1

EK2370 Build-your-own-radar-system
project course

EK 2370
Introduction to
Radar Systems II

Joachim Oberhammer
2019-HT-1
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Contents, Lecture 2
• Selected topics of radar systems and

EK 2370
applications
– Radar interference
– Radar cross-section and stealth
– Specific applications: air traffic management,
weather radar
• Introduction to SAR

Joachim Oberhammer
• Radar hardware architectures and
components
– Fundamentals of RF technology
– Limitations and non-ideal RF components
– Building blocks of basic FMCW radar architecture
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EK 2370
Selected topics of radar

Joachim Oberhammer
systems and applications
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Radar interference
• Noise
– internal: noise by electronic components

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– external: natural thermal radiation of background, atmosphere
• Clutter
– echos from targets out of interest, or multi-path echos of valid
targets (incl. ionospheric reflection/refraction)
– natural or man-made:
• natural: ground, sea, rain fronts, sand storms, birds, three

Joachim Oberhammer
scattering, …
• man-made: buildings, power lines, chaff
– surface/volume/point clutter:
• surface clutter (ground, e.g.) typically has no doppler-shift =>
easier to remove by moving-target-indicator (MTI) radar
(exceptions: waves, moving three tops)
• volume clutter (rain storms, e.g.) has doppler-shift => difficult to
remove
• point clutter (birds, individual tall buildings)
– mainlobe and sidelobe clutter (typ. 50 dB attenuated)
• Jamming: external active source: intentional (electronic
war-fare) or not intentional (same frequency radar)
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Radar cross-section (RCS)

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• RCS is a comparison of the strength of the reflected signal
from a target to the reflected signal from a perfectly smooth
totally-reflecting sphere of a cross-sectional area of 1 m2
(i.e. sphere diameter 1.13m)
• Factors affecting RCS:
– size

Joachim Oberhammer
– material properties: volume material, surface material (paint)
– surface roughness
– geometrical shape
– Orientation of the object to the radar

Trihedral corner reflectors: wanted reflection Unwanted corner reflector

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Radar cross-section RCS

• Calculation of RCS for geometrical bodies:

EK 2370
Joachim Oberhammer
• Determination of RCS
by EM Simulation:
– determine induced
surface currents
– calculate radiated
field by currents

• Measurement of RCS:
σ … RCS
Si … incident power density at the target
Ss … scattered power density
seen at distance r
 RCS in m2
7
Insect 0.00001
Bird 0.01
Stealth aircraft <0.1
Surface-to-air missile 0.1

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Human 1
Small combat aircraft 2-3
Large combat aircraft 5-6
automobile 100
Cargo aircraft 100
Truck 200
Coastal trading vessel (55 m long) 300-4,000

Joachim Oberhammer
Corner reflector 1.5 m edge length 20,000
Frigate (103 m long) 5k-100k
Container ship (212 m long) 10k-80k
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Surface roughness scattering

• Specular reflection: surface
roughness low as compared to

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wavelength

• Diffuse scattering: surface

roughness large as compared
to wavelength

Joachim Oberhammer
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Radar stealth
• RCS reduction techniques:

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– geometry:
• overall size reduction
• reduction of feature complexity Surface structure
• purpose shaping
• surface structure/roughness
– materials:
• radar absorbing materials

Joachim Oberhammer
• radar absorbing paints
– active cancellation
– plasma stealth
Absorbing materials

Civil application: oil film detection

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Radar stealth

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Smooth surface: reflects well for perpendicular incidence
deflects for other angles

Joachim Oberhammer
Rough surface: reflects less well, but for all incidents

Trailing edge diffraction: straight/indented wing

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EK 2370
Selected radar

Joachim Oberhammer
applications
Air traffic management 12

radar

EK 2370 2018
Classification for different flight phases:
a) En-route radar or air-route surveillance radar (ARSR),
range 250 nm
b) Airport-surveillance radar (ASR), 40-60 nm, 12-15 rpm
c) Precision approach radar (PAR)
d) Surface movement radar (SMR), 60 rpm

Joachim Oberhammer
e) Weather radar

(a) (c) (a) (c)

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Air Traffic Control (ATC) Radar

EK 2370 2018
• Primary surveillance radar (PSR):
– knowledge of position (angle, range) of any reflective flying object
of sufficient radar signature
– no target identification
– also for non-cooperative targets (origin: defence applications)
– used by ATC as backup/complementary radar to secondary radar
• Secondary surveillance radar (SSR):
– targets respond with information upon being pinged => only for
cooperative targets (origin: IFF – identification friend or foe)

