We visited the VLA in 2010 on our way back across the country.
Neat place!
Yes, it is. I got the tour from one of the engineers. Amazing lab area.
Was impressed with the waveguide. It was about the size of a 2” iron pipe, made out of ferrite material. 1/4 wavelength wall thickness at the IF frequency. Inside was a spun copper wire layer, it appeared to be about the size of 18 ga. wire. Not sure I remember the IF frequency, but think it was somewhere between 2 & 3 GHZ.
The signal was converted down at the dish to the IF frequency and phase compared at the central point where it acted as if the antenna was effectively 1 mile in diameter and stearable.
The dishes were on rail cars and were movable. I don’t remember the size of the dishes, but they were pretty large.
Inside the building was a heavy steel door going into the vault which had finger stock sealing the door. The vault is where the rest of the receiving equipment was located.
There were a lot of computer monitors scattered through the open area in the building.
Quite a nice facility.