What radars

[TC.RET]

Hi Guys,

Memories are slipping away and help is only needed because it's niggling me about radars at airfields late 60's early 70's. EGSS Plessey 430? (1972/1973) EGPF Marconi 264? (1967/1969). EGPH what was it in 1973/81, an ACR 1 or an AR 1. The annoying thing is I used them all and after 40 years my recall is dimming! All Zheimer has not here yet but after this post U may disagree!!

Thanks for any replies

[Talkdownman]

PF Marconi S232?
PH ACR6?
I recall that airfield radars tended to be those, or variants thereof, in those days.....

I'm still using a 424, and no, that's not Alzheimer's.......

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

EGLL very early 70s, ACR IV and Marconi S264.

[Spitoon]

I seem to recall that at PF in the early 80s there were two 264AHs - can't remember what was used for APR though. Maybe these beasts - and beasts they were close up! - were for en-route use.

[Talla Radar]

No, you are quite correct Spitoon, the 264s were used for APR at PF in the 1980s.

[Spitoon]

Not directly related to the OP but for those with an interest in such things, I've put the ACR 430 manual up here (http://www.webfilehost.com/?mode=viewupload&id=6569605). It just amazes me how basic things were....and how much we could tweak the things ourselves!

Sorry - you've got to wait 60 secs before you can download the file.

[bottom rung]

There are at least two 430s still in use in the UK.........:) Anyone got a magnetron or two lying around?

[Talkdownman]

Ah, but how many 424s still in use...?

[Numpo-Nigit]

Edinburgh's first radar was an AR1, which became operational in 1970.

For reasons which were never totally clear, the Glasgow press published a photo of me doing Aerodrome Control to celebrate the fact!

NN

[arrffaa]

bournemouth into the nineties - acr430
now - ar15
belfast - ar1
dunsfold - acr424 plus a cossor something
heathrow had ar1/acr6/en4008? plus s650 sitting on the maintenance area car park roof (what for?) and an asmi (superb kit)
ulster radar - type80?

that's as good as i can do - not good eh?:(:(

[BEXIL160]

Cardiff 1970s had a 424 and an AR1 (later some EN4000 series thingy)

Glasgow two 264's (as noted above)

Farnborough, AR1, 232 and CR62

Exeter had a 430, replaced by the first civil Watchman

Always thought Dunsfold had something after the 430, an AR15 perhaps (AR 1.5?)

Similar thought, who had the last wobbly line DF, as opposed to the later digital versions? (FERNAU?)

BEX

[2 sheds]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3182/2314654321_505297bfb8.jpg
Cossor ACR6 at Bournemouth Airport, 1979, just before the aerial was removed to Stansted.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2246/2315467764_fbe0282203.jpg
Marconi 264H, north side Heathrow, 1960s.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2342/2315459294_10794ebf39.jpg
Plessey ACR430, Bournemouth, 1980s.


Similar thought, who had the last wobbly line DF, as opposed to the later digital versions?

Whaddya mean "had..."?!

2 s

[bottom rung]

Netheravon was still using a wobbly line DF for QGHs in 1994 unless I'm mistaken.

[Once Bitton,]

Birmingham had a Marconi 232 ,a pre-cursor of the 264 ,almost to the 1990`s .It also had a plessey 430 . The blips on the 232 were 5 miles wide at 40 mile range ,and we didn`t have ssr !

[2 sheds]

You mean one of these...?

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2601/3969799406_759925fbfa.jpg

[BEXIL160]

ooooooo! Digital DF!

I seem to recall if you press the "lamp test", bottom right, the lights all light up in sequence but end at a random bearing..... DF roulette anyone?
:ok:

BEX

[161R]

I seem to remember that Edinburghs' AR1 was in fact a EN4000 - AR1 aerial with Marconi guts. Why buy a complete system when you can bolt two bits together of two different systems? A least you know what you're going to get.....

[matspart3]

Gloucester still has an ACR430 (albeit with solid state heads, making it, technically, a MARIS 900)

[Radarspod]

This is the best thread in this forum for ages!

