Aerial assembly and pedestal from SCR 584 tracking radar, c.1944

Made:: 1944

The SCR 584 was an American 10-cm radar whose primary purpose was to follow a target automatically and supply information on its position, for use with anti-aircraft guns. The equipment was housed in a large trailer, with the aerial pedestal on the roof.

The aerial beam was slightly offset from the axis of the reflector, and was rotated about that axis by spinning the dipole feed assembly. As a result, the echo from any target not exactly on the axis varied in strength as the dipole rotated.

The timing on the variation conveyed the direction of the error in the aerial’s bearing, enabling the aerial-positioning system to ‘track’ the target.

Details

Category:: Radar & Radio Location

Object Number:: 1971-401

type:: radar equipment

credit:: Royal Aircraft Establishment

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Parts

Aerial assembly component for SCR-584 radar, c.1944

Part for aerial assembly and pedestal from SCR-584, radar, c. 1944. The SCR-584 radar used conical scan tracking—in which a single offset (squinted) radar beam is continuously rotated about the radar antenna’s central axis—and, with its four-degree beamwidth, it had sufficient angular accuracy to place antiaircraft guns on target without the need for searchlights or optics, as was required for older radars with wider beamwidths such as the SCR-268. The SCR-584 operated in the frequency range from 2.7 to 2.9 GHz (known as the S band) and had a parabolic reflector antenna with a diameter of nearly 6.6 feet (2 metres).

One of the most notable microwave radars developed by the MIT Radiation Laboratory was the SCR-584, a widely used gunfire-control system. SCR-594 was first used in combat early in 1944 on the Anzio beachhead in Italy. Its introduction was timely, since the Germans by that time had learned how to jam its predecessor, the SCR-268. The introduction of the SCR-584 microwave radar caught the Germans unprepared.