Joachim Oberhammer
– requires targets to be equipped with active transponders
– target height calculated from requested barometric pressure
• [ADS-B (automatic dependent surveillance) might replace SR]

Secondary (interrogating) radar antenna

(very narrow beam in azimuth)

ASR-9 primary radar antenna

 Air Traffic Control Radar
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Beacon System (ATCRBS)

EK 2370 2018
• secondary surveillance radar (SSR)
• ATC request on 2.5° HPBW antenna:
– 3-pulse sequence, 1030 MHz
– mode selection by pulse spacing
– 450-500 interrrogations per second
• active reply by aircraft, omnidirectional transponder at 1090 MHz
• aircraft information:
– Aircraft ID: mode 3/A request

Joachim Oberhammer
– Range: delay between request and reply
– Azimuth: direction of antenna
– Altitude: mode C request

P1 P3
Mode A: P2
Aircraft ID
aircraft ID
request µs
2462
µs
P2 … by omnidirectional antenna: SSR side lobe suppression
Mode C:
altitude
request
µs µs
ATC request Transponder reply Aircraft altitude
1030 MHz 1090 MHz (15 time slots) (barometric pressure)
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Weather radar
• Air-borne, space-borne, ground based
• Rain drops size << λ

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=> Rayleigh backscattering
• RCS for single rain drop:

• Echoing areas in unit volume (1m3):

Joachim Oberhammer
• Volume in cell under consideration:

Di = rain drop diameter

ε = dielectric constant of water at f0
|K|2 = 0.93 (water), |K|2 = 0.2 (ice); for L to X bands
Z = radar reflectivity
η = radar reflectivity per unit volume
θ = vertical beam width
R = range to radar
c0 = speed of light
τ = transmitters pulse width Based on radartutorial.eu
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Weather radar
• Basic weather radar equation:

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Weather radar frequency bands:
- terrestrial, long range: 1-2 GHz (S)
- short-range: 4-8 GHz (C)
- very short range, cloud development:
X-band (8-12 GHz)
(also used by airliners)

Joachim Oberhammer
- Ku-band (12-18 GHz), Ka (27-40),
similar to X-band but more sensitive
- (satellite-based radiometers:
94, 163-183 GHz)

• Altitude depending radar signature of rain front:

– high altitudes: snow => medium reflections (ice, large flakes)
– medium altitudes: water melting around snow => large
reflections (water, large flakes)
– low altitudes: small rain drops forming => low reflections
(water, small drops)
Based on radartutorial.eu
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SAR – Synthetic aperture

Joachim Oberhammer
radar
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Synthetic-aperture radar (SAR)

EK 2370 2018
• General: larger antenna aperture => better angular resolution
• aperture is created by single antenna in time-multiplex instead
of large simultaneous (phased) array
• utilizes moving trajectory of a platform
=> very large virtual aperture=> very high resolution images
• requirements:
– exact knowledge of flight trajectory

Joachim Oberhammer
– full-coherent transmitter
– static targets
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SAR images

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Joachim Oberhammer
spaceborne SAR image

airborne SAR image

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SAR resolution
• Azimuth resolution of a physical-aperture radar is
limited by diffraction:

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𝜆 λ … wavelength
𝛼𝐴𝑍𝐼,𝑅𝐴𝑅 ~ d … antenna aperture diameter
𝑑

Example: ERS (European Remote Sensing satellite),

10 m antenna, 6 GHz, space-borne (850 km)
=> 4250 m beam-width on Earth’s surface

Joachim Oberhammer
• Theoretical azimuth resolution of synthetic-aperture
radar: object is in view for 2 ∙ 𝛼𝐴𝑍𝐼 =>
𝜆 𝑑
𝛼𝐴𝑍𝐼,𝑆𝐴𝑅 ~ =
2𝛼𝐴𝑍𝐼,𝑆𝐴𝑅 2

For example above: => 5 m azimuth resolution

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SAR limitations
• The smaller the antenna, the better the SAR radar?

