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To: Cicero
I build the occasional TACAN antenna and know the old AN/URM-138 IFF system to component level. They use 3 or 4 other things in the military now. Not an issue here.

There is a problem with radar in some circumstances.

Not saying this is a false report at all. I'm working on some H-Plane csc^2 antennas that are are about 12 feet long. In a vertical and accompanying horizontal one by it's side, it is very accurate. They are transmit-recieve in X-band. In circular polarity they are as accurate as linear without crappy weather. It takes a 3000 foot range to certify them. They get boresighted using a laser before hoisting them on the positioner on the other side of a canyon from the xmit source. Nice patterns.

Good to meet someone with else with experience in this field.

One more thing - they are built of composite material with a built-in heating system to keep snow and water away.

129 posted on 12/09/2005 9:37:24 PM PST by BobS
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To: BobS

I should say that electronics is not my field, which is probably why the army promptly sent me to electronics school and then to the Hawk Missile training program in Huntsville, Alabama.

The army has a habit of putting people in fields other than the ones they might be qualified in. When I showed up for basic training in Fort Dix, it turned out that the Company Clerk couldn't read. Presumably they made him a clerk for that very reason. When it was KP time, he would hold up his list on a clipboard next to our chests, and compare the look of the names on the printed sheet with the names on our nametapes. Worked fine, but a little slow.

That was quite a while ago. Semiconductors and printed circuit boards had been invented, but Hawk missiles and radars still used miniature vaccuum tubes and copper wires, I think because they thought they would stand up better to stress and possible EMP bursts. I remember they were worried about the possibility of hairline cracks in the circuit boards. So we used wires, clips, and solder.


172 posted on 12/10/2005 9:28:45 AM PST by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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