Upgraded Northrop Grumman Radar Will Extend Life of F-16 Fighters

By George Berkheimer, STAFF WRITER

We've all heard the clichŽ about teaching old dogs new tricks, but Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems of Linthicum is on track to start giving some old Falcons new sight.
On Jan. 26, Northrop Grumman Corp. (MGC) released promising results from the first series of flights undertaken to test its recently unveiled Scalable Agile Beam Radar (SABR), an active electronically scanned array (AESA) upgrade designed to replace the mechanically scanned radars now in use on every Lockheed Martin F-16 Fighting Falcon. That is to say, unlike the mechanically scanned radar, SABR doesn't need to move in order to scan the airspace and ground space in front of it.
"SABR will offer all the advantages of an active electronically scanned multi-function array, but at a significant cost savings," said NGC spokesman Paul Cabellon.
It also offers a considerable weight savings, coming in nearly 30 pounds lighter than the system it replaces, which is also a Northrop Grumman product.
SABR is designed to fit the F-16 with no structural, power or cooling modifications, but Cabellon pointed out that scalability allows it to fit other aircraft and mission areas, including (but not limited to) bombers such as the B-1 and B-52, unmanned aerial vehicles and special mission aircraft.

Market Potential
Although the United States Air Force is no longer acquiring the F-16 and is looking to replace its existing Falcons with the new Lockheed Martin/Boeing F-22 Raptor, Lockheed Martin continues to roll out advanced variants for the export market.
In fact, noted Katherine Gray, vice president of Global Sensor Solutions for NGC, the F-16 is currently in service with 25 countries worldwide. "That makes it the most popular fighter and the largest Western jet fighter program in the world," she said.
The only problem is that its technology is aging rapidly.
"AESA technology is what our customers are looking for," said Arlene Camp, director of Advanced F-16 Radar Programs for the corporation. "They want an upgrade to be affordable and not just modern, but revolutionary. We decided to invest in SABR to keep the F-16 relevant and keep it in the fight."
That's good news for most F-16 customers, who can't afford the F-22 or Lockheed Martin's F-35 Lightning II, commonly referred to as the Joint Strike Fighter.
That's also good news for Maryland's economy. Every replacement radar ordered will be built at NGC's radar plant in Linthicum. The price tag for SABR is expected to be comparable to the cost of a mechanically-scanned radar, roughly $1 million, and the upgrade can easily be performed by maintenance personnel in the field in only one afternoon.
Camp declined to share the cost to develop SABR, which was built entirely on internal funds. However, she acknowledged, "it's the largest investment Northrop Grumman has made in the past two years."

All Clear
SABR improves upon the existing F-16 fire control radar with its capacity to detect multiple incoming aircraft and the ability to enable multiple air-to-air weapons launches and to interleave different scanning modes.
It also presents pilots with a big picture of the target area on the ground and allows them to zoom in for greater detail, while it's high resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) mapping mode enables accurate ground target location at long ranges for positive identification, helping to enhance the pilot's situational awareness.
According to Camp, development began in 2007 and took only 24 months to complete. "We leveraged multiple programs along the way, which allowed us to maximize value," she said.
The program moved rapidly from laboratory testing to a rooftop tracking test which allowed the radar to pick up a limited number of targets up and down the eastern seaboard, and culminated with airborne testing aboard a North American Saberliner, an F-16 surrogate testbed aircraft, beginning on Nov. 16, 2008.
"We proved the ease of installation and the radar's ability to perform in an F-16 environment, and we saw that it was actually transmitting through a real radome," said Camp. "We got sample SAR imagery, which turned out to be a phenomenal map, from our third flight."
The next step will be to take the radar airborne on an actual F-16. That will likely happen during the last quarter of this calendar year, provided the radar has been proven to work with other aircraft subsystems in a Systems Integration Laboratory.

Taking the Next Step
Radars for the F-16 have been manufactured in Linthicum for the past 30 years. "Northrop Grumman/Lockheed Martin has proven to be the most successful partnership in the defense industry," Gray said. "This program works to strengthen that partnership."
NGC's AESA technology is also in use in the F-22 and the F-35, as well as aboard Navy ships.
"We're unique in that we have been able to take electronic sensors of this nature and apply them in so many different applications," said John Johnson, vice president of the corporation's Aerospace Systems Division. "We make them very thin, very lightweight and very low power. Our success depends on that."
As does the continued success of the F-16, which Northrop Grumman believes could continue to serve our nation and its partner allies for 30 years to come, with the right upgrades.
"We're already preparing to enter into the final production phase in the next several years," said Camp. "We're just looking for a customer to take the next step with us."