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Receiver-System Design, Part 1- System Specifications

Tuesday, June 1, 2004 - Dave Adamy

Receiver-System Design, Part 1 System Specifications

Dave Adamy
June 2004
Receiver systems for electronic warfare (EW) and reconnaissance (recon) are significantly
different from the receivers in communication systems and radars. In these other cases, each receiver is
designed to optimally recover the information carried by only one type of signal, within a narrow
frequency range. More importantly, the receiver can be tuned to the known correct frequency and can
usually make use of automatic gain control to optimize reception of the desired signal.
EW and recon receivers, on the other hand, typically must handle several different types of
signals over a significant frequency range and typically have very little information about the signal
frequency to be received. They are usually required to handle a range of different modulation types and
parametric ranges, and they are often required to determine the emitter location as well. Thus, the
specifications for such a receiver system can be very challenging, requiring sometimes painful
performance tradeoffs to be made.
In this series, we will cover the following subjects:

Typical performance specifications that must be met by EW and recon receiver systems

Types of receivers used in EW and recon systems (review)

Calculation of receiver-system sensitivity and related design factors

Determination of dynamic range from component specifications and design procedures

The impact of various emitter-location approaches on receiversystem design

The general types of signal-flow paths within the receiver system

Design principles for radar-warning receivers

Design principles for reconnaissance receiver systems

The design of digital receiver systems

The Receiver System
First, lets consider the definition of a receiving system. As shown in Figure 1, it includes one or
more antennas, a signal-distribution network, one or more receivers, and usually some sort of signalprocessing circuitry. Its output can be audio or video displays to one or more operators or data to one or
more computer or data-distribution systems. When emitter location is required, there is often significant
preprocessing before the receivers, as shown in Figure 2.
Table 1 lists the typical specifications for an EW or recon receiver system. All of these
specifications are not required for all receiving systems. There will also be specifications having to do
with power-supply requirements, packaging limitations, and environmental conditions for storage and
operation, but we will concentrate only on performance specifications here.
Frequency Range
The frequency range of the receiver system determines the range over which the receivers in the
system can be tuned. If wideband receivers are included in the system, large portions of the frequency
range may be continuously covered. Naturally, the antennas must provide adequate coverage of the
frequency range. If wide frequency ranges are covered, there may be several different receivers,
connected to different antennas or antenna arrays. For example, in a typical ground-based emitterlocation system, there are two or three antenna arrays, each covering a portion of the frequency range
and connected to different preprocessors and receivers, as shown in Figure 3. This figure shows a
typical wideband, ground-based, direction-finding system. Each array typically covers less than a fiveto-one frequency range.
Modulations
An EW/recon receiver system must be able to receive all of the expected types of modulations
for threat emitters. For radar signals, this includes pulse, continuous wave (CW), frequency-modulated
(FM) CW, FM on pulse (chirp), or digital modulation on pulse.
For communications signals, this includes AM, FM, phase modulation, multichannel FM/FM
signals, single sideband (upper or lower sideband), and various digital modulations. For AM signals, the
percentage of amplitude modulation is normally specified, and for FM signals, the modulation index is
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commonly specified. Common digital modulations include pulse-amplitude modulation (PAM),

frequency-shift keyed (FSK), binary-phase-shift keyed (BPSK), and quadrature-phase-shift keyed
(QPSK). There are also spread-spectrum modulations, including frequency hopping, chirp, and direct
sequence. In manually operated receivers, there will typically be a control for modulation selection.
Automatic systems must typically determine the modulation and automatically select the proper
demodulation circuitry.
Bandwidth
The bandwidths specified are typically the effective bandwidths of the receivers, of which there
may be several types. In general, the bandwidth of any properly designed receiver narrows as the signal
path progresses. The front end is necessarily wide, and multiple intermediate frequency amplifiers are
wider upstream and narrower downstream. A general rule of thumb for narrowband receivers is that the
effective bandwidth will be very close to the final predetection bandwidth. Manually operated receivers
often have selectable bandwidth. The narrower the bandwidth, the better the sensitivity, but the
bandwidth must be wide enough to include the modulation spectrum of received signals.
The formula for the effective bandwidth when there is a wider radio-frequency bandwidth and a
significantly narrower video bandwidth (such as in radar-warning receivers) is as follows:
BEff = sqrt (2 BRF x BVID)
Where: BEff is the effective bandwidth
BRF = the predetection bandwidth
BVID = the postdetection video bandwidth
Whats Next
Next month well complete this discussion of specifications and start our discussion of types of
receivers used in EW/recon receiver systems. For your comments and suggestions, Dave Adamy can be
reached at dave@lynxpub.com.

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