RAYTHEON BRINGS EO TECHNOLOGY To Defend Our Nation

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Profile Lila Engle joined Missile Systems in 1999 after earning her bachelor’s degree in mathematics, physics and astronomy at Northern Arizona University. “I was encouraged to be active in my development, to pursue technical challenges and accountability to business goals, and to put forward the causes and achievements of every colleague,” she recalls. Engle served her first two years at Missile Systems in an informal rotation program where she often supported a dozen or more programs at a time. “I was hands-on everything. I worked with every colleague I could. At any time, I was defining system requirements, writing proposals, implementing solutions, developing secured labs, completing purchase requests or tracking lost shipments. Though some of that didn’t seem to fit my training, I was exposed to big-picture and operational details across Raytheon.” This rapid immersion in all parts of the business exposed her to the principles of technical performance and program leadership. In 2001, Engle proposed an MS Multi-Spectral/ Multi-Sensor Scene Simulation (MS3) Resource Group, chartered to support bid and proposal, technology demonstration and contract performance across tactical and strategic defense technologies. She continues to lead the MS3 project in developing core expertise and resources for synthetic scenes characteristic of long/medium/ short-wave infrared (IR), uncooled IR, laser detection and ranging, semi-active laser/radar, real beam, multi/ hyper-spectral, multimode and other sensor technologies, and for coordinated subsystem- and system-level simulation activities throughout simulation life cycles. The MS3 project has been honored multiple times as the “most innovative” and “most interesting” technology at Raytheon Electro-optical Systems Technology symposia. As a champion of One Company strategy, Engle credits the team’s progress to the direct involvement of numerous stakeholders and subject matter experts across Raytheon businesses and customer and vendor organizations. “While the technical challenges of synthetic scenes are significant, the most important part of this work deals with breaking down barriers, increasing communications across user groups, and building consensus for common solutions to diverse problems.” 14 2005 ISSUE 1 EO TEST SYSTEMS Enabling the Enablers The early days of electro-optical (EO) test systems generated solutions to aid in the assembly and acceptance testing of EO systems. Forward-looking infrared test systems and rugged, depot-level test systems — developed for air-to-air and strike weapons — have yielded legacy standard platforms still in use today. Precision fixturing, optical interferometry and optical performance testing (such as Modulation Transfer SM-3 target simulator, Raytheon Missile Systems Function and Noise Equivalent Irradiance) continue to be key in ensuring the high performance of today’s EO systems from the visible through the infrared. Raytheon Technical Services Company LLC in Long Beach, Calif., and Raytheon Missile Systems (MS), in Tucson, Ariz., currently offer several standard platform test systems, as well as custom solutions for EO systems. Raytheon continues to develop and improve EO test systems for engineering development and military depot-level testing, including test systems for the TOW, F/A-18 and F-117 weapon systems. Scene simulation continues to be an important enabler for EO weapon systems. Hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) simulations of tanks and other targets have evolved into space simulations of ballistic missile targets. These HIL simulators enable the development and test of software aimpoint algorithms that are critical to terminal guidance, navigation and control. These simulators also play an important role in missile defense programs by validating hardware models and testing system performance. Automatic TOW 2 Field Test Set (AT2FTS), Raytheon Technical Services Company LLC Precise radiometric discrimination has emerged as a significant capability of missile defense programs, and the role that test systems plays in the radiometric characterization of these EO systems is as a valuable enabler in the system’s ability to distinguish the reentry vehicle from countermeasures. Space and Airborne Systems and MS currently use cutting-edge space and vacuum chambers to radiometrically characterize such systems as the Exo-atmospheric Kill Vehicle, Space Tracking and Surveillance System, Near Field Infrared Experiment and Standard Missile 3. Maintaining traceability to the National Institute of Standards and Technology is critical in this enabling technology. So what’s next for EO test systems? Emerging technologies include the development of high-fidelity ballistic missile endgame simulations, which are important to refining lethal aimpoint algorithms, as well as boosting target simulation, which is critical to newly emerging boost phase kill vehicles. In addition, electro-optical built-intest and reduce the cost of test initiatives are in place to enable overall cost reduction early in the development cycle of weapons systems. And finally, the EO test community of practice is in its early stages of development to answer the question, “What do technology information groups do the rest of the year?” • Jeff Wolske jswolske@raytheon.com