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• Yes, but: practical limitations of reducing antenna size:
– sampling required every d/2 to avoid aliasing effects
=> high pulse-repetition frequency needed
=> max. ambiguous range limitations
– electrically-small antenna => larger beam-width => lower
power on target

Joachim Oberhammer
• The higher the frequency, the higher the SAR image
resolution?
• Yes, but:
– long range requires lower frequencies for lower attenuation
=> larger antenna size needed for low beam width
– lower power available at higher frequencies

• Typical resolution examples:

– satellite-based SAR: m
– airborne SAR: cm
– THz SAR for material characterization: µm
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EK 2370
Radar hardware architectures
and components

Joachim Oberhammer
• Fundamentals of RF technology
• Limitations and non-ideal RF components
• Building blocks of basic radar architecture
 23

RF background: dB, dBm

• dB dimensionless logarithmic unit for relative
measurements

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• dBm dimensionless logarithmic unit for absolute
power measurements, with reference to 1 mW
(=0 dBm)

Joachim Oberhammer
Comparison: logarithmic units for voltage and power: P~V2

10x higher voltage = 100x higher power:

both voltage and power increase by 20 dB
10x higher power = √10x higher voltage:
both increase by 10 dB
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RF background: S-parameters
• “black box” component:
– Inside unknown; description for predicting external behaviour

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– external interfaces: ports
– incident/reflected/transmitted signals on ports

Joachim Oberhammer
• Parameters describing 2-port system:

S11 … reflected signal on P1 upon incident on P1

S21 … transmitted signal on P2 upon incident on P1
S22 … reflected signal on P2 upon incident on P2
S12 … transmitted signal on P1 upon incident on P2
 RF background: Impedance 25

matching

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• Impedance matching important for system design

input output
Component Component Component
A B C

Joachim Oberhammer
Interface 1: well-matched Interface 2: poorly matched
- most power transmitted - little power transmitted
- little power reflected - most power reflected

• Implications of poorly-matched components:

– power is “lost” in the system (not available at output)
– reflected power impacts performance of previous component,
might even destroy it
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Non-ideal RF components

Joachim Oberhammer
 27

Nonlinearity
• Synonyms: nonlinearity, harmonic distortion, gain

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compression, intermodulation
• Linear systems:
– superposition principle 𝒇 𝒙 + 𝒚 = 𝒇 𝒙 + 𝒇(𝒚)
– homogeneity 𝒚 𝒙 = 𝒂𝒙
𝒇 𝒂𝒙 = 𝒂𝒇 𝒙
• Nonlinear system: 𝒚 𝒙 = 𝒂𝟏𝒙 + 𝒂𝟐𝒙𝟐 + 𝒂𝟑𝒙𝟑

Joachim Oberhammer
 28

Effects of nonlinearity
• Gain compression:

EK 2370
Joachim Oberhammer
• Harmonic distortion (single tone):
𝒂𝟐𝑨𝟐 𝟑𝒂𝟑𝑨𝟑 𝒂𝟐𝑨𝟐 𝒂𝟑𝑨𝟑
𝒚(𝑨𝐜𝐨𝐬 𝝎𝒕) = + 𝒂𝟏𝑨 + 𝐜𝐨𝐬 𝝎𝒕 + 𝐜𝐨𝐬 𝟐𝝎𝒕 + 𝐜𝐨𝐬 𝟑𝝎𝒕
𝟐 𝟒 𝟐 𝟒

• Intermodulation (dual-tone):
 Noise, receiver sensitivity, 29

signal-to-noise ratio (SNR)

• Internal noise: added to signal by an internal source of

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random variations, generated by electronic components:
shot noise, flicker (1/f) noise, thermal noise
• Receiver noise floor (receiver sensitivity of hardware):
𝑘𝑇𝑜
𝑛𝑜𝑖𝑠𝑒 𝑓𝑙𝑜𝑜𝑟 (𝑑𝐵𝑚) = 10 log10 + 𝑁𝐹𝑠𝑦𝑠 + 10log10 𝐵𝑊
1𝑚𝑊
• Received signal (target) can be detected if larger than:

Joachim Oberhammer
noise floor + required SNR by signal processing =>
• Minimum detectable signal, MDS:
𝑘𝑇𝑜
𝑀𝐷𝑆𝑑𝐵𝑚 = 10 log10 + 𝑁𝐹𝑠𝑦𝑠 + 10log10 𝐵𝑊 + 𝑆𝑁𝑅𝑟𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑖𝑟𝑒𝑑
1𝑚𝑊

