Radar System Engineering

CHAPTER 7
THE EMPLOYMENT OF RADAR DATA
BY B. V. BOWDEN, L. J. HAWORTH, L. N. RIDENOUR,
AND C. L. ZIMMERMAN*
7“1. The Signal and Its Use.—The presentation of echo signals on an
indicator by no means completes the problem of designing an operationally
useful radar system. It is necessary that action of some sort be
taken on the basis of the information afforded by the radar. To enable
this action to be taken promptly, intelligently, and correctly, an organization
must be created. This organization begins with the radar indication
and extends to the execution of commands that arise from the situation
as displayed by the radar. The nature of these commands and the
nature of the organization that assimilates the radar data and gives the
commands differ widely from one functional use of radar to another.
The organization that employs radar data may be almost entirely
mechanized and automatic, as is, for example, the Army system for radar
antiaircraft fire control. In this system, the azimuth, elevation, and
range of a target are transmitted directly and continuously from the
radar to an electrical computer. The computer solves the fire-control
problem, determines the future position of the target, and transmits
azimuth, elevation, and range (fuze time) information to the guns of the
battery. The guns are positioned automatically by means of servomechanisms,
and a fuze-setting mechanism is automatically adjusted to
cut fuzes to the time-setting indicated by the computer. z The duties of
the gun crew are the purely mechanical ones of supplying ammunition
and loading.
The Army system of antiaircraft fire control just sketched was outstandingly
successful in the past war. This success can be viewed as
demonstrating the principle that, when a complicated task must be
carried out quickly and accurately under trying conditions, extreme
mechanization is well worth while, if it removes from human operators
the necessity for employing judgment and for performing complicated
operations. Such mechanization substitutes for the skill of operators the
design, manufacturing, and maintenance skills that are necessary to
1Sections 7.1, 7.2, 7.4, 7.7, and 7.8 by L. N. Ridenour,Sec. 7.3by L. J. Haworth,
Sec. 7.5 by B. V. Bowden, and Sec. 7.6 by C. L. Zimmerman.
2The use of proximityfuzes eliminatesthis step.
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