Raytheon to build additional radar fire-control systems for Aegis shipboard electronics
WASHINGTON –Shipboard electronics experts at the Raytheon Co. are building additional MK 99 fire-control systems for the Aegis weapon system aboard U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke-class destroyers and Ticonderoga-class cruisers under terms of a $72.5 million contract announced in December.
Officials of the Naval Sea Systems Command in Washington are asking the Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems segment in Marlborough, Mass., to build MK 99 Aegis fire-control systems equipment, fulfill Aegis modernization production requirements, and provide engineering services.
The MK 99 fire-control system functions as the interface between the Aegis AN/SPY-1 radar and the ship-launched SM-2 family of anti-air missiles. The MK 99 fire-control system communicates with the missile-control station, notifying it of the air threat, and then illuminates the missile's target.
The MK 99 also controls the loading and arming of shipboard missiles aboard Burke-class destroyers and Ticonderoga-class cruisers. The MK 99 launches and provides terminal guidance for the ship's missiles, and controls the continuous-wave illuminating radar to provide a high probability of kill.
The Aegis weapon system (ASW) comprises the AN/SPY-1 radar, the MK 99 fire control system, weapon control system (WCS), the command and decision suite, and SM-2 Standard missile family, which includes the basic RIM-66, the RIM-67 extended range, and the newer RIM-161 to counter ballistic missiles. The extended-range RIM-174 was deployed in 2013.
Related: Navy orders 12 advanced AN/SPQ-9B shipboard radar systems from Northrop Grumman
The MK 99's radar transmitter is being upgraded to improve performance and reduce acquisition and maintenance costs. The MK 99 illuminator transmitter upgrade is replacing obsolescent traveling wave tube (TWT) technology with solid-state transmitters to improve the MK 99's mean time between failures.
The system's solid-state transmitter and open-systems architecture also will enable upgrades for new technologies and capabilities over the lifetime of system.
On this contract Raytheon will do the work Marlborough and Burlington, Mass; Chesapeake, Va.; Portsmouth, R.I.; and San Diego, and should be finished by April 2022.
For more information contact Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems online at www.raytheon.com, or Naval Sea Systems Command at www.navsea.navy.mil.
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John Keller | Editor
John Keller is editor-in-chief of Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine, which provides extensive coverage and analysis of enabling electronic and optoelectronic technologies in military, space, and commercial aviation applications. A member of the Military & Aerospace Electronics staff since the magazine's founding in 1989, Mr. Keller took over as chief editor in 1995.
