Radar Testing: Advanced Equipment for Modern Radar Analysis Tektronix

In addition, modular test instrumentation has led to more compact test systems, so more than one box instrument functionality can fit into a smaller, PXI-based modular instrument or system. You can include multipurpose instrumentation in your modular systems if you can sacrifice test performance capabilities for additional functionality. With modularity also comes the trade-off of highly dense test systems for high-performance test systems. They are also creating “super boxes,” or collections of boxed instruments, for larger test coverage from single systems.

Measurement Equipment Selection Chart

Radar target simulators have a signal generation module that generates radar signals that simulate the interaction between the radar system and the target. ARES simplifies radar testing with a user-friendly JETS software interface, empowering engineers and scientists to effortlessly configure and reprogram targets and flight environments in minutes. That represents where the trigger found the signal, and the spectrum plot displays the frequencies present at that time. Some signals may exhibit transient behavior in both the time and frequency domains simultaneously. Multipurpose modular measurement instruments also offer improved measurement IP, better components (especially analog-to-digital converters and digital-to-analog converters), advances in signal processing, and better software accessibility and architectures. This means you can use the same instrument to perform more types of test by switching between devices like a real-time processor, spectrum monitor, channel simulator, and DUT controller. Test and measurement vendors are investing more in software platforms to run their instruments and earning more revenue as customers quickly choose the flexibility, test speed, and reliability of software over previously manual test systems. The industry trends rapidly changing new radar and EW technology are also making test instrumentation highly adaptable, software driven, and modular to address the need for more modeling and simulation testing. All these systems are producing more data at faster rates with a series of sensors working together to use software to control the systems. The system level encompasses aggregated test structures that need parallel testing and high-speed data analysis. This enables real-time testing and validation of radar systems. Some of the frequency bands commonly used by radar target simulators are X-Band (8-12 GHz) for military and civilian applications, S-Band (2-4 GHz) for long-range surveillance, weather monitoring & air traffic control and the Ku-Band (12-18 GHz) for missile defense & aerospace testing. Radar target simulators, like radar systems themselves, can operate across a broad range of frequencies depending on their intended applications and requirements. These simulators replicate the behavior of radar targets under different conditions, allowing engineers and researchers to assess the performance and reliability of radar systems without relying solely on real-world scenarios. Radar target simulators are devices used for testing, calibrating, and validating radar systems. The intuitive JETS software provides real-time data display, enabling analysts to observe radar performance and make instant adjustments during live emulation.JETS allows users to define logging rates and select specific data parameters for export. For this analysis, the analyzer stores a digital acquisition, finds the pulses within it and measures a full set of parameters for each pulse. The continuous non-interrupted visibility guarantees 100% probability of intercept of signals or transients as short as 3.7 μs because there is no dead time. Figure 9 is a radar pulse with an interfering carrier sweeping through the pulsed spectrum. The RSA Series enables DPX™ Live RF spectrum display on up to 800 MHz acquisition bandwidth. An alternate method is to visualize this measurement by emulating the anomalies of a cathode ray tube (CRT) common as the display on a spectrum analyzer before the turn of the century. It can display a range of power vs frequency by ‘sweeping’ the LO and the x-axis of display.

ARES-SAR Radar Environment Simulator for SAR mode

COTS radar target generator systems have a lower nonrecurring engineering cost investment because of their higher-level software starting point and ability to be tailored to specific application needs. The increased complexity of radar systems makes flexible radar modeling and simulation during development critical to decreasing the cost of expensive full-system testing, finding and resolving design problems earlier in the process, and reducing schedule risk. The ARES line of radar environment simulators realistically replicate adversarial threats, targets,... Through the JETS software interface, developers can customize simulation options including Doppler, range delay, pulse modulations for moving targets, atmospheric loss, ground and sea clutter, turbulence, weather and target reflections, RCS, glint, scintillation, multipath, multiscatter, and ECM techniques. By accurately testing air-to-ground and air-to-air modes through emulation, ARES allows developers to preemptively address issues before actual flight tests, resulting in millions of dollars of cost savings, reduced risk of failure, and accelerated deployment of radar systems. The ARES line of radar environment simulators builds on more than 25 years of test and train technology from the Mercury Processing Platform to emerge as the modern solution.ARES products realistically replicate adversarial threats, targets, environments, and weather scenarios—all from a controlled environment.

• It can integrate with SPx Radar Simulator to define and manage scenarios involving moving targets, creating a unified simulation of both radar and video displays.
• Modeling and simulation also reduce expensive full-system testing and help you identify and solve problems earlier in the testing process to reduce schedule risk.
• One last step is for the DPX spectrum display processor to check the user entry for “persistence.” If the persistence is set to minimum, then the pixel memory will be zeroed out before the next set of spectra is entered.
• Any or all of the measurements with numeric results can be included in the pulse table display as seen in Figure 9.
• When installed on an oscilloscope, the internal software limits on setting frequency coverage, bandwidth, and record length automatically adjust to use the frequency and memory limits of the oscilloscope on which it is installed.

