L-Band High Power Solid State Transmitter
For Modern Radar System
Chcri Zhcnchcng, Qiun Honghirig,
Nanjing Research Institute of Electronic Technology, Nanjing, China
ABSTRACT
This paper addresses a half distributed solid state array
radar system, which uses 54 L Band power amplifier
modules ( 2 0 k W output power) The total space
combination power of this system can reach up to
100kw for 150 p s pulse widths at 8% average duty
cycle with a 14 5% instantaneous bandwidth Switching
power supply and liquid cooling have been employed to
achieve good performance and stable reliability Such a
system has already been utilized in a three dimensional
high performance radar
E. Introduction
With the rapid development of pulsed silicon microwave
high power transistor. it makes possible to increase the
overall performance of the radar system with a lower
cost. In the late ~ O ' S , the solid state radar systems,
such as ANITPS-59 and GE-592. have been developed
by General Electric. However, at that time, the pulse
silicon microwave power transistor only had a 50 Watt
peak power output. To satisfy the need of long range
detection, the radar must have a higher power output.
One solution is to increase the number of the power
transistor to guarantee the overall power output. The
other solution is to increase the duty cycle or pulse width
of the single transistor. The disadvantage of the first
solution is high cost and high technical difficulties, of
which the second solution will bring difficulties to the
signal form design of the radar system. By 1980's, the
silicon microwave power transistor has been taken a big
step forward towards high peak power, high efficiency,
high gain and high reliability. So as to solve the
problems of the high power solid state radar transmitter
design in the early time. The final stage of the system
mentioned in this paper utilizes a L Band high power
solid state transistor with a 250 Watt peak power output.
The successful manufacture of the L Band all solid state
high power transistor has proven that we already
grasped the key technology of the solid state transmitter
design, such as device network matching, power
combination, monitoring protection, power supply,
structure design and electromagnetic compatibility.
0-7803-291 4-7
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Hong Dingzhu, Chcn Qijk
II. Transmitter System Configuration
Figure 1 shows the block diagram of the transmitter
system. It can be found on the Fig.1 that the system
consists of pre-driving amplifier, duplex pre-amplifier, a
1:54 power dividing network, 54 power amplifier
modules with 2.0 k W power output, 54 main switch
power supply for the power amplifier modules and other
supplemental power supply and monitoring protection
and liquid cooling system.
Pre-driving amplifier, installed on the rotating plate of the
antenna, preamplify a 10-20mw RF input signal to a
1 . 5 signal,
~ as the in
put signal of the antenna face element (duplex pre-
amplifier). Pre-driving amplifier is a three stages
amplifier using FET devices. The first two stages are AB
class amplifier and the final stage is C class amplifier.
AB class amplifier uses the GaAs FET devices to obtain
a satisfied performance at the low temperature condition.
Duplex pre-amplifier is to increase MTBCF and drives 54
final stage power amplifier modules. The 1.5 Watt
signal from the rotating plate amplifier, goes through a 4
meter cable, directional coupler, circulator, filter, over
pulse width and over duty cycle protective switch, duplex
etc., which will be attenuated to about 0.15 0.18 W to -
drive as the input to the pre-amplifier. After RF
amplified and isolated, the output 5 Watt is to input the
2.0 k W duplex amplifier module which is the same as
the final stage of 2.0kw modules. Therefore, there are
56 2.0 k W power amplifier modules on the antenna face
and 56 main switch power supply. After the final
duplexer (circulator), high power equalizer, and
directional 'coupler, the 2.0kw RF signal of pre-amplifier
will go to a 1:54 power dividing network through cable,
of which the 54 individual output port will provide a
signal with the same amplitude and phase. Then going
through the phase shifter, a 5 Watt is produced and will
be as the input to the 54 2.0kw-linal stage power
amplifier module on the antenna face. The branch A
and branch B of pre-amplifier have same characteristic
and function, When branch A fails, it will can be
switched to branch B manually or automatically The
 Figure 1 The block diagram of the transmitter system
small signal duplex switch is a PIN device The final
duplex switch is a electromagnetic field circulator By
changing the current flow direction of the
electromagnetic coil, branch A will on/off and branch B
is off/on It takes a bit longer time (about 100ms) for
this switching, this switch can stand high power and is
very reliable as well
The monitoring, controlling and protection unit of pre-
amplifier has Branch A and Branch B operation,
switching indication, including 1 1 5 V , +5 V power supply
indication and the over pulse width and over duty cycle
protection and indication The RF input to the pre-
amplifier will be cut off to save the expensive transistor if
pulse width is over 200 ~1 s or duty cycle is over 14%
with some certain indication High power RF equalizer is
to improve the amplitude and phase characteristic of the
front stage output
Monitoring unit is to test the operating status of the
transmitter system and collect all kinds of failed
information e g , the number of failed power amplifier
modules and location, the number of failed main switch
power supply modules and location, 15V and +5V
power supply status, over pulse width and over duty
cycle information pre-amplifier's power supply and
branch A and branch B operation status It connects to
the main console of the radar system Such a
monitoring can reduce MTTR
The whole transmitter system employees liquid cooling
method except the power supply's wind cooling The
liquid cooling system consists of liquid cooling plate,
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main water tube, 2nd cooling equipment etc The
cooling liquid brings about 28kW heat by the heat
exchanging from the 56 power amplifier modules to the
2nd cooling equipment The temperature difference
between the in and out liquid is less than the 4C
I l l . Power Amplifier Module in The Final Stage
The power amplifier module in the final stage is the
most important part in the whole system, including
input switch, directional coupler, front amplified chain,
1:5/5:1 cascade feedback power dividerlcombiner
network, high power combiner and circulator, capacitor
bank, power supply switch board, BITE circuit and
cooling part. It's block diagram and experimental
photograph are shown in Fig.2 and Fig.3 individually.
The input 5 Watt signal goes through the
directionalcoupler, switch and attenuator to the drived
amplified chain, where a 100 Watt output is produced.
Then the 1.2 power divider can produce two subsignal to
drive two 250 Watt transistor, and then pass the 1:5
cascade feedback dividerkombiner network to combine
and amplify to 1100 Watt. Two l . l k W signal will be
combined through directional coupler and circulator to
2.0kw. +42V, rt 15V and +5V power supply is from
external outlet. Meanwhile, +28V is transformed
internally from +42V. All power supply will be charged
and filtered internally within the module in order to
smooth the spike and ripple wave value. BITE uses the
two directional coupler to sample the signal and then
 45w

