The AN/SPS-49 is a

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the naval warfare, maritime military branch, service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is the world's most powerful navy with the largest Displacement (ship), displacement, at 4.5 millio ...

two-dimensional, long range air search

radar Radar is a system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), direction ( azimuth and elevation angles), and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It is a radiodetermination method used to detect and track ...

built by

Raytheon Raytheon is a business unit of RTX Corporation and is a major U.S. defense contractor and industrial corporation with manufacturing concentrations in weapons and military and commercial electronics. Founded in 1922, it merged in 2020 with Unite ...

that can provide contact bearing and range. It is a primary air-search radar for numerous ships in the U.S. fleet and in

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

aboard s,

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

on its (prior to FELEX mid-life upgrade) and

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

on its s. It formerly served in a complementary role aboard

Aegis The aegis ( ; ''aigís''), as stated in the ''Iliad'', is a device carried by Athena and Zeus, variously interpreted as an animal skin or a shield and sometimes featuring the head of a Gorgon. There may be a connection with a deity named Aex, a ...

cruisers with the

AN/SPY-1 The AN/SPY-1 is a United States Navy passive electronically scanned array (PESA) 3D radar system manufactured by Lockheed Martin, and is a key component of the Aegis Combat System. The system is computer controlled and uses four complementary an ...

but the systems are currently being removed during routine upgrade with no replacement. In accordance with the

Joint Electronics Type Designation System The Joint Electronics Type Designation System (JETDS), which was previously known as the Joint Army-Navy Nomenclature System (AN System. JAN) and the Joint Communications-Electronics Nomenclature System, is a method developed by the U.S. War Depa ...

(JETDS), the "''AN/SPS-49''" designation represents the 49th design of an Army-Navy

electronic device Electronics is a scientific and engineering discipline that studies and applies the principles of physics to design, create, and operate devices that manipulate electrons and other electrically charged particles. It is a subfield of physics and ...

for

surface ship Surface combatants (or surface ships or surface vessels) are a subset of naval warships which are designed for warfare on the surface of the water, with their own weapons and armed forces. They are generally ships built to fight other ships, subma ...

search radar system. The JETDS system also now is used to name all

Department of Defense The United States Department of Defense (DoD, USDOD, or DOD) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government charged with coordinating and supervising the six U.S. armed services: the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Space Force, ...

electronic systems.

Operation

First tested in 1965 aboard and introduced in 1975, the AN/SPS-49 operates in the 851–942 MHz, or L-, band and has a range of . The orange-peel parabolic shape of the antenna creates a narrow 3.3°-beam to reduce the probability of detection or jamming. It can rotate at 6 rpm in long range mode or 12 rpm in short-range mode. Default is at 12 rpm for the AN/SPS-49A(V)1, to provide more frequent scans against incoming missiles. The SPS-49A(V)1 can detect out to its full range at either 6 or 12 rpm. The antenna is stabilised to compensate for ships pitch and roll, to a maximum of +/-15° for both pitch and roll in 12 rpm mode, and +/-23.5° for both pitch and roll in 6 rpm mode. The output stage of the transmitter in all variants uses a two-cavity

klystron A klystron is a specialized linear-beam vacuum tube, invented in 1937 by American electrical engineers Russell and Sigurd Varian,Pond, Norman H. "The Tube Guys". Russ Cochran, 2008 p.31-40 which is used as an amplifier for high radio frequenci ...

amplifier. Combat systems of the FFG-7 class

In 1998, the Inspector General of the Department of Defense reported that SPS-40 and SPS-49 radars in Bahrain were "unusable because the equipment operates on a frequency that interferes with the Bahrain telecommunications services".

On board ships

United States

* * * * * * * *

Republic of China

* Cheng Kung-class frigate

Italy

* *

Australia

Canada

New Zealand

* ''Te Kaha''-class frigate (Replaced with SMART-S as part of the FSU programme in the early 2020s)

South Korea

* *

Gwanggaeto the Great-class destroyer The ''Gwanggaeto the Great''-class destroyers (), often called KDX-I, are destroyers, but are classified by some as frigates, operated by the Republic of Korea Navy. It was the first phase of ROKN's Korean Destroyer eXperimental, KDX program, in ...

Variants

As of 2014, there are eleven configurations of the AN/SPS-49(V). * AN/SPS-49(V)1: Baseline radar (Various CVN, LHA, LSD and other ships) * AN/SPS-49(V)2: (V)1 radar without the coherent side lobe cancellation feature (s) * AN/SPS-49(V)3: (V)1 radar with the radar video processor (RVP) interface (FC-1) () * AN/SPS-49(V)4: (V)2 with the RVP interface (s) * AN/SPS-49(V)5: (V)1 with automatic target detection (ATD) (

New Threat Upgrade New Threat Upgrade (NTU) was a United States Navy program to improve and modernize the capability of existing cruisers and destroyers equipped with Terrier and Tartar anti-aircraft systems, keeping them in service longer. The Program was sele ...

(NTU) ships) * AN/SPS-49(V)6: (V)3 system with double shielded cables and a modified cooling system () * AN/SPS-49(V)7: (V)5 system with a (V)6 cooling system ( Aegis combat system) * AN/SPS-49(V)8: (V)5 system enhanced to include the AEGIS Tracker modification kit ( Aegis combat system) * AN/SPS-49(V)8 ANZ: (V)8 system modified to interface with the CelsiusTech 9LV-453 combat system (s) * AN/SPS-49(V)9: (V)5 with medium PRF upgrade (MPU) * AN/SPS-49A(V)1: Developed in the mid-1990s. Added radial speed determination on each target, each scan. Improved clutter rejection

References

External links

Electronics Technician Volume 4-Radar Systems
- via Tpub {{Raytheon Raytheon Company products Sea radars Military radars of the United States Military electronics of the United States