The US has had this capability for quite a while with the LCMR (AN/TPQ 48/49/50), which has been produced in large quantities (1k+, per mfg) and at least a few were in Ukraine.
French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
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Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#82From what I heard about the SMART-L [1] radar around 1990, it could spot reflective objects the size of tennis balls at a distance of about 100Km. I guess with modern electronics and DSP, a much smaller system must be able to detect drones with ease. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMART-L
What if you cover the drone with non-reflective material? Or does it care about the reflective nature of the core of the object rather than just the surface?
Frequency is relative to the size of the object you want to detect and the size of the wave. Higher frequencies detect smaller things and can discern between them. Go too far and you detect bugs. Too low and you only see barn doors.
Spinning blades are a dead giveaway for radars. Certain things reduce radar signature but the interesting part now is electronic countermeasures.
A radar can produce a fuzzball graphic to the viewer of the data, speed, distance, direction of movement, etc.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
I suspect we're going to see a big resurgence in anti-aircraft guns, like the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flakpanzer_Gepard .
Of all shapes and sizes. I can imagine a robot M16 attached to a drone spotter might be effective against the sort of small drones that are hitting tanks in Ukraine.
Semi automatic shotgun spread pattern is pretty good for short range.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
C-RAM is 20, but a bulkier, less mobile system. Raw barrel size isn’t the only consideration.
My initial comment was mostly a remark on approaching it as a new problem and suggesting small arms, not a statement that I thought the existing system was optimized for all situations.
Look at the effective range of those things.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#85When you are not at war, and your defence alliance is also not at war, and the only perception of war is from the most paranoid nation on the planet, who is also part of your alliance, then ramping up defence spending isn't about defence, it's about profit. War is a racket. Nothing more. Maybe "Ar est une raquette" makes it sound sexier, I dunno. https://www.heritage-history.com/site/hclass/secret_societie...
The most paranoid members of NATO or EU arent the US. Its the Eastern states. You can guess, why.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#86> Since the war in Ukraine started, the French government has urged companies to produce more weapons, faster and cheaper. > However, the reality is complicated. > "It's an ongoing process. Up until now, we were producing around 10 radars a year, now the target is over 20 a year,” Descourvieres said. If there was an actual war on, and a nation was taking both combat and operational losses - then 10 or 20 per year har…
> If there was an actual war on, and a nation was taking both combat and operational losses - then 10 or 20 per year hardly amounts to squat.
That is correct. But you want to ramp up production without too much over-investment. It is not certain, at the moment, that this conflict will devolve to a full-blown world war. So if you invest in a factory to produce 1000 radars a year, what good is it if the conflict putters out?
There is zero solidarity on a European level for common investments in armament, with most countries lining up for US-made equipment instead of investing in ramping-up their own production. So that also means that the financial burden of ramping-up arms production is also not shared.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
These videos are horrible. On one side I feel for that kid who probably didn't chose to be there and grappling with imminent death. On the other hand if my country was invaded I would probably watch those videos with popcorn. It's a weird war, mixing social media with a ww1 trench war, military hardware with a share button, you get to watch live the horror of the trenches from under your duvet. The other thing is tho…
>On the other hand if my country was invaded I would probably watch those videos with popcorn We don't even know which country the soldier belonged to. And realistically, if your country was invaded, you are unlikely to be in a position to relax and eat popcorn but I get your sentiment. I agree how weird this war is. The first war being live streamed. That increases the horror since watching videos of something happe…
> And realistically, if your country was invaded, you are unlikely to be in a position to relax and eat popcorn but I get your sentiment.
Most military age ukrainians do. Ukrainian mobilisation is nothing of the scale of ww1. France was roughly the same size as Ukraine in ww1 and had 7m men under arms. Ukraine has less than 10 times less.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#88I read the article but couldn't find any mention of how a radar detects drones? A drone is much smaller than an aircraft, can be confused with birds and can have 0 communication with a command & control station due to AI. So how can anything detect it? Plus, even if you detect it, it's coming towards you at a speed of 100+ kmph with the intent to crash into you and detonate the payload. Any missile you use is way too…
1) Small drones can be detected. I'm not gonna go into the specifics, but Orlan sized drones with 3m wingspan can be detected from hundreds of km. Smaller sized commercial drones, which are 1/10th of that size, can also be detected pretty well.
2) No mater how small these drones are, they are dependent on some nav and coms system. Even autonomous "fire-and-forget" drones need a somewhat robust GPS link for navigation. For operated drones, any telemetry can and will be linked to.
But, ok, let's assume some futuristic drone that has a powerful AI system to do all its navigation via onboard sensors, which do not transmit or receive any information. How could such a drone get past a radar system? By either being too small for the radar to detect, fly too low for the radar to detect, or have some geometry that voids detection. Or the radar gets jammed, while the drone tries to get past it.
3) Drones have features which can be detected by radar. Motors, for example, would be one of those.
4) Radars are rarely the only sensors used. You have a whole array of different sensors which can be used to pickup stuff. Even with the radars themselves, you could have one radar for detection / target acquisition, and another radar for precise imaging.
There's no free lunch, though. A very small drone would mean limited range and payload, which in turn means you'll either have to deploy it close to the enemy, or via some larger craft.
Flying a drone too close to ground ads tons of interference to the drone, not to mention detection by things like acoustic sensors, humans, cameras, and what not.
But that also goes for the radars. Small targets can easily disappear in clutter, or dip under the elevation of the radar.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#89I read the article but couldn't find any mention of how a radar detects drones? A drone is much smaller than an aircraft, can be confused with birds and can have 0 communication with a command & control station due to AI. So how can anything detect it? Plus, even if you detect it, it's coming towards you at a speed of 100+ kmph with the intent to crash into you and detonate the payload. Any missile you use is way too…
1) Small drones can be detected. I'm not gonna go into the specifics, but Orlan sized drones with 3m wingspan can be detected from hundreds of km. Smaller sized commercial drones, which are 1/10th of that size, can also be detected pretty well. 2) No mater how small these drones are, they are dependent on some nav and coms system. Even autonomous "fire-and-forget" drones need a somewhat robust GPS link for navigation…
> Even autonomous "fire-and-forget" drones need a somewhat robust GPS link for navigation.
GPS is a satellite "broadcast" that GPS receivers listen to. GPS receivers are "passive" in a sense that they do not transmit any signals at all.
Re: French company ramps up production to meet demand for its military drone radar
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're making a lot of wrong assumptions, drones can be any size, nobody's talking about missiles to shoot them down, not all drones are kamikaze, &c. If they're already being produced they do work for their intended purpose, Thales doesn't fuck around
I understand I am making assumptions bec of lack of information in the article. Re shooting them down, if you can't shoot them down, whats the point of detecting them? And a drone being kamikaze only matters IF you can shoot them down. Because then it's a race between the drone rushing to kamikaze vs you shooting it down. I will admit that I am just speculating here because I have a strange interest in militarized dr…
Apar from shooting'em down, one could hijack them or mess with their GPS or RC signals or even fry their circuitry with highly directional microwaves.