SBIR-STTR Award

The U.S. navy must continually improve and expand the capabilities of shipboard combat systems to meet expanding and increasingly sophisticated threats. These include difficult to detect low observable targets (lot) and low-flyers which remain undetected until they reach the radar horizon. Millimeter (mm)-waves represent a growing technology which offers potential solutions to some of the difficulties posed by the low flyer/lot threat. Centra will design and analyze millimeter-wave radar systems for detection, track, and id of low flying and low observable targets. This project will also identify any existing millimeter-wave radar systems which can be modified for shipboard use to detect and track low flying targets. The results of this project will be performance requirements and design parameters for potential millimeter-wave radar systems, and recommendations concerning necessary modifications to be made to existing systems as well as performance predictions for each candidate system.

Centra Technology Inc. Proposes a Phase II SBIR effort to investigate the potential of Millimeter Wave, MMW, track radars to accurately track and support the engagement of low flying targets. A Phase I study (Topic N87-72, "use of millimeter wave technology in naval shipborne radar applications,- Contract N00024-83-C-5126) showed that MMW track radars offer significant potential to improve the ability of shipboard weapons systems to counter low flying targets. However, Phase I also uncovered several issues which bear on achievable track accuracies. In particular, the effects of multipath, propagation, clutter, and tracking techniques are critical. These dominate track errors on low flyers and play a large role in determining the complexity of the weapon used to engage the target. These effects will be investigated in detail and advanced MMW track radars and weapons systems concepts will be designed and evaluated in Phase II. The ability of differential tracking to reduce track biases and errors caused by multipath will be determined through analysis and simulation. A primary objective will be to develop an advanced tracking strategy to provide continuous track on low flyers inside 8 NMI with track accuracyy better than 0.2 MRAD at a range of 3 nmi for target heights down to 4 ft.