configurations can be modified
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to specific needs.
For airtoair operation, the EL/M2032 has rangewhilesearch (RWS), trackwhilescan (TWS) and
singletargettack (STT) capabilities and ensures longrange target detection and tracking. Its air
combat modes are slewable, HUD, boresight and vertical scan, allied with automatic target
acquisition. For airtoground operation it has realbeam mapping with expand or freeze capability,
ground movingtarget indication, airtoground ranging and terrainavoidance facilities, beacon and
seasearch modes and Dopplerbeam sharpening. A twoaxis monopulse, pulseDoppler, all
attitude, allaspect radar, its detection range for fighter aircraft in lookup mode is said to be
30nmi, 25nmi in lookdown mode. Antenna size varies from 30 to 75cm according to platform
restrictions, and weight varies accordingly from 94 to 110kg.
Israel had the first operational lookdown/shootdown radar in service the 2001 for the Kfir in
the 1970s. This capability was not available to Russian aircraft until entry into service of the MiG
29. The 2001B, a solidstate radar except for the travellingwave tube, is still available for
operation with singleseat tactical aircraft in both aittoair and airto ground modes.
Though it has similar multimode and allaspect capability to the 2032, the 2011 does not physically
resemble it and is more suited to the airtoground role. Antenna diameter for the 2011 is 33cm
adaptable, power 1.5kW, and weight 67kg. Ranging capability in the airtoground mode is 150
15,000m with an accuracy of 30m (or 5 per cent). Detection range in the airtoair mode is 150m
8nmi with the 33cm antenna and a target size of 5m2 (probability of detection is 90 per cent).
Certainly no newcomers to radar design, Italy's two radar houses, FIAR and SMA, are currently
offering very capable retrofit systems that are finding favour on the world market.
SMA has developed the SCP01 "Scipio" multimode radar in conjunction with Tecnasa of Brazil
and the Brazilian air force, to equip Brazilian AMX fighters. Now at the end of its developmental
testing phase, the SCP01 offers three modes: airtoair, airtoground, and airtosea. A relatively
compact system, it consists of five line replaceable units and weighs only 73kg. Like the best of
the current generation of fighter radars, it uses HOTAS controls and claims a high degree of ECM
immunity. SMA also claims a MTBF rate of better than 230h and a MTTR rate of 20min. While the
FIAR Grifor radar equips Italian AMX aircraft, SMA hopes to acquire followon contracts for the
Italian air froce and is eagerly awaiting the chance to bid on AMX's first export sale, possibly in
Asia.
FIAR's fighter radar line is based around its Grifo family, of which the ASV variant equips Italian air
force AMX aircraft. The ASV, tailored to antiship missions, is a low PRF Xband system with a
peak power output of 80kW. Grifo F/X plus is a lightweight pulse doppler system designed
specifically for the AMX in multirole missions (low, medium, and high PRF) but offered for the F5.
FIAR also offers the GrifoM for Mirage retrofit and the Grifo7 for the MiG21/F7 fighter. All
operate in the Xband, use pulse compression techniques, HOTAS control, offer good ECCM,
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flexible wide modular architecture,'and interface with a range of missiles (except Grifo7). The
Grifo7 has recently been sold to an Asian country, most likely India, to upgrade its Mig21 fleet.
However, this report remains unconfirmed by FIAR. The extreme space constraints of the MiG21
nosecone are a challenge for shoehorning in a capable multimode radar. The Grifo7 uses low
and medium PRF, and a 38cm circular planar antenna. FIAR is concentrating marketing efforts in
Asia and South America, and is banking on the belief that developing nations will be holding onto
their existing fleets for a long time. Grifo has already been sold to Singapore for its F5 upgrade
and to New Zealand for its A4 Kahu.
In the US, apart from work on ATF radar, manufacturers have been engaged in a series of
evolutionary upgrades to existing fighter radars, particularly for the F16 and F/A18 aircraft. The
Hughes AN/APG73, based on the AN/APG65, offers increased processing speed and expanded
memory and will equip F/A18 fighters in the US, Canada, and inSwitzerland. Westinghouse has
captured the lion's share of global F16 radar upgrades with its AN/APG68, first delivered to the
USAF in 1984. It offers enhanced ground mapping, BVR AMRAAM capability, and extended
detection range, and will be in production throughout the 1990s. For other airframes,
Westinghouse has launched its Modar 5000 family, a highperformance Xband pulse Doppler
system built around common modules and offering over 600h MTBF.
In an F5 application, Modar 5000 would weigh about 68kg, feature an acquisition range out to
80nmi, and would afford both airtoair and airtoground capability. The company's APG66
system (developed for F16A/B) is getting a second lease on life as the BAeproposed solution for
the Hawk 200 light singleseat fighter. A new LRU signal data processor on the APG66H has
reduced packaging, increased reliability, and enhanced speed.
Both GE Aerospace and ESCO (formerly Emerson) offer retrofit systems, intended primarily for the
F5. GE's multimode F5 radar, operating in the I/J band, features DBS ground mapping, lookup
and lookdown tracking. Average acquisition range in search mode is 30nmi in lookup mode and
19nmi in lookdown. MTBF is somewhat poor though, at 150h. ESCO's latest variant on the
successful AN/APQ159 series, the 159(V)7, provides an airtoground mode, a planar antenna,
and a new programmable signal data converter. Again, MTBF is poor, around 127h. It has been
selected by CESELSA of Spain for the Mirage III modernization program. While these latter
systems fall at the low end of the modernization spectrum, they still afford a huge increase in
capability over previous generation systems available to the airframes concerned. Even these
modest radars are beholden to the great advances in processing, many of which are software and
not hardware driven.
CAPTION: Photograph: Improved signal processing allows more extracted return data to be used.
Here, a GECFErranti Blue Vixen radar in airtosurface mode highlights targets in the North Sea in
a decluttered display.
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Drawing: The ThomsonCSF/Dassault Electronique RBE2 radar uses a passive electronically

scanned antenna. The Radant phase shifter that serves to steer the radar beam is comprised of
two lenses (working in the vertical and horizontal planes) separated by a polarizing filter. The
beam is instantaneously shifted from one point to another and is not swept as in mechanically
based antennas.
Photograph:
Photograph: GECFerranti has announced a retrofit line of firecontrol radars, called Blue Hawk.
The system provides reliable multimode pulse Doppler capability in a confined space.
Photograph: The FIAR Grifo F/X plus radar is amultimode, pulseDoppler system designed
specifically for smaller fighters such as the F5. Other Grifo variants are available for antisurface
missions and for retrofit to other airframes. India is reportedly acquiring the Grifo7 radar for its
MiG21 fleet.
Photograph: The SMA/Tecnasa SCP01 system, nown going through qualification flight testing, is
to be fielded by the Brazilian air force on the AMX fighter. Development of the system began in
1989; the first operational prototype was isntalled on a HS125 testbed in 1991.
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Date Posted: 01-Aug-1992

FIGHTER RADAR IN THE 1990S

Drawing: The ThomsonCSF/Dassault Electronique RBE2 radar uses a passive electronically

Copyright IHS Global Limited, 2015

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