The AN/SPY-3 is an

active electronically scanned array An active electronically scanned array (AESA) is a type of phased array antenna, which is a computer-controlled array antenna in which the beam of radio waves can be electronically steered to point in different directions without moving the an ...

radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance (''ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, w ...

manufactured by

Raytheon Raytheon Technologies Corporation is an American multinational aerospace and defense conglomerate headquartered in Arlington, Virginia. It is one of the largest aerospace and defense manufacturers in the world by revenue and market capitaliza ...

and designed for both blue-water and

littoral The littoral zone or nearshore is the part of a sea, lake, or river that is close to the shore. In coastal ecology, the littoral zone includes the intertidal zone extending from the high water mark (which is rarely inundated), to coastal areas ...

operations.

Technology

X band The X band is the designation for a band of frequencies in the microwave radio region of the electromagnetic spectrum. In some cases, such as in communication engineering, the frequency range of the X band is rather indefinitely set at approxim ...

functionality (8 to 12 GHz frequency range) is optimal for minimizing low-altitude propagation effects, narrow

beam width The beam diameter or beam width of an electromagnetic beam is the diameter along any specified line that is perpendicular to the beam axis and intersects it. Since beams typically do not have sharp edges, the diameter can be defined in many differ ...

for best tracking accuracy, wide frequency

bandwidth Bandwidth commonly refers to: * Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range * Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...

for effective target discrimination, and the target illumination for SM-2 and

Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile The RIM-162 Evolved SeaSparrow Missile (ESSM) is a development of the RIM-7 Sea Sparrow missile used to protect ships from attacking missiles and aircraft. ESSM is designed to counter supersonic maneuvering anti-ship missiles. ESSM also has the ab ...

s (ESSM). The X-band has, in general, favorable low-altitude propagation characteristics, which readily support the horizon search functionality of the AN/SPY-3. A large operating bandwidth is required to mitigate large propagation variations due to meteorological conditions. The system uses

commercial off the shelf Commercial off-the-shelf or commercially available off-the-shelf (COTS) products are packaged or canned (ready-made) hardware or software, which are adapted aftermarket to the needs of the purchasing organization, rather than the commissioning of ...

(COTS) computers and has reduced manning requirements for operation and maintenance. A number of operation and maintenance functions can be completely automated. Commercial IBM Regatta series symmetric multiprocessor (SMP) servers, ruggedized for the shipboard environment, provide the low-latency computing throughput (rapid sensor-to-shooter loop closure) and high productivity software engineering environment. The system was introduced in the new s and s. On both of these classes, the AN/SPY-3 was originally to be combined with the

S Band The S band is a designation by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) for a part of the microwave band of the electromagnetic spectrum covering frequencies from 2 to 4 gigahertz (GHz). Thus it crosses the convention ...

AN/SPY-4 under the designator "Dual Band Radar". On 2 June 2010, Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter announced that they will be removing the SPY-4 S-band Volume Search Radar from the DDG 1000's dual-band radar to reduce costs as part of the Nunn-McCurdy certification process. Due to the SPY-4 removal, SPY-3 radar is to have software modifications so as to perform a volume search functionality. Shipboard operators will be able to optimize the SPY-3 MFR for either horizon search or volume search. While optimized for volume search, the horizon search capability is limited. Without the VSR, DDG-1000 is still expected to perform local area

air defense Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes surface based, ...

. aircraft carrier will be the only ship to have both radars married in one system;https://fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/RL32109.pdf starting with , SPY-4 has been replaced with

AN/SPY-6 The AN/SPY-6, also known as the Air and Missile Defense Radar (AMDR), is an active electronically scanned array 3D radar under development for the United States Navy (USN). It will provide integrated air and missile defense for Flight III s. Vari ...

radar from Raytheon. AN/SPY-3 was also under consideration for retrofit to existing ships (, , and s), as well for installation in future LH(X) .

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:An Spy-3 Sea radars Military radars of the United States Military electronics of the United States Missile defense Naval radars Military equipment introduced in the 2010s

Technology

See also

References