Process Took Less than 120 Days
Raytheon has finished building the first radar antenna array for the US Army’s Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor (LTAMDS), the company announced on 21 February.
The work was completed less than 120 days after the Army selected Raytheon to build the next-generation radar, which is intended to defeat advanced threats such as hypersonic weapons. The company worked in close collaboration with hundreds of suppliers across 42 states, including a core team playing a strategic role in building the LTAMDS solution, consisting of:
• Crane Aerospace & Electronics
• Cummings Aerospace
• IERUS Technologies
• Kord Technologies
• Mercury Systems
• nLogic
“Raytheon’s employees and partners are focused on delivering the first LTAMDS by the Army’s Urgent Material Release date because we know how important expanded battlespace coverage and other capabilities are to the men and women in uniform,” explained Tom Laliberty, Vice President of Integrated Air and Missile Defense at Raytheon’s Integrated Defense Systems business. “Because we invested in cutting-edge radar technology and advanced manufacturing capability, we will meet the customer’s critical milestones and get LTAMDS in the field rapidly.”
The newly-built primary array, similar in size to the PATRIOT radar array, will provide more than twice the iconic system’s performance. Following extensive testing, the new radar array will be mounted on a precision-machined enclosure for integration and further evaluation. The enclosure uses advanced design and manufacturing techniques for accelerated manufacture to support the US Army’s Urgent Materiel Release programme.