1w 5w 26W

-
3w

Capacitance grou
and transform
+1sv
-15V
+5v -
Fig.2 The block diagram of the 2 OKW power amplifier module

sends the input overlow and output overlow information
to the control and protection unit Switch is controlled by
external "On" instruction to realize 54 modules "On/Off"
side copper covered Special pressure soldering
techniques makes the printed circuit board and its
copper base well grounding. The module is milled by
CNC machine with the liquid channel on its back.
Besides RF in and out and operation status indicator,
automatic water seal quick connector is also on the front
panel. Module can be replaced even when the cooling
system is operating. It has been proved by the testing
experiment that the system is very reliable under high
and low temperature, vibrating and crashing condition.
The test performance curve is shown in Fig.4.

&lI t
Fig.3 The photograph of the 2 OKW power
amplifier module

individually and amplitude and phase tracking Phase I :

shifter controls the output phase of the 54 2 Okw power t'r - a -a tr '
I 1 6
amplifier modules to realize the beam scanning by the Fig.4 The performance of the 2.OKW power
space combination The circuit board of the power amplifier module
amplifier module IS made of Teflon glass board with two-

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 IV. Amplitude and phase Tracking amplitude tracking *
< 0 75dB( P-P)
output peak power 2 Okw each module
So called amplitude and phase tracking is the difference phase tracking < f IO" (P-P)
among the power output and relative phase of the 54 (There are 54 modules )
power amplifier modules at the same frequency In order power module gain 26d0
to achieve good amplitude and phase characteristics. power modcile efficiency 28%
microwave high power transistor being used must have ambient condition -40" -+5O'C
All those show the maturity of the design technology of
t 1 the L Band high power all solid state transmitter This is
the effort of every one in our research group The
authors would like to thank our colleagues for their
assistance and support

Fig.5 The block diagram of the Amplitude and

Phase testing system

excellent similarity as well as the fine matching circuit 1

and testing system and manufacturing precision The # a s a- a a
Wiltron 360ps vector network analyzer is used to do the
Fig.6 The amplitude and phase tracking curve of
testing The testing block diagram is shown in Fig 5 54 2 OKW power amplifier modules
Fig 6 shows the amplitude and phase siinilaritying curve
of 54 power amplifiers at frequency fo

V. Conclusions and Acknowledgment REFERENCE

By using L Band high peak power transistor (PH1214- 1 Michael T Borkowski Radar Handbook chapter 5
"solid-state Transmitters"
220M), 2 Okw high power amplifier module has been
2 Chen Zhencheng, Qian hongbing, Zhou guoan "A
developed so as to design the 100kw all solid state radar UHF Distributed High Power Solid State Radar
transmitter It has the following characteristics Transmitter", CIE 1991 International Conference on
pulse width 150 1-1s Radar
instaneous bandwidth 200MHz 3 Donald J Hot7 Fuar Agi "Solid State Transmitters For
duty cycle 8o/' Modern Radar Application", CIE 1986 International
bandpass flatness I O 75dB
Conference on Radar

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