The P-15 "Tropa" (russian: "Тропа"; en, "

trail A trail, also known as a path or track, is an unpaved lane or small road usually passing through a natural area. In the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, a path or footpath is the preferred term for a pedestrian or hiking trail. Th ...

") or 1RL13 (also referred to by the

NATO reporting name NATO reporting names are code names for military equipment from Russia, China, and historically, the Eastern Bloc (Soviet Union and other nations of the Warsaw Pact). They provide unambiguous and easily understood English words in a uniform manne ...

"Flat Face A" in the west) is a 2D UHF

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 ...

developed and operated by the former

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

Development

In 1952 SRI-244 started development of what become the P-15 early warning radar; by 1955, the radar had passed state trials and was accepted into service with the anti-aircraft troops of the

Soviet armed forces The Soviet Armed Forces, the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union and as the Red Army (, Вооружённые Силы Советского Союза), were the armed forces of the Russian SFSR (1917–1922), the Soviet Union (1922–1991), and th ...

. The P-15 was designed to detect aircraft flying at low altitude and came to be associated with the

S-125 The S-125 ''Neva/Pechora'' (russian: С-125 "Нева"/"Печора", NATO reporting name SA-3 ''Goa'') is a Soviet surface-to-air missile system that was designed by Aleksei Isaev to complement the S-25 and S-75. It has a shorter effective ra ...

"Neva" anti-aircraft system (NATO reporting name SA-3 "Goa"), though it was later replaced by the P-15M2 "Squat Eye" radar which mounted a single radar antenna on a 20-30 meter mast to improve coverage. In 1959, the modernised P-15M "trail" radar passed through the state test program, the modernisation replacing outdated mercury-based electronics. In 1962, another modernisation of the P-15 passed through trials as the P-15N, the radar being developed and produced by the Ulyanovsk Mechanical Plant. The P-15N introduced a more sensitive receiver, which improved the detection range and a new

amplifier An amplifier, electronic amplifier or (informally) amp is an electronic device that can increase the magnitude of a signal (a time-varying voltage or current). It may increase the power significantly, or its main effect may be to boost the v ...

for the

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna. The transmitter itself generates a radio frequency alternating current, which i ...

. Further improvements were made in 1970 when the P-15MN passed trials. The P-15MN included a pulse coherent Doppler filter (

moving target indicator Moving target indication (MTI) is a mode of operation of a radar to discriminate a target against the clutter. It describes a variety of techniques used for finding moving objects, like an aircraft, and filter out unmoving ones, like hills or trees ...

) to remove passive clutter (by up to 50 dB), the first such radar in the Soviet Union. Finally by 1974, the modernisation of the P-15 was so extensive that it resulted in a new designation, the P-19 "Danube", also known as the 1RL134. The P-19 is known in the west as the Flat Face B.

Description

The P-15 is a high mobility radar. With the antenna mounted directly on the single truck (Zil-157) used for transport, the system could be deployed and taken down in no more than 10 minutes. The P-15 uses two open frame

elliptical Elliptical may mean: * having the shape of an ellipse, or more broadly, any oval shape ** in botany, having an elliptic leaf shape ** of aircraft wings, having an elliptical planform * characterised by ellipsis (the omission of words), or by conc ...

parabolic

antenna Antenna ( antennas or antennae) may refer to: Science and engineering * Antenna (radio), also known as an aerial, a transducer designed to transmit or receive electromagnetic (e.g., TV or radio) waves * Antennae Galaxies, the name of two collid ...

accomplishing both

transmission Transmission may refer to: Medicine, science and technology * Power transmission ** Electric power transmission ** Propulsion transmission, technology allowing controlled application of power *** Automatic transmission *** Manual transmission *** ...

and reception, each antenna being fed by a single antenna feed. The radar can rapidly shift its

frequency Frequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit of time. It is also occasionally referred to as ''temporal frequency'' for clarity, and is distinct from ''angular frequency''. Frequency is measured in hertz (Hz) which is eq ...

to one of four pre-set frequencies to avoid active interference, with passive interference being removed by a coherent doppler filter. Azimuth was determined by mechanical scanning with an associated accompanying PRV-11 (NATO reporting name "Side Net") used to determine elevation. A

secondary radar Secondary surveillance radar (SSR)''Secondary Surveillance Radar'', Stevens M.C. Artech House, is a radar system used in air traffic control (ATC), that unlike primary radar systems that measure the bearing and distance of targets using the d ...

for

IFF In logic and related fields such as mathematics and philosophy, "if and only if" (shortened as "iff") is a biconditional logical connective between statements, where either both statements are true or both are false. The connective is bicon ...

is generally used in conjunction with the P-15, generally the 1L22 "Parol".

Operators

The P-15 was operated by the Soviet Union from 1955. It has since become obsolete, but it was passed down to successor states after the fall of the Soviet Union. It has been largely superseded by its successor the P-19.

External links

VNIIRT

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:P-15 Radar Russian and Soviet military radars VNIIRT products Military vehicles introduced in the 1950s

Development

Description

Operators

See also

External links

References