• Implications: raised “noise floor” => reduced radar range

• Noise reduction:
– using higher-performance components, higher Tx power
– statistical signal processing (noise is random – target
signals are not)
k ... Boltzmann’s constant (1.38 x 10-23 J/K)
BW ... receiver bandwidth in Hz
 Noise figure of components and 30

systems
• quantitative assessment of the added noise of system

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components to the signal
• noise figure: specifies the degradation of SNR of a
specific component between input and output
• single device: 𝑆𝑁𝑅𝑖𝑛
𝑆𝑁𝑅𝑖𝑛 𝑆𝑁𝑅𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑁𝑜𝑖𝑠𝑒 𝐹𝑎𝑐𝑡𝑜𝑟 (𝐹) =
𝑆𝑁𝑅𝑜𝑢𝑡

Joachim Oberhammer
𝐹, 𝐺 𝑁𝑜𝑖𝑠𝑒 𝐹𝑖𝑔𝑢𝑟𝑒 (𝑁𝐹) = 10 log10 𝐹 [𝑑𝐵]
• cascaded devices:
Fi … noise factor
𝑆𝑁𝑅𝑖𝑛 𝑆𝑁𝑅𝑜𝑢𝑡 Gi … gain

𝐹2 − 1 𝐹3 − 1 𝐹4 − 1 𝐹𝑛 − 1
𝑁𝐹𝑠𝑦𝑠 𝑑𝐵 = 10 log10 𝐹1 + + + ……
𝐺1 𝐺1 𝐺2 𝐺1 𝐺2 𝐺3 𝐺1 𝐺2 𝐺3 … 𝐺𝑛−1
• Comments:
– for a chain of amplifier stages, the noise figure of the first
amplifier stage has the largest impact
– for noise source at temperature T0 = 290K: NF~Loss
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Building blocks of simple

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FMCW radar architecture

Chirp signal RF waveform

generation generation RF transmitter (TX)

Joachim Oberhammer
Baseband signal processing RF Receiver (RX)

A
D

Blue: low-frequency baseband signals Red: high frequency RF signals

 32

EK 2370
Signal generation and

Joachim Oberhammer
transmitter building blocks
 Chirp signal 33

generation

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• Chirp generator, ramp generator: creates periodic
sawtooth, triangle, or sinusoid signal
• Linear voltage ramping => linear FMCW (LFMCW)
DC power
signal control:
shape, periodicity, chirp

Joachim Oberhammer
amplitude

• Primitive circuit based on: NE555,

4 resistors, 1 capacitor, 1 transistor
 VCO – voltage 34

controllable oscillator

EK 2370
• Modulates a the frequency of a sinusoid RF signal with
the voltage of the chirp generator
DC power

Joachim Oberhammer
chirp (modulation) signal modulated RF signal

VCO
RFout
GND
Examples:
VCC
Vtune

Mini- Circuits ZX95-1200WR-S+: Mini- Circuits MOS-868-119+:

612-1200 MHz (0.5-18V), 805-868 MHz (0.25-14V),
9 dBm output. +0.5 dBm output.
 35

RF power amplifiers

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• Important parameters:
– Maximum output power (Pout), peak and continuous wave
– Gain (G), typically fixed gain
– Bandwidth (BW) and flatness in BW
– Non-linearity, intermodulation distortion, harmonics
– Peak-to-average power ratio
– Maximum input power

Joachim Oberhammer
– Power consumption, power efficiency
– Impedance (Z0)

Examples:

0.7-3.5 GHz, G=21 dB, 0.7-4.2 GHz, G=46 dB, 5 kW, 4-8 GHz,
Pout=24 dBm Pout=15 W, SSD TWT (travelling wave tube)
 RF coupler/power 36

divider

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• Couples part of the Tx signal as reference to the
receiver, used by receiver as local oscillator (LO) signal
• Important parameters: coupling ratio, bandwidth,
insertion loss, max. power

Joachim Oberhammer
Wilkinson power divider
(transmission lines):

Waveguide based power divider:

 37

Building blocks of simple

FMCW radar architecture

EK 2370
2. Receiver and base-band processing

Joachim Oberhammer
 Receiver architectures

Joachim Oberhammer EK 2370

38
 39

What is a receiver?
• Functions of a receiver:
– select a particular RF frequency range of interest

EK 2370
– (amplify signals in that frequency range)
– demodulate signals from RF down to the baseband
• Typical elements: filters, LNA (low noise amplifier),
mixers, demodulators
• Important parameters: sensitivity (min. detectable signal),
dynamic range, linearity, frequency range, frequency

