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Wedgetail AEW&C Antennas
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by
Dr Carlo Kopp
Text
© 2010 Carlo Kopp
Detail Imagery ©
2005, 2010 Carlo Kopp
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Wedgetail
AEW&C
(Boeing
photo)
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Background
The Wedgetail AEW&C “Pocket AWACS” is intended to become
Australia's new airborne surveillance and battle management system. The
author was provided with a tour of the first prototype in 2005. This
presented the opportunity to collect some high quality imagery of the
various antennas installed on the aircraft.
Photography by the author using a Mamiya 645/1000S (Fuji
RDPIII, NPC160).
All images and line artwork ©
2005, 2010 Carlo Kopp.
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Wedgetail
Prototype in Detail
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Head on view of the first
prototype.
Ventral
nose ESM antenna radome assembly. Note the red covers over the AAR-54
MAWS apertures.
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Profile view of nose radomes. Note the
circular LWS-20 laser warning receiver aperture below the aft cockpit
window.
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Internally stowed crew access
airstairs.
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Ventral view of wing and CFM-56
engine, with slats and flaps deployed.
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Above, below: Northrop-Grumman MESA L-band
AESA primary antennas. The sidelooking slab arrays provide beam aspect
azimuth, range and heightfinding capability. The dorsal “surfboard”
antenna provides coverage over the nose an tail sectors. Note the dual
air inlets in the leading edge employed for cooling.
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Above, below: aft tailcone fairing
mounting MIDS/JTIDS/Link-16, AN/AAR-54 MAWS, ALR-2001 ESM apertures and
the ventral dummy AN/AAQ-24 DIRCM turret. The AN/ALE-47 CMDS is located
between the ventral strakes.
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Aft ventral
centre fuselage showing ALR-2001 low band antenna array.
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Aft ventral
centre fuselage showing ALR-2001 low band antenna array.
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Wingtip
ALR-2001 ESM array.
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Boeing E-3C AWACS
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A US Air
Force E-3C AWACS visiting Australia in 2007. The recently installed ESM
array is prominent. It uses a dual baseline interferometry scheme for
precision DF.
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Imagery Sources: Boeing (title), Dr
Carlo Kopp
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