UNIT-V, ParT-B

MTI aNd PUlse

doPPler radar

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 SYLLABUS
• Tracking with Radar
• Monopulse Tracking
• Conical Scan and Sequential Lobing
• Limitations to Tracking Accuracy
• Low Angle Tracking
• Tracking in range
• Comparison of Trackers.
• Question Bank

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 Azimuth Angle
• The first piece of information is the angle of
the radar beam with respect to north;
• called the "azimuth angle".

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 Elevation Angle
• The second is the angle of the beam with
respect to the ground; called the "elevation
angle".
• The third piece of information needed is the
distance (D) from radar to target.

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 Tracking with Radar
• The Radar, which is used to track the path of one or
more targets is known as Tracking Radar.
• In general, it performs the following functions before it
starts the tracking activity:
Target detection
Range of the target
Finding elevation and azimuth angles
Finding Doppler frequency shift

• So, Tracking Radar tracks the target by tracking one of the

three parameters — range, angle, Doppler frequency shift.
• Most of the Tracking Radars use the principle of tracking in
angle.

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Angular Tracking
• The pencil beams of Radar Antenna perform tracking in
angle.
• The axis of Radar Antenna is considered as the reference
direction.
• If the direction of the target and reference direction is not
same, then there will be angular error, which is nothing but
the difference between the two directions.
• If the angular error signal is applied to a servo control
system, then it will move the axis of the Radar Antenna
towards the direction of target.
• Both the axis of Radar Antenna and the direction of target
will coincide when the angular error is zero.
• There exists a feedback mechanism in the Tracking Radar,
which works until the angular error becomes zero.
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 Angular Tracking
• Following are the two techniques, which are used in angular
tracking:
1. Sequential Lobing
2. Conical Scanning
SEQUENTIAL LOBING
• A single beam is switched between two squinted angular
positions to obtain angular measurement alternately for tracking
the target, then it is called sequential lobing.
• It is also called sequential switching and lobe switching.
• This technique is used to find the angular error in one coordinate.
• The difference in amplitude b/w the voltages obtained in the two
switched positions is a measure of the angular displacement of
the target from the switching axis.

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• As shown in the figure, Antenna beams switch between Position 1(A) and
Position 2 (B) alternately.
• Angular error θ is indicated in the above figure.
• The direction in which to move the beam to bring the target on boresight is
found by observing which beam position has the larger signal.
• When the echo signals in the two beam positions are equal, the target is
on axis and its direction is that of the switching axis.

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SEQUENTIAL LOBING

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SEQUENTIAL LOBING

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 CONICAL SCANNING
• If the Antenna beam continuously rotates for tracking a target,
then it is called conical scanning.
• Conical scan modulation is used to find the position of the target.
Following figure shows an example of conical scanning.

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CONICAL SCAN
• The axis of the radar lobe is made to sweep out a cone in
space; the apex of this cone is, of course, at the radar
transmitter antenna or reflector.
• At any given distance from the antenna, the path of the lobe
axis is a circle
• If the target is on the scan axis, the strength of the reflected
signals remains constant (or changes gradually as the range
changes).
• But if the target is slightly off the axis, the amplitude of the
reflected signals will change at the scan rate.

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CONICAL SCANNING

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CONICAL SCANNING

• Squint angle is the angle between beam axis and rotation axis
and it is shown in the above figure.
• The echo signal obtained from the target gets modulated at a
frequency equal to the frequency at which the Antenna beam
rotates.
• The angle between the direction of the target and the rotation
axis determines the amplitude of the modulated signal.
• So, the conical scan modulation has to be extracted from the echo
signal and then it is to be applied to servo control system, which
moves the Antenna beam axis towards the direction of the target.

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CONICAL SCAN PULSE TRAIN

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BLOCK DIAGRAM OF CONICAL SCAN RADAR

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 Conical Scan
• Two sinusoidal reference signals are taken 90 deg out of
phase with each other.
• These Signals are applied to pair of phase sensitive
detectors with incoming echo intensity received through
range gate of radar receiver.
• One of the detector produces the dc vol. proportional to
elevation angular error & other to azimuth angular error.
• The amplified error signals drive the azimuth & elevation
drive motor of antenna in a direction so as to correct the
respective error automatically.
• AGC is used to smooth/eliminate as much of noise like
amplitude modulation as possible.

