NEW TECHNOLOGIES

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Oct 08. Link Microtek’s Engineering Division has invested in a 200W TWT amplifier system that enables the company to carry out broadband high-power testing of its comprehensive range of waveguide components and subsystems. Having such a facility in-house is unusual among microwave component manufacturers, and it means that Link Microtek is now able to verify that its waveguide products can handle high power levels over a wide frequency range of 7 to 16GHz. Specially configured by Link Microtek’s engineering team, the TWT system consists of a signal source, a 200W CW amplifier, coupling to allow accurate measurements of both forward and reverse power, and a WRD750 size waveguide output, to which the device-under-test is connected. Commenting on the development, Link Microtek’s managing director, Steve Cranstone, said: “The TWT system allows us to confirm the high-power performance of our waveguide products, without the expense and delay of using an external test house. It is ideal for testing the broadband microwave components we manufacture, especially our attenuators, couplers, terminations and harmonic absorption filters.”

Oct 08. Lockheed Martin is studying widebody derivatives of its Hercules military airlifter able to carry larger loads, but believes the “C-130XL” would only be a niche product and not a replacement for its C-130J tactical transport. The C-130XL is one of several concepts being studied to fill the “white space” requirement for intra-theater transport of heavy U.S. Army equipment in the 2020 timeframe, says Jim Grant, vice president of business development for global mobility. (Source: AvWeek)

06 Oct 08. BAE Systems successfully fired the first round from the first XM1203 Non-Line-of-Sight (NLOS) Cannon prototype at a U.S. Army test site. “The first firing of a cannon using an onboard power system is a significant achievement for our soldiers and the Future Combat Systems (FCS) program. Now we have a Manned Ground Vehicle that can demonstrate its battlefield mission,” said Mark Signorelli, vice president of Army Programs at BAE Systems. The system’s predecessor, the NLOS Cannon Firing Platform, utilized a remote hardstand to support its firing. The first round was fired by the same prototype the Army and the FCS One Team
debuted on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. in June 2008. The company took the prototype through final laboratory tests before it went to the Army test site in August. The successful firing of the first round through the NLOS Cannon prototype demonstrates BAE Systems is on schedule for soldiers to begin user tests with the system and experience push-button firepower capability as early as next year.

17 Oct 08. A top designer of flexible body armor similar to the much-vaunted Dragon Skin says he has just tested a new type of ballistic material that is far harder than current plates and can defeat one of the most deadly armor piercing rounds in the world. And it can do all this at the same weight as a standard Enhanced Small Arms Protective Plate, but in a more flexible and comfortable package, developer Allan Bain claims.
Bain, who body armor experts agree was a founding father — with Dragon Skin maker Murray Neal — of the so-called “scalar” armor concept, has developed a new way to forge the ceramic that goes into the bulle-blocking plates, giving it greater density and the ability to be bent into odd shapes. With the help of experts at Georgia Tech University, Bain produces his armored disks in an oven that reaches nearly 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit – nearly half the surface temperature of the sun – to make the ceramic stronger, smaller and without sacrificing weight.
SEG4+ body armor wraps around the wearer like Dragon Skin, weighs about 7.5 pounds per square foot of coverage — about the same as a standard-issue E-SAPI plate – but delivers far more protection with “gapless, seamless” covera