FREQUENCY AGILITY
Radar Glossary
Radar — Frequency Agility
Information on Frequency Agility
Frequency agility refers to the radar's ability to
rapidly change its operating frequency in a pseudo-random fashion to
maintain a narrow instantaneous bandwidth over a wide operating bandwidth.
Frequency
agility forces the jamming effort to spread its
power over the operating bandwidth of the radar (even through
the radar is only using a very narrow instantaneous bandwidth
at
any one point in time). Frequency agility reduces
jammer to signal ratio and reduces, therefore, the effectiveness of
the jamming effort.
Without agility, the jammer concentrates all of its
power into the radar bandwidth. Frequency agility forces
this power to be spread over the operating bandwidth (diluting
the effective jammer power getting into the radar).
A more advanced
form of frequency agility is called look-ahead electronic
protection (EP). Rather than using a random approach to changing
frequency, look-ahead agility selects the next operating frequency and checks
to see that it is clear of jamming. If it
is clear, that frequency is used. If not, another selection
and check is be made. Look-ahead agility further complicates the
jammer's task.
Other topics in our resources on Radar related to Frequency Agility include:
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