Digital RF processing system for Hardware-in-the-Loop simulation

This paper presents the design of the Digital RF Processing (DRFP) system for generating many of the RF effects within the Advanced Radar Environment Simulator (ARES) Hardware-in-the-Loop system developed within the Hardware-in-the-Loop Technology and Simulation Group (HTS) of Weapons Systems Division (WSD), DSTO. This system is based on Digital RF Memory (DRFM) technology. The DRFM signal processing is performed on a digitised signal on a commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) hardware board. The RF Up/Down conversion is performed by a COTS RF module. The RF up/down converter translates an 800MHz instantaneous band in range 2-18 GHz down to 500 MHz IF signal (100 - 900 MHz). The ARES Digital RF Processor (DRFP) provides the technique designer with a set of tools to model a number of environmental effects, such as Doppler, Range Delay, intra-pulse complex modulations, and multi-point convolutions. The ARES DRFP provides a real-time communication link to receive high fidelity generic environmental parameters which are computed by a numerical model of the radar environment. This feature provides the technique designer with significant flexibility compared to other typical Radar/RF scene generators. This paper discusses the implementation details and the design strategies of the development. Preliminary results of the ARES DRFP output are also discussed.