Photos Courtesy NDIL - Click to Enlarge   

Gunnery engagements have come a long way. Aside from a gun being optically or visually controlled, most have the ability to acquire targets through the means of using their own co-located radar.  This proves very helpful, especially when visibility is low.  One of the key elements in Naval Surface or Anti-Air engagements  is to achieve a Fire-Control Solution – To hit a moving target, through moving air, from a moving platform.  Upon achieving this solution it allows the shooter the potential to lay their initial rounds near or close to its intended target with minimal correction (fall of shot) thereafter.  The task to acquire a target was often onerous  as it involved  a network of people and the merging of information from different sensors.  One would like to say it was like the “click” of a button, maybe this was true on St. Barbara’s day and that's only if you did a Balloon wind-finding to determine your initial ballistics.

Conical, Spiral and Unidirectional Scans were the scans of choice when using these radars.

These were created by rapidly rotating the centrally located nutating feedhorn around the antenna’s boresight.  Scan rates were generally in between 50 to 100 Hz. These types of radars were always a dead give-away to an EW, not just by the screen display, but by the low-pitched gnawing type sound (scan rate) you hear in the audio.

The intercept station above depicts the IP-480 Analysis screen of the  AN/WLR-1C.  Along with the audio

provides an example of what an EW operator may see on their scope when listening to the intercept.