Joachim Oberhammer
selectivity, bandwidth, demodulation schemes (I/Q, SSB,
AM, FM, …)

RF signal baseband signal

Common receiver architectures (1): 40

Direct conversion receiver

• Converting RF signal directly to baseband by using an

EK 2370
LO signal which is identical or close to RF carrier signal
• Advantages:
– simple, low-cost architecture
• Disadvantages:
– poor RF frequency selectivity
– strong impact by 1/f noise

Joachim Oberhammer
– poor rejection of low-frequency components in LO, LO
selfmixing resulting in DC offset (risk for saturation)
• Synonyms: zero-IF receiver, homodyne receiver
 Common receiver architectures (2): 41

Superheterodyne receiver

EK 2370
Joachim Oberhammer
• Using intermediate frequency (IF) stage
• Advantages:
– RF image rejection by RF pre-filter due
to “large” LO-to-RF frequency offset mixer
– high frequency selectivity: sharp
narrow-band filters at IF (MHz) possible
(not possible at RF (GHz)) demodulator
– for tuning to RF, it is easier to tune
an oscillator (LO=local osc.) than a
filter (IF=fixed, LO=variable)
• Disadvantages:
– very complex; multiple image-frequencies; multiple LO
• Multiple IF stages possible
Common receiver architectures (3): 42

Direct sampling
• Analog-digital converters

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(ADC) directly sampling the
RF signal, and filtering by
digital signal processing
(DSP) after conversion
=> all digital receiver
• Evolution of world’s fastest ADCs:

Joachim Oberhammer
– 2005: 250 MS/s, 12 bit
– 2018: 6.4 GS/s, 12 bit
• Advantages:
– drastically reduced RF components: no LO, no mixer; only
RF filter and LNA
– instantaneous large spectrum available (all channels)
• Disadvantages:
– limited dynamic range (ADC resolution)
– huge power consumption
– huge signal processing effort
• Limited usage so far (HF radio, IF direct sampling)
 43

EK 2370
Specific receiver building

Joachim Oberhammer
blocks
 44

Low noise amplifier

• Purpose: amplifier for very low power signals without
significantly degrading the signal’s SNR

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• Characteristics:
– handles low power input/output signals (small signals)
– high linearity (low impact of unwanted large signals)
– low noise figure
• Typically first active component in a receiver chain
• Typical parameters: G=10-20 dB, NF=3 dB

Joachim Oberhammer
420 to 450 MHz, 10 to 500 MHz, G=18dB, 75 to 110 MHz, G=35dB,
G=15 dB, NF=1.5 dB, NF=2.9 dB, POUT=5 dBm NF=5.0 dB,
power supply: 6-12 V, DC power: 12 V, 20 mA, DC: 6-15 V, 100 mA,
cost: 29 USD SMA conn., 167 USD WR-10 waveguide ports
 45

Mixer (downconverter)

EK 2370
IF…intermediate frequency=RF-LO
RF…radio frequency
LO…local oscillator (offset from

Joachim Oberhammer
carrier in heterodyne architecture)

• mixer=signal multiplier:

upconverter, for
telecom TX

• two new frequencies:

 46

Mixer (downconverter)
• many frequency products => post-filtering required

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Low-pass filter

Joachim Oberhammer
• pre-filtering to avoid image frequencies

LSB RF
X
USB RF
 47

Mixer (downconverter)
• Important mixer parameters:

EK 2370
– conversion gain or loss (active or passive mixers)
– linearity (saturation by strong signals, distortion)
– noise figure
– IF, LO, RF frequency ranges
– LO power requirements
– isolation between ports

Joachim Oberhammer
square-law mixer

switching mixer sampling mixer

 48

Base-band processing

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• Video amplifier
(name for historical reasons)
• (adaptive) filters to remove
Hardware

unwanted frequency parts:

– example doppler radar: filtering
out targets in certain velocity

Joachim Oberhammer
range
• Analog-digital conversion
• Signal filtering, post-processing
Software

in digital domain (software or

FPGA)
• Statistical signal processing,
image processing, machine-
learning for object recognition
(software)
 49

Summary, Lecture 2
• Selected topics of radar systems and

EK 2370
applications
– Radar interference
– Radar cross-section and stealth
– Specific applications: air traffic management,
weather radar
• Introduction to SAR

Joachim Oberhammer
• Radar hardware architectures and
components
– Fundamentals of RF technology
– Limitations and non-ideal RF components
– Building blocks of basic FMCW radar architecture