New techniques for testing and operational support of AESA radars

The Active Antennas (AESA) technology has dramatically increased the operational capability of modern radars. Nevertheless, minimize production costs and cost of ownership of these systems is also a major industrial objective. The paper is organized in two parts. The first one deals with improvements achieved so far for reducing the costs and the complexity of industrial testing. In the second part, a data mining method, based on Bayesian Networks, is presented. It aims at processing all data issued from the Built-In-Test (B.I.T.) in order to accurately detect some defects impossible to catch with current methods, such as transient failures or initiation of youth's defects. Originally planned for testing in production, this new performing method could replace, in the future, the current B.I.T. processing, which is used in operational support.