The DPX spectrum display with 292,000 individual spectra per second has (for this 100 µs pulse width and 120 µs pulse period) at least six spectrum measurements per pulse with no gaps. The SignalVu vector signal analysis software uses the digitized voltage waveform stored in the oscilloscope and uses the same software as the RSA Series to make all of the RF measurements. All the measurements made in the RSA5000 and RSA7100 rely on getting signals which have passed through an IF frequency converter system. Just like the RSA, the pulse measurements are performed on data in the acquisition memory on a continuous capture/ analyze cycle, or on waveforms stored on the instrument hard disk drive. It can simultaneously record radar video, radar tracks, AIS, ADS-B, IFF, and navigation data within a synchronised file structure. RDR Data Recorder provides a robust, multi-channel solution for capturing and replaying a wide array of real-world sensor data. Inadequate testing risks poor performance, regulatory non-compliance, and catastrophic real-world failures. It is also nearly impossible to consistently replicate specific real-world conditions, including variable weather, environmental interference, or unpredictable target behaviour. Field trials are expensive, time-consuming, and carry substantial safety risks, particularly for defence or autonomous systems. Given the complex environments in which these systems operate and their unique advantages in adverse conditions, ensuring their reliability and performance through testing is essential. Trigger jitter – a crucial factor in achieving repeatable measurements – is less than 1 trillionth of a second (1 ps) rms. If the B-event fails to occur, the oscilloscope, rather than waiting endlessly, resets the trigger after a specified time or number of cycles. Then an edge-driven “B Delayed” trigger can be specified to occur after a delay expressed in time for events. The main or “A” trigger responds to a set of qualifications that may range from a simple edge transition to a complex logic combination on multiple inputs. The 5 and 6 Series MSO, DPO7000 and DPO/MSO/DSA70000 Series oscilloscopes allow the user to specify two discrete trigger events as a condition for acquisition.

Key Radar Testing Procedures

These measurement results can be further processed to display trends and analyze these trends. The Advanced Signal Analysis suite, Option 20, includes the pulse measurement capability. Of course, the bandwidth and acquisition speeds are much fast than a turn of the century spectrum analyzer. In addition, several single-frequency pulsed carriers and two continuous wave (CW) interferers can be observed. The x axis represents frequency, the y axis represents time and amplitude is represented by color. For this display,blue represents very low-occurrence transients, while red represents parts of the waveform that are constantly recurring. Figure 4 shows just one single pulse that has a narrower pulse width than even hundreds of thousands of correct pulses. The oscilloscope is the fundamental tool for examining varying voltage versus time. Very fast transition times or very short duration (sub-nanosecond or shorter) can be accurately seen on a 70 GHz bandwidth oscilloscope such as the DPO70000SX family. Another important factor is to ensure the instrument has enough bandwidth to capture the rise/fall times correctly. The Doppler effect can also be observed to measure velocity, however it is usually calculated over multiple pulses.

Key Considerations for Radar Test

Once the main display monitor is ready to accept the next update, the buffer pixels are converted to the different colors that represent the density of hits – blue for very few hits up to red representing many hits. Samples of whatever signal is in the IF are passed to the hardware signal processor without interruption. The DPO/DSA/MSO Series oscilloscopes also utilize DPX technology for voltage vs.time traces. The wideband oscilloscope with an FFT spectrum plot can provide a single view of both in-channel and out-ofchannel emissions. When examining an installed radar system, one important task is to check for emissions that do not help the radar and very well may cause interference. A very subtle disturbance of this radar transmitter has proven easy to analyze. The spectrum plot distinctly shows a peak disturbance at 4 kHz, which is 53 dB below the average value of the amplitude. The effective way to fully analyze the variation is to use the FFT of the trend data from this plot. The horizontal scale is simply the number of the pulse whose amplitude is plotted vertically. At this setting there is very clearly a periodic variation of the pulse amplitude. The Average ON power of the pulse numbers have very small variations showing. With multiple pulses included in one waveform, it is not easy to see differences between the individual pulses.

• Oscilloscopes offer excellent time domain analysis and trigger capability, but lack in dynamic range, especially at high frequencies.
• These simulators replicate the behavior of radar targets under different conditions, allowing engineers and researchers to assess the performance and reliability of radar systems without relying solely on real-world scenarios.
• At this setting there is very clearly a periodic variation of the pulse amplitude.
• For triggering on specific frequencies at specific amplitudes, Tektronix invented the Frequency Mask Trigger (FMT).
• The DPX spectrum display in the upper left dramatically shows the infrequent wideband splatter due to the phase transitions.
• The frequency span capability is limited only by the bandwidth capability of the oscilloscope on which the software is installed.
• If the persistence is high, then the older data will slowly be divided out so that the effect from an old spectrum event will slowly fade away.

For the purposes of pulse measurements there is a need for a Gaussian response filter to minimize this overshoot on a pulse. He measurements will have the same dynamic range as the oscilloscope, while maintaining its full bandwidth. The vector signal analysis software can use any of the input channels of the oscilloscope. Some of the measurements are specifically Ringospin for chirped pulses, including Frequency Deviation, Frequency Error, Phase Deviation and Phase Error.

ARES

With the wide array of sensors used, testing at the component level requires more complex I/O analysis. Having high directivity and tighter beams allows the radar to find targets that are further away and smaller. For system-level test, the heavy software suite and integration require further testing with a series of multifunction simulations to ensure the software is ready and able to manage potential error or unexpected inputs.