RS

[Regular Cappuccino]

Bedford Thurleigh late 1970s had a 232 and what I was told was the only 664 (a sort of derivative of the 264?). Needless to say they had a PAR of some description too, but being only a humble Cranfield Radar wallah, I wasn't allowed near that!
As has been said already, the blips on the 232 were enormous, so when you were about to run out of radar separation a quick flick of the switch to the 664 and hey presto! bags of separation again!

EMA started with a 424 but by sometime in the 1970s had an AR1. The 424 was upgraded with solid state guts and a Kelvin Hughes display, and remained in use for half-milers well into the 1980s. The guts were eventually sold to cambridge, while the head (minus 'twanged' rubber band) languished in the MT car park - the NOTAM still said it was simply ' u/s'....
Eventually it was formally withdrawn and now adorns the Aeropark.
The AR1 was replaced sometime around 1990 (can't recall exactly when) by a Marconi 511, initially with Cossor cursive displays and subsequently with the first CAA approved colour raster scan displays in the UK.
RC

[alemaobaiano]

Thanks for the manual Spitoon, that brought back memories :}

TTFN

[Talkdownman]

We are still using an ECKO CE235-1 ' wobbly line' CRDF to supplement our Plessey 424. Both are in daily use, approximately 400 SRAs / year.

[chevvron]

In my recollection, Dunsfold never had a 430. They had a Cossor 787 10cm radar up to about early '90s( superb clear picture compared with the AR1; really sharp small blips but no MTI) , initially in the middle of the airfield then on top of the tower VCR when the new one was built. When the RAF re-equipped with Watchman, the Brize AR15 was purchased, but there was some controversy about that as apparently (so I was informed at the time) there were parts missing when it arrived at Dunsfold which had definitely been in the packing cases when it had left Brize.
Farnborough had an AR1 plus an S232 with an SLA1 PAR. The prototype AR15 called an AR1b was trialled for about 6 months in early 1975, but proved unsuitable for the Farnborough radar tower; it was so high above ground that ground reflections bounced up and tended to cancel high cover! New consoles in about '81 brought SSR feeds from either Heathrow or Pease Pottage(had to be switched by tels rather than on the console).The PAR was replaced by the CR62 when the AR1/S232 were replaced by a single Watchman mounted on the aforementioned tower backed up by the same two SSR sources which were switchable from the console. This was replaced in late '02 by the present Raytheon ASR10 primary radar.

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

T.. What was that mega-powerful radar at Farnborough for the TSR2 trials. Cossor something-or-the-other seems to ring a bell???

[Imperator1300]

In the 80's EGPN had a Marconi 264 'A/H' (which I think meant 'GTI' :p). It came originally from RAF Sopley (where my Dad worked on it!).

[Mr_Grubby]

Northern Radar, Lindholme.

The radar equipment consisted of a locally sighted Type 82 ten centimetre primary radar with active-decoding secondary radar. Coverage was supplemented by a Type 84 radar remoted in from Staxton Wold in North Yorkshire originally by a broad-band (hilltop to hilltop) link and later by narrow band (land-line) link.

Clint.

[throw a dyce]

The Marconi 264 A/H was at Aberdeen.With great low level coverage to the east,it was used en-route for the helis,and approach for the airport.Also SRAs were fun with the large blip.

[chevvron]

HD: don't recall a mega powerful radar at Farnborough but there was one at Wisley; Cossor ASR1 or ASR3 (don't remember which) . If it was for TSR2, then it's logical as I believe it was planned to operate TSR2 test flights from Wisley. It was 23 cm and BEA apparently used to work Wisley for air tests as the coverage was far better than Farnborough or Bsoscombe.
Boscombe did have a similar radar in '72, so maybe this was the one which was at Wisley which I believe closed about this time. One of my colleagues on my cadet course (he did ADC endorsement at Boscombe) told me he'd gone to the CI in a Cherokee; on the way back he was able to be tracked on the radar from Boscombe from just north of 50N (ORTAC to you youngsters) at 2000ft, so it had phenomenal low cover!

