The area within these half-power points is defined as the radar beam, and it contains nearly 80 percent of all the transmitted energy. It is usually a cone-shaped cutout from a sphere, mostly sharply focused (pencil beam), but sometimes much wider in one dimension (fan beam).

The width of the radar energy "beam" is a critical factor in many of the calculations which are needed to determine the amount of energy that is detected in the pulses reflected from weather "targets".

With regard to radar, high gain and narrow beams are desirable for long detection and tracking ranges and accurate direction measurement. The minimum received power that the radar receiver can "sense" is referred to a the minimum detectable signal (MDS) and is denoted Smin .

Aug 10, 2023 · There are two main radar beam aspects to consider when viewing images from any Doppler radar. The first one deals with the beam spreading as it moves farther from the radar transmitter. The second is how the beam bends, called refraction, as it travels through the atmosphere. Depiction of the WSR-88D radar beam.

Mar 17, 2019 · This article looks at one of the most fundamental topics in understanding weather radar – Antenna and Beamwidth. A firm grasp on this subject allows pilots to better understand other essential building blocks, enabling them to use radar more effectively. Most people think about the radar beam as being a nice triangle or cone shape.

Radar Beams under Standard Refraction • Colored lines show how the radar beam bends upwards relative to the Earth’s surface under standard atmospheric refraction condition at different radar antenna elevation angles (in degree).

This module is intended to give the student an appreciation of some of the things that can alter the radar beam once it has left the antenna and moves through the atmosphere, returning eventually to the receiver, and to the images that the meteorologist must view.

Jan 6, 2012 · A real beam radar achieves this angular resolution by scanning a narrow illuminating beam across the scene to provide azimuth samples sequentially. Angular resolution is comparable to the angular extent of the physical beam.

Aug 12, 2011 · We know that a K-band radar beam has a 12° beam width beginning from its source and radiating outward. Using some simple trigonometry, we can calculate the beam width (arc length) using the known angle and the distance of 1000 feet (radius) to the target. Radar beams obey the inverse square law.

Nov 4, 2020 · The path along the radar beam to the target resolution volume and back to the radar contains air molecules and possibly cloud and precipitation particles. These particles absorb and scatter the radar energy, reducing both the incident energy at the target and the backscattered energy arriving at the radar compared to what their values would be ...