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 Monopulse Tracking Radar
• Angular location of the target is obtained by comparison of
signals received in two (or more) simultaneous beams.
• A measurement of angle is made on the basis of single pulse and
hence the name monopulse. (in practice multiple pulses are
used).
AMPLITUDE-COMPARISON MONOPULSE

• Compares the amplitudes of the signals simultaneously received

in multiple squinted beams to determine the angle.
• Two overlapping antenna with their main beams pointed in
slightly different directions are used as shown in fig (a).

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 AMPLITUE-COMPARISON MONOPULSE(ACM)
• The two beams in figure (a) are said to be squinted, or offset.
• They are generated by using two feeds slightly displaced in
opposite directions from the focus of a parabolic reflector.
• The sum and the difference of the two squinted antenna patterns
are taken.
• The sum pattern is used on transmission.
• While both the sum and the difference patterns are used on
reception.
• The signal received with the difference pattern provides the
magnitude of the angle error.
• The direction of the angle error is found by comparing the phase
of the difference signal with the phase of the sum signal

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AMPLITUE-COMPARISON MONOPULSE

• Signals received from the sum and difference patterns are

amplified separately and combined in a phase sensitive detector
to produce the angle-error-signal, fig (d).
• The sum signal also provides target detection and range
measurement, as well as act as a reference for determing the
sign of the angle measurement.

Fig. (a)

Fig. (d)

MONOPULSE ANTENNA PATTERN 24

Block Diagram of ACM in one angle coordinate

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• The two adjacent antenna feeds are connected to the two
i/p arms of hybrid junction (4 port microwave device with 2
i/p and 2 o/p ports).
• When two signals (squinted beams) are inserted at the two
i/p ports, the sum and difference of the two are found at
the two o/p ports.
• On reception, the o/p of the sum and difference ports are
each heterodyned to an intermediate frequency and
amplified in the superheterodyne receiver.
• It is important that the sum and difference channels have
the same phase and amplitude characteristics. For this
reason, a single local oscillator (LO) is shared by the two
channels.
• The transmitter is connected to the sum port of the hybrid
junction.

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• A duplexer (TR) is included in the sum channel for the
protection of the sum-channel receiver.
• The o/ps of the sum and difference channels are the inputs to
the phase-sensitive detector, that compares two signals of the
same frequency.
• The o/p of the phase sensitive detector is the angle-error
signal.
• The error signal is used to drive the boresight of tracking
antenna using a closed loop servo system to keep the boresight
positioned in the direction of the moving target.
• Magnitude of the angle error signal is proportional to ІθT-θoІ.
θT=target angle, θo = boresight angle.
• The sign of o/p of the phase sensitive detector indicates the
direction of the angle error relative to boresight.

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• If the sum signal in the IF portion of the receiver is
= AscosωIFt
• then difference signal will be either
= +AdcosωIFt or –Ad cosωIFt = Ad cosIF(ωIFt+π),
depending on which side of boresight is the target.
• here(As > 0, Ad > 0)

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COMPARISON OF MONOPULSE ANTEENA BEAM

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 Comparison of Trackers

Sno. Property Monopulse Conical

Scan Scan
1 S/N Ratio High (2 to 4 dB) Less than
Monopulse
2 Accuracy High Less

3 Complexity High Low

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 Comparison of Trackers
Sno. Property Monopulse Conical Scan
Scan

5 Applications Useful where Useful where

more more Precision
accuracy is is required
required
6 Advantages Better SNR & Better Precision
Accuracy Less Complex

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 Comparison of Trackers
Sno. Property Monopulse Conical Scan
Scan

7 Minimum No. 1 >1

of Pulses

8 Susceptibility Less More affected

to Electronic Affected by fluctuations.
Counter
measure
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 Limitations to Tracking Accuracy

• Receiver Noise- which also affects all radar, and

mainly determines tracking accuracy at large
range.