Second thoughts, was it Decca; I seem to recall 'DASR-1' as a radar type, and Jack Wheeler(last SATCO Wisley) got a job with Decca/Plessey at Addlestone/Cowes when Wisley closed.

[Imperator1300]

Ooops...I meant EGPD, not EGPN :\. Been away for too long!

[Hyperborean]

Don't know about Boscombe but Llanbedr had a DASR1 when I was a cadet there. Not a huge range as I recall but it had 2 aerials back to back, one high and one low beam. It bust a gearbox whilst I was there and we "borrowed" a gun laying radar from Manorbier, an AA4 Mk7. Sadly my cadet unit endorsement only covered the DASR1, I would have liked documentary evidence that I controlled traffic on an artillery radar.

[radarman]

Who remembers the Gilfillan MPN11/CPN4? You sat in a darkened truck in the middle of the airfield surrounded by whining magnetrons and oscillators, chinagraph in one hand, screwdriver in the other for adjusting cursors, MTI gain etc. Magic atmosphere.

And Bomber Command's CPN 18 in the '60's. Had a 40 mile normal range, but you could select '40D' (40 miles plus delay) which gave you a picture from 13 to 53 miles. The first 13 miles was sucked down the hole in the middle, so to speak, which left some weird distortions inside about 30 miles.

The Type 80, with pinhead-sized blips you could hardly see. You could go for a roundabout ride in the signal processing cabin, which was suspended directly underneath the radar head and rotated with it at 4 rpm.

Someone has already mentioned the ex-Bloodhound missile control radars converted for ATC use at Northern, Eastern and Midland Radars. Lovely piece of kit, with its built-in height finder and target tracking system, but very labour-intensive, needing a tracker and height finder for each console. Pity Midland Radar had such a large overhead they couldn't see anything. :E :E

Hatfield used to have a Marconi 232 and a 430. When the 232 died they arranged a microwave feed from West Drayton. One of the engineers (who was permanently out of his brains) devised a system for superimposing the 430 onto the WD picture, so we had a digital 430!

[chevvron]

I was at Lindholme for unit endorsement in '73. The T 82 was a superb radar with passive decoding on the SSR ie you had to designate which aircraft by placing a 'strobe' on it with a little joystick, and the code came up on a small panel next to the screen. It had no MTI hence the picture at short range was 'gated' out leading to the 'Midland Radar Overhead' jokes.
When I was there, initially the Patrington T80 was remoted in, being supplanted in mid '73 by the T84 and/or T85 from Staxton Wold. These were mainly used to pick up traffic which had just crossed from Danish airspace (UR37 airway?), whilst traffic from Dutch airspace could clearly be seen on the T82 crossing the dutch coast.
When I did ATC Camp at Manston in '88, there were some Air Defence guys there just re-opening the Ash radar station which had previously just been used as a remote radar for LATCC. Presumably this closed again with the thawing of the cold war, but what happened to it? Is the radar still spinning? It would be ideal for Farnborough LARS East sector.

[Numpo-Nigit]

This link explains the many and varied uses of the Ash radar site over the years -

RSG: Sites: RAF Ash ('YTM') ROTOR 'R3' GCI, Kent (http://www.subbrit.org.uk/rsg/sites/a/ash/)

NN

[chevvron]

Fascinating read, thanks.

[vapourer]

HD - I think the radar you have in mind is the Cossor 901. It was in use at Boscombe Down when I was there in 1972 doing my approach radar cadet training, although it was u/s a lot of the time as I recall.

It was positioned on top of a tall concrete tower and in this clip, which seems to be part actual film and part computer game, it realistically appears 30 seconds in.

