Northrop Grumman has delivered the aft fuselage for the first Boeing EA-18G as the team passes a risk-reduction milestone in developing the electronic-attack variant of the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. Laboratory testing of the interference cancellation system has demonstrated the crew will be able to use UHF voice communications while the aircraft's ALQ-99 jamming pods are transmitting. "Comm while jam" capability is one of the biggest risks in the EA-18G programme, says Boeing.
The tests used a brassboard model of the interference-cancellation system under development by EDO and ALQ-99 outputs recorded during tests of an F/A-18F in the anechoic chamber at NAS Patuxent River, Maryland.
The system uses one of the EA-18G's lower-fuselage UHF antennas to receive the ALQ-99 jamming signal. This is fed to the interference cancellation box, which creates a mirror image of the signal to eliminate self-jamming interference from the UHF signal received by the upper-fuselage antenna. The challenge is in characterising how aircraft configuration effects antenna isolation, time delay and multipath environment, says Boeing.
The EA-18G will enter critical design review in April. Two F/A-18Fs to be converted into EA-18G test aircraft are due off the Boeing assembly line in mid-May, ahead of a September 2006 first flight.
GRAHAM WARWICK/WASHINGTON DC
Source: Flight International
