ELECTRONIC WARFARE SOUTH AFRICA 2017International Conference & Exhibition6-8 November 2017 | CSIR, Pretoria

ELECTRONIC WARFARE SOUTH AFRICA 2017International Conference & Exhibition6-8 November 2017 | CSIR, Pretoria

Pulsed Noise Radar: A

New Challenge For The

EW Community

Presented by: Molahlegi Molope, Armscor

Date: 07 November 2017

SCOPE

• Background

• How It Works

• Challenges For The EW Community

• Empirical Results

• Recommendations

• Conclusions

• Questions

BACKGROUND

• Noise Radar/Stealth Radar - First paper in 1957

• Main focus on short range applications which use CW signals• Through wall penetration – Police, Asymmetric Warfare in built up areas

etc

• Ground penetration – e.g. detection of landmines

• Military Applications• Air Defence Radars – Only Recently Started

• Long Range

• Pulse Noise Radar Technique• Regarded as the modern way of implementing pulsed Radar

How It Works

• Adds noise to the modulating signal

• Saves a copy of the transmitted signal

• Uses the same transmitted signal for a burst of pulses : Enables Doppler Processing

• Uses the received signal and a copy of the transmitted signal to do matched filtering

• Does all other normal Radar signal processing steps

CHALLENGES FOR THE EW COMMUNITY

• Low Probability of Intercept – LPI• It can be used without being detected (Good for Military)• Noise is spread over UWB• Long pulses lead to low peak power

• Separate receive antenna eliminates blind range

• Resistant to jamming

• Coexistence with other RADARs• Congested EM Spectrum

• Other Radars filter out noise• Immune to interference

• Lower range sidelobes

• Foliage penetration

• Can perform target classification

EMPIRICAL RESULTS

• Simulation Setup• LFM Signal plus noise created in Matlab

• FERS Simulator used to simulate the following scenario:• fc: 1.3 GHz

• Baseband signal: Noisy LFM signal from Matlab

• Three targets• Range of 5km and velocity of 494.6 km/h

• Range of 15km and velocity of 937.6 km/h

• Range of 20km and velocity of 0 km/h

EMPIRICAL RESULTS CONT 2

• Simulation Results

EMPIRICAL RESULTS CONT 3

• Simulation Results

WORK IN PROCESS

• Using a SDR with separate TX & RX Antennas – USRP 2 & WBX• Full duplex operation – Blind range eliminated• Configurable

• Center frequency (50MHz to 2.2GHz)• BW (Theoretical 40MHz, Practical 25MHz)• Waveform• PW• PRI• PRF• Number of pulses• TX & RX Gains

• Long pulse implies low peak power• Investigating timing issues• Offline processing in Matlab

RECOMMENDATIONS

• We must consider doing more research in Noise Radar to take advantage of its benefits.

• Develop ESM and ELINT systems that can intercept Noise Radars

• Develop jamming techniques that are effective against Noise Radar

CONCLUSIONS

• Noise Radar is here to stay and the sooner we get onto the band wagon the better.

• From a Radar perspective, it allows us to detect enemy platforms without being seen.

• From an EW perspective, we must prepare ourselves for this new threat that our platforms will be facing soon.

QUESTIONS