Master Radar Station
Radar Type 80
The
first radar I worked on when I completed my RAF apprenticeship in 1972 was this
Type 80 (shown in photo to the left) at RAF Bawdsey near Felixstowe in Suffolk,
England. This was a 2.5 Mw (peak) S-band (3 GHz or 3,000 MHz) search radar with
a range of around 200-250 miles. The transmitter and receiver equipment and
IFF equipment rack was housed in the square cabin just below the antenna that
rotated with the antenna. After working in here for a while whilst the radar
was rotating you could feel quite ill! One novelty trick was to toss a screw
driver across the cabin to your mate. It would describe a curved course as it
flew and you had to aim a little clockwise if he was to be able to catch it!
If you look at the large version of this photograph you might be able to make
out the IFF aerial mounted just below and in front of the feed array. The building
below was known as the modulator building and housed the high voltage power
supplies for the transmitter modulator. The cabin was connected to the modulator
building by a tube containing slip rings that carried power and signals up to
the rotating parts.
The
aerial rotated at 4 rpm and you'll get an idea of the size of this beast from
the size of the stairways in the top picture and the people standing to the
left in the lower picture. When the propagation conditions allowed we could
see the power lines across northern France. The Type 80 was developed in the
early 1950's from an experimental design based on the Type
14 Mk VI under the project code name Green Garlic.
Almost overnight this radar made the "Rotor"
air defence system redundant, offering superior range and performance over existing
"Rotor" equipment that formed a chain of air defence radar stations
that covered the United Kingdom. The Type 80 was so successful that many of
the old "Rotor" stations closed within a few years of commencing operation
and the stations equipped with the Type 80 became Master Radar Stations (MRS).
One
feature of the Type 80 modulator that never failed to impress visitors was a
large twelve phase mercury arc power rectifier known as the "Mekon",
after Dan Dare's mortal enemy in the "Eagle" comic. In operation the
"Mekon" shone a bright violet colour and gave off high levels of UV
radiation. The "Mekon" was housed in its own cubicle with a darkened
glass observation window; it was an impressive sight to see the arc dance around
on the pool of mercury. (This photograph
appears to be signed "K. J. Fyson, Oct 85" Ken
Fyson was a civilian instructor in 2T block at RAF Locking for a number of years.
He was also a keen amateur photographer -
Ed)
- Concise details of Radar Type 80: (From Annex A to AP 3401, Chapter 22)
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1. Class of Equipment. 2. Purpose of
Equipment. 3. Frequency. 4. Coverage. 5. Range Performance. 6. Discrimination. |
7. Aerial Characteristics. 8. Aerial Reflector. 75 ft long by 25 ft high, of distorted parabolic section, producing Cosec2 radiation pattern. Mounted on 25 ft gantry. 9. Aerial Feed. Slotted wave guide. 10. Scanning Rates. Normally 4 rev/mm, but up to 6 rev/mm possible. 11. Transmitter. 12. Receiver. Two output channels: linear and logarithmic. |
Editors note: I am indebted to Kelvin Holmes for providing the technical details of the Type 80
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