Radar System Evolution

Without a doubt, radar has been a drastic RF/microwave technological evolution since it was first used in WWII. During this period, RADAR or Radio Detecting and Ranging has been proven to be a critical military tool. Its main purpose, to locate targets and threats and to provide advanced warnings of enemy’s direction and position.

Radar for Civilian Use

The basic operation of such system consists of transmitting high-frequency signal, normally a pulsed signal towards the current location of expected target and to receive signals that are reflected by the target in question. By doing signal processing on radar returns, the information could then be extracted such as the target’s speed and position.

Military uses were intended only for radar technology. But time flies and now, radar is finding more useful applications in various industrial, weather, medical, commercial and most especially on automotive systems.

There are several businesses that even install one in their fleet of vehicles such as sellers of propylene glass and bomba pneumática to quickly find its location. The continuous growth of this application have kept radar designers to deliver new features and better performance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rIHdcwlvlk

Radar in Land

Military systems are still representing majority of the sources for radar applications; with military radar systems being used on sea, land and in air. Radar systems have been used various military applications for performing missile control, ground surveillance, air traffic control, fire control, moving target indicators, vehicle search and moving target indication.

Radar at Sea

Since land-based radar systems were designed and developed to support US troops during WWI, US Naval Research Labs have created radar systems too specifically for maritime applications which include onboard submarines. For this particular application, the submarine will draw close to water surface label and enable the antenna of the radar to rise above the water’s surface and then, transmit data signal to search for enemy aircraft.

As for modern ground-based radars, it becomes more compact and can be carried by military personnel like the AN/PPS-5A/B ground surveillance radar system. Early iterations of radar systems regardless for aviation, maritime or ground kept receiving upgrades as there are new technological developments being introduced.