• Amplitude Fluctuations- of the rarget echo that

bother conical-scan and sequential lobing, but
not monopulse.

• Glints - or angle noise which affects all tracking

radars, especially at short range.

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 1. Receiver Noise
• Major Factor limiting the accuracy of a radar at long range
where S/N ratios are small. Accuracy of tracking radar the
RMS error in angle measurement is given by

• RMS value of the error are inversely proportional to the square root of the signal to
noise ratio, S/N.
• The conical-scan radar does not track a target with its max antenna gain the S/N is
less than monopulse radar.

Where k=1 for a Monopulse Radar fp=Pulse repetition Frequency

ƟB = Half power beam width βn= Servo bandwidth
Ks= Slope of the angle error signal Bτ=1 generally
B=Band Width fp/2Bn=No. of pulses integrated
τ= Pulse Width
S/N= SNR per pulse

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 2. Amplitude Fluctuation
• The amplitude of the radar echo from a complex target with
multiple scattering centers will fluctuate as the “aspect” of the
target changes wrt the radar. in target echo during time interval
of sequential measurement can degrade the accuracy of the
measurement.
• Also known as Target Fading.
• Conical-scan and sequential scan lobing radars interpret any
change in amplitude of the target echo signal as being due to
the target not being on boresight. They then direct the antenna
to move in the direction to make the “error signal” zero.
• Thus a change in amplitude due to fluctuations in the target
echo during the time interval of the sequential measurement
can degrade the accuracy of the measurement.

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 Amplitude Fluctuation

• High freq. amplitude fluctuations can be caused by reflections

from propellers and jet engines.
• Amplitude fluctuations in the target echo signal, which are also
known as target fading, donot affect the angle-error voltage
with each pulse.

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 3. Glint
• Also called angle noise, target noise, angle fluctuations and
angle scintillation.
• It occurs with complex targets that have more than one
scattering center within the resolution cell of the radar.
• We generally assume that the arriving wavefront is planar and
uniform when target is simple (ex-sphere) but complex targets
(aircrafts) consists of multiple scatterers, each at a different
angle, their individual echo signals arrive a the antennas with
slightly different wave tilts.
• Glint from a complex target can be thought of as a distortion of
the echo wavefront.

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3. GLINT ( ANGLE NOISE)

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 LOW ANGLE TRACKING
• A radar that tracks at low elevation angles illuminates the target vai
two paths.
• One is the direct path from radar to target and the other path includes
a reflection from the earth’s surface.
• It is as though the radar is illuminating two target, one above the
surface and the other its image below the surface.
• Similarly echo from the target may be received by radar in two paths,
direct from target and the other from target image below the surface.
• So there are 4 propagation paths (multipath case).
• Surface reflected signal is sometimes called multipath signal.
• So error in the measured elevation agle of the target occurs because of
the effect of glint.
• The error can be large enough to seriously degrade the quality of the
tracking.
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 Models for Reducing Multipath Effects at Low Angles
• The effects of multipath depend on what part of the antenna pattern
strikes the surface.
• Three regions can be identified, according to elevation angle:
1. Sidelobe region: elevation angles are such that the near-in-sidelobes,
rather than the main beam, illuminates the surface. Accuracy is
degraded when the elevation angle is less than six beam widths
above the horizon.
2. Main-beam region: the effects of multipath can begin to be severe
when the elevation angle is less than about 0.8 beamwidth.
3. Horizon region: at grazing angles approaching zero degrees when
there is specular reflection from the surface, the echo signal from
the target and its image are approximately equal and out of phase so
that combined direct and surface-reflected signal is very low. This
reduction in signal-to-noise ratio further aggravates the accuracy
problem.