YouTube - BAC TSR2 RAF/MoD BOSCOMBE DOWN UK TEST FLIGHT XR219 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhGGEOYnUUo&feature=related)

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

Vapourer... yes, Cossor 901; that's it. I'm sure it was at Farnborough for a while, atop a concrete tower somewhere in the NW part of the airfield as it could be seen from the road from Fleet past the old gas turbine place. It sure was poky as they could see traffic landing at the Paris Airports! If my brain is playing up, I apologise.

Only time I visited Boscombe was in 1971 when the Dove I was aboard as a "safety" pilot during SRA training had to div to Boscombe due to fog at Hurn. Maybe that's when I saw the Cossor????

[arrffaa]

dunsfold did have a 430 but it was never used......................i think!

[Mooncrest]

Love radar scanners. Great things. Plessey ACR 430 at EGNM from about 1970 until 1996 or so, concurrent with a Watchman from 1989 until the present day. From one orange PPI indicator at the back of the VCR in the old days to big bright colour displays now, downstairs from the VCR. Plus a remote SSR feed.

It seems a lot of airfields have had more than one radar scanner going at once. EGCC had a Marconi 264 at the 24 end with a Cossor ACR6 at the 06 end, if I remember correctly. Now just the stripey Watchman on it's enormous tower.

Did Church Fenton have the ACR 430 as well ? Seem to remember it did.

:)

[Liobian]

Ulster Rad certainly had a Type 80 in 1970, with height-finders located close by on the airfield - all now long gone. For those interested, the Gailes Type 14, latterly removed to the Museum of Flight at East Fortune, has been scrapped; but at least they have kept the valve cabinets.
Happy Days ! :ok:

[Mooncrest]

I would be very interested to know what primary and secondary radars are currently in use at the UK's airports and how long they've been in use. EGNM has a Watchman primary with SSR wired in from Claxby. Been going for nearly twenty years now.

All replies, plus pics if possible, gratefully read.

MC :)

[Talkdownman]

Our Decca 424 primary radar is approx 55 years old and in daily use.... ;)

[Number2]

What was the radar at Boscombe Down (just adjacent to the Tower)? I remember that the frequencies used to 'buzz' every time it turned.

Always wondered why I never had children.......

[Hyperborean]

If "Shakin Sam Weller" is my old mate also known as "The Knee Trembler," he would probably say " Here's a kettle of fish." and get on with it.

[Hyperborean]

Last heard of he retired about 6 months before me, which I felt sore about as he was a) younger than me and b) one of my first uts. As to hair I don't know, you can't tell over a phone line.

[Hyperborean]

I'm within sound of Leuchars, Tayport; but have been out of the loop for just over a year spending my retirement playing with my other interest, old boats.

[yachtie1]

Hi

My first job after leaving the RAF was helping to install the S232 at RAE Bedford. I went on to installations at Gatwick (before the runway was opened) and Birmingham (Elmdon). I also installed S264s at Manchester (Ringway), Lowther Hill (Scottish ATC), Zurich and Teheran and have worked with them in Heathrow (SATCC), Ventnor, Lossiemouth, Boscombe Down, Copenhagen and Rome.

The S232 transmitter was rated at 50KW mean power and the S264 came in two versions, 50KW mean power using concentric line triodes, and 500KW mean power using a Klystron.

The signal processing system used Moving Target Indication (MTI) to suppress ground clutter but this had several disadvantages. It relied on the comparison between the phase change of successive pulses - if there was a change the target was assumed to be moving whilst if there was not it was ground clutter. This caused two problems (1) Tangential Fading, when the target disappeared when travelling at right angles to the radar beam and (2) blind speed fading, when the target disappeared when travelling at certain speeds relative to the transmitter. Tangential Fading was dealt with by using Switched MTI which minimised the effect by only being used at close range where the ground clutter was heaviest, the remainder being unprocessed video. Blind speed fading was a function of the Pulse Repetion Frequency (PRF)
and was minimised by using staggered PRF.

There were problems which were more difficult to overcome - Anaprop, when a temperature inversion caused the beam to bend downwards, picking up targets from far greater distances than normal, clouds and birds.

All in all a very happy time for me.