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2020-04-01

LTAMDS Ready to Help Defeat Hypersonic Threats

The first LTAMDS radar was built less than 120 days from when the U.S. Army chose Raytheon in a US$384 million contract to produce the new Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor.

The Army requires a next-generation radar to help defeat complex and technologically advanced threats, such as hypersonic weapons. This is where the new LTAMDS radar comes in and will ultimately replace the current U.S. Army’s Patriot radars. It will operate on the Army’s Integrated Air and Missile Defense network. The U.S. Army is planning to field LTAMDS by 2022.

Raytheon completed indoor testing of the first partially populated LTAMDS radar antenna less than five months from the contract award.

“Concluding these initial tests brings Raytheon one step closer to putting LTAMDS into the hands of service members,” said Tom Laliberty, vice president of Integrated Air and Missile Defense at Raytheon’s Integrated Defense Systems business. “Raytheon and our supplier partners continue to make the right investments in people, technology and manufacturing capability to ensure we meet the U.S. Army’s Urgent Materiel Release.”

The testing consisted of calibrating LTAMDS primary antenna array in an indoor, climate controlled test range, and evaluating its performance against simulated targets. With testing complete, the array is being mounted on a precision-machined enclosure for integration and further evaluation. It will then commence testing at an outdoor range against real-world targets.

Engaging Multiple Threats

LTAMDS consists of a primary antenna array on the front of the radar, and two secondary arrays on the rear. The radar antennas work together to enable operators to simultaneously detect and engage multiple threats from any direction, ensuring there are no blind spots on the battlefield. LTAMDS’ primary array is roughly the same size as the Patriot radar array, but provides more than twice of Patriot’s performance.

While it is designed for the U.S. Army’s Integrated Air and Missile Defense system, LTAMDS will also be able to preserve previous Patriot investments. When the Army connects radars and interceptor missiles onto a giant network, Raytheon’s LTAMDS reportedly acts like a smartphone. It’s ready to connect to the network. There is no need to retrofit or upgrade.

“The Army asked for an advanced radar and we’re showing them that the radar is on track and on time,” said Bill Patterson, Raytheon’s LTAMDS programme director. “You can feel our team’s sense of pride.”

“We’re able to meet the Army’s urgent materiel release date by leaning on our team of engineers, many former warfighters, our advanced manufacturing and our technology investments, and our suppliers,” said Raytheon’s Nate Jones, an air and missile defense expert who served as one of the original Scud-Busters in the early 1990s.

“The same people who designed it are now leading our skilled workforce to meet the urgent schedule,” said Bob Kelley, director of Integrated Air and Missile Defense programmes for business development and strategy. “The work on LTAMDS is complex, technical and rigorous. And it’s crazy fast, as in crazy good fast.”

The U.S Army selected Raytheon to provide its next-generation, 360-degree-capable radar in October 2019. The company will receive more than US$384 million to deliver six production representative units of the LTAMDS radar under an Other Transactional Authority U.S. Army agreement.

The system expands battlespace coverage to protect soldiers from advanced air and missile threats. Strong teams of suppliers are playing a strategic role in developing LTAMDS, including: Crane Aerospace & Electronics, Cummings Aerospace, IERUS Technologies, Kord Technologies, Mercury Systems and nLogic.

LTAMDS was showcased for the first time at the 2019 Association of the United States Army conference (AUSA), where the company rolled out a mock-up.

Stronger Signal

Behind the radar is Raytheon’s years-long investment in developing semiconductor technology based on gallium nitride, a substance better known as GaN.

GaN circuits are used to build radars that emit stronger signals and boast greater sensitivity. The GaN-based transmitters will not need to be recertified over the life of the missile.

The tech has already been used to enhance the Patriot Guidance Enhanced Missile – Tactical ballistic missile, or GEM-T. GEM-T is used against aircraft and tactical ballistic and cruise missiles. The Army held a Sense-Off competition to speed the development of the Patriot replacement radar, and complete a modernisation programme as early as 2022.

The winning Raytheon LTAMDS design is a simultaneous 360-degree, Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar powered by the company’s GaN circuits, which strengthen the radar signal. The new LTAMDS radar, with U.S. government approval, could become available for international sales.

Raytheon’s LTAMDS solution expands battlespace coverage to protect soldiers from advanced air and missile threats. Its design helps the U.S. Army prevail when they confront the “tyranny of distance” in places like the Pacific theater, where the vast expanse of ocean complicates communications and situational understanding.

Raytheon’s solution is designed to be fully operable with the U.S. Army’s existing architecture. It draws from a portfolio of combat-proven capabilities and radar modular assemblies that are scalable and configurable.

Reference Text/Photo:

www.raytheon.com

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