Ultra Electronics TCS develops EW sensor capability

Available in various models covering A through K band, UltraEAGLE represents a modern integrated digital receiver system for Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) applications. UltraEAGLE offers state-of-the art, radar emitter intercept, analysis and recording capability.

RFEL and Ultra Electronics TCS collaborated closely to refine requirements in order to deliver the exact core required. This collaborative design utilises RFEL's Wideband DDC and Wideband ChannelCore Flex IP to provide real-time, high bandwidth processing of multiple GHz input bandwidths.

The solution provides analysis of a wideband input spectrum, providing a wideband view, a fixed raster channelised view and an adaptable fine analysis view. All the parameters are adaptable in real-time and the core is fully programmable, allowing it to be re-tasked into different operating modes. This optimal solution was defined using RFEL's 20 years of signal processing expertise and Ultra Electronics TCS EW system knowledge.

This collaboration marks the first export sale of the new wideband variant of ChannelCore Flex for RFEL and is seen as the beginning of a promising partnership with Ultra Electronics TCS.

Alex Kuhrt, RFEL's CEO said, "We are delighted that Ultra Electronics TCS has selected us to support this important product innovation. This marks another step on RFEL's growth in North America. Ultra Electronics TCS have demanding technical requirements and timelines, but the use of ChannelCore Flex removes a large element of risk from their programme. We are looking forward to working with them in the future."

John Bailey, Ultra Electronics TCS Director - Engineering (EW) added, "We worked closely with RFEL to develop our requirements and it quickly became clear that a novel variant of ChannelCore Flex would allow us to offer a more capable option in our system, with reduced cost and risk. The integration of the core into our wider design allows us to provide additional value to our customers."

This latest, wideband version of ChannelCore Flex has many new features that ensure it continues to provide highly versatile, state-of-the-art solutions for a wide range of demanding channelisation applications such as communications, intercept, Electronic Warfare (EW), security, industrial applications, COMINT, SIGINT, sonar, radio astronomy, research and software-defined radio.

ChannelCore Flex uses a novel architecture to implement a large number of Digital Down Converter (DDC) channels very efficiently.  FPGA resources are used in proportion to the log of the number of channels, enabling thousands of channels to be implemented in a moderately sized FPGA. 

RFEL can provide free, fully operational, fully featured ChannelCore Flex evaluation cores to support system design and evaluation in either MATLAB or ModelSim.  These evaluation models operate for 30 minutes before reboot, allowing time for extensive evaluation of the effectiveness of a design.  The time limitation is removed when the core is programmed with a key code that is provided when full core license is purchased.