Cryogenics: Keeping It Cool Cryogenics is defined as the production and use of very low temperatures (below -200° F/144 K). Until the advent of uncooled technology, all of our infrared products required cryogenic cooling. Even now, the most sensitive of these products still require cryogenic cooling. Cryogenics cuts across many of Raytheon’s products, from small tactical missiles (Javelin), air- and ship-defense missiles (Stinger, AIM-9X, Standard Missile, Rolling Airframe Missile), missile defense systems (EKV, SM-3, STSS) and ground-based systems (ITAS, IBAS, LRAS). In each of these products, cryogenic coolers are used to cool an infrared focal plane and associated optical elements. Without cryogenic cooling, each of these systems would fail to function. For small, short-time-of-flight missiles, the cryogenic system typically requires storage for a long period (many years), quick cooldown times (a few seconds) and operation for a short time (a couple of minutes). For these applications, the Joule-Thomson (J-T) cooler (see Figure 1) is an ideal solution. In a J-T cooler, a quantity of compressed gas is expanded to provide cooling for a short period. The coolers are simple, consisting of a supply line, a finned-tube heat exchanger, and a very-small-diameter expansion tube. The RAM cooler shown below (in Xray) consists of two J-T stages cascaded together to provide very fast cooldown in Figure 1. Joule-Thomson (J-T) cooler Figure 2. Two-stage hybrid cooler a critical ship-defense application. The X-ray emphasizes the relative simplicity of the RAM cooler. Because of the small dimensions of the cooler parts, however, J-T coolers require careful assembly and exquisite cleanliness. For space-based applications (such as STSS), the cooler must operate properly for many years without failure or significant degradation. There are additional requirements for low power draw and low vibration. In this application, a resonant piston compressor with flexure bearings is coupled with a Stirling or Pulse Tube cooler to provide years of consistent and stable performance. The cooler shown in Figure 2 is a two-stage hybrid with an upper (Stirling) stage and a lower (Pulse Tube) stage. The lower stage has no moving parts, ensuring a long lifetime. Figure 3. AIM-9X missile cooler The requirements for the AIM-9X missile cooler lie somewhere between tactical missile requirements and the missile defense or spacebased needs. The cooler (see Figure 3) must survive years of storage, yet provide many hours of reliable cooling under a wide range of environmental conditions once the missile is loaded on an airplane (since the system may be powered but not always launched). The cooler must be efficient, small, lightweight, reliable and inexpensive. The AIM-9X cooler meets these needs, combining a resonant piston compressor and a small Stirling cooler. The entire package fits gracefully within the envelope of the missile and provides thousands of hours of quiet, efficient cooling. • Myron Calkins myroncalkinsjr@raytheon.com Profile David Rockwell has always been fascinated with light and optics. Since his Massachusetts Institute of Technology thesis on the construction and use of a narrow-band laser as a probe of the properties of superfluid helium, Rockwell received his doctorate degree and established a career in laser research. At the beginning of his career with the company some 25 years ago, Rockwell was responsible for building new laser system capabilities based on Nd:YAG technology. His team was able to convert the basic one µm wavelength to a range of wavelengths in the visible and near-infrared spectral range. Based on this wavelength-conversion success, it became critical to find ways to maintain beam quality as laser power was scaled. “Our work led to a sole-source contract with the Army in the 1980s to build a phase-conjugate laser, install it in a ground vehicle, and successfully execute extended field trials,” Rockwell explains. “Direct derivatives of our work performed 10 years ago were sustained and improved by Raytheon to become principal elements of our successful bid on the ongoing Joint High-Power Solid-State Laser (JHPSSL) program. JHPSSL is the entry to the next-generation highenergy laser (HEL) business, and Raytheon intends to be the leader.” After a brief stint in the optical communications industry, Rockwell was attracted back to Raytheon by a new initiative to scale solid-state lasers using Yb:YAG crystals to yield more power than was contemplated in the early 1990s. “The type of crystals used is not, by itself, what sets Raytheon apart from its competitors. The unique element of the Raytheon HEL program is the technique we have developed to ensure that the beam divergence of our high-power lasers is maintained near the fundamental lower limits, rather than increasing beyond the point where the lasers cease to be useful.” Now, as an Integrated Product Team leader on JHPSSL, Rockwell says, “We have an exciting opportunity to build a laser system that was considered impossible not long ago.” 2005 ISSUE 1 15
Page 1 and 2: technology today HIGHLIGHTING RAYTH
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Page 5 and 6: World Leadership in FLIR Systems Ra
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Page 18 and 19: MATERIALS AND STRUCTURES Raytheon D
Page 20 and 21: DESIGN FOR SIX SIGMA - LESSONS LEAR
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RAYTHEON BRINGS EO TECHNOLOGY To Defend Our Nation

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