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 Models for Reducing Multipath Effects at Low Angles
1. Use Narrow Beamwidth
2. Illogical Target Trajectory
3. Off-axis or Off-Boresight, Monopulse Tracking
4. Double-Null Elevation-Difference Pattern
5. High Range-Resolution
6. Frequency Agility
7. Doppler Resolution
8. Clutter Fence
9. Polarization
10. Complex Angle (CA)
11. Superresolution
12. Maximum likelihood Estimation
13. Electro-Optical and Infrared

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LOW ANGLE TRACKING

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Tracking in Range
• In early day manual tracking was used in radar
system but there are so many limitations in Manual
tracking.
• So avoid the limitations of Manual tracking some
methods are used.
• One of them is Split– Gate- Tracker.

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SPLIT GATE RANGE TARCKING

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RADOME
• RADOME word is formed by two words RADAR DOME.
• Radome= Radar + Dome.
• It means dome or shelter for radar.
• Radome are the protective/sheltering structure for
the radar antenna, which protect it from bad weather
conditions.
• It should be mechanically strong and should not
interfere the normal operation of the radar.
• Radome is electromagnetically transparent protective
shield.
• Radomes are designed and classified as per the
application and the environmental condition of the
working area of radar.
• Radome may be used for :-
 Ground based Radar
 Shipboard Radar
 Airborne Radar
• Material used for Radome :-
Metal like steel, Aluminum.
Teflon Fiberglass
Plastic
Nylon fabric
Dacron etc.
• Generally shape of Radome is Sphere.
• The sphere is good mechanical structure and offers
aerodynamic advantages in high winds.
• Due to spherical shape of radome, snow or other frozen
particles are not deposited on it.
• A Radome with good electromagnetic properties
should be of -
low loss,
 have an adequate bandwidth,
 not raise the side lobe level significantly,
 provide a low VSWR,
a low antenna noise temperature and
 not cause the boresight (pointing direction) to
shift.
Radome Wall construction

• Thin wall.
• Half wavelegth.
• A-sandwich
• B-sandwich
• C-sandwich
• Multilayer.
• There are two types of radomes that have been
used for ground- based and shipboard radars:
1) The rigid self-supporting radome.
2) The air supported radome.
Rotodome
• Rotodome means Rotating dome.
• In some cases the radome is made to rotate in
synchronism with the antenna. Then it is called
Rotodome
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 DOUBLE CANCELLATION

• It will have better clutter rejection null.

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DOUBLE CANCELLATION

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RESPONSE

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 QUESTION BANK
1. What is the difference between pulse radar & pulse Doppler radar?
2. Explain basic principle of MTI radar.
3. Draw & explain block diagram of MTI radar.
4. What do you understand by blind speed? How to eliminate it?
5. Explain non coherent MTI radar.
6. Explain principle of tracking radar.
7. Explain acquisition in detail.
8. Compare the radar trackers.
9. Explain Sequential Lobing.
10. What is the limitation of MTI radar?
11. Explain Conical Scan radar & its operations?
12. Explain Sequential lobing, tracking radar with its operation.
13. What is Blind Speed & how you can avoid it?
14. Explain Monopulse Tracking.
15. What is delay line Canceller? Explain its use & filter characteristics.
16. What is Doppler Effect? Derive expression for relative velocity of a moving target.

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17. Explain low angle tracking. Define multipath error.
18. Explain lobe switching & conical scan.
19. Discuss the block diagram of range gated Doppler filter.
20. Explain (i) Blind speeds (ii) Staggered PRF.
21. Write short notes on Radome and Rotodome.
22. A MTI radar operates at 5 G Hz with PRF of 800 PPs. Calculate lowest three
blind speeds of this radar.
23. A MTI radar operates at 4.8 G Hz with pulse repetition frequency of 600 Hz.
Calculate lowest blind speed of the radar.
24. What is pulsed radar? What are effects of transmitting a long pulse? Explain all
stages of a pulsed Radar. If tdf 1mm, 10mm, 20cm. f=9.549GHz.Calculate it
occurs in which regions i) Rayleigh, ii) Mie iii )Optical Region.
25. The MTI radar is used by traffic control police to measure speeds of car. If
Doppler freq. shift measured from moving car is 1.6KHz.Calculate speed of car.

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