The use of radars to locate enemy mortar, rocket, and artillery positions goes all the way back to World War II. The superb SCR-584, designed to direct the fire of 90mm anti-aircraft batteries, was shown to be quite capable of tracking inbound enemy indirect fire. It wasn't long before the services developed dedicated systems specifically for that role. Here's a video showing the early 1970s era TPQ-31 in use.
The next generation of radars for the Marine Corps is the TPS-80 Ground/Air Task Oriented Radar, or GATOR, which combines Air Traffic Control, Air Defense, fire finding, and other functions in one set.
All I know is that the radar dish on a SCR-584 looks awfully familiar, and a certain star pilot needs to answer some questions about the "modifications" he made to his ship...
Posted by: Casey | 09/30/2017 at 06:25 AM
Especially as to how the SCR-584 got flung back in time. Don't forget the first on-screen image of the series:
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
Posted by: Captain Ned | 10/01/2017 at 06:35 AM