Multi-radar beam alignment and comparability assessment

Knowledge graph centered on Multi-radar beam alignment and comparability assessment with 15 nodes and 31 connections. Top connected: Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, Gothic, Gothic Mountain, VISSS snowfall particle analysis, EDR from Doppler radar.

Method synopsis

Protocol for evaluating antenna pointing accuracy and measurement comparability between multiple Doppler radar systems using solar alignment, constant elevation scans, and range height indicator measurements to assess beam overlap.

Synthesized from method descriptions across 1 paper using this protocol.

Procedure from a recent peer-reviewed implementation

Steps below were extracted from the most recent peer-reviewed implementation of this protocol in the corpus — Investigating KDP signatures inside and below the dendritic growth layer with W-band Doppler radar and in situ snowfall camera (2025), Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. Implementations in other papers (listed below) may differ.

1. Deploy LIMRAD94 W-band radar
   LIMRAD94 was mounted on a novel cold-temperature scanning unit at 2995 m altitude at Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory (RMBL), positioned 525 m from nearest ARM Mobile Facility (AMF2) and VISSS location. Operated at 40° elevation with 151° azimuth towards VISSS, AMF2 and CSU X-band radar.
   Quantities: 40° elevation angle, 151° azimuth, 2995 m altitude, 525 m distance from AMF2Duration: November 2022 to June 2023Conditions: Cold temperature mountain environment, winter snow conditions
   Equipment: LIMRAD94 W-band radar, cold-temperature scanning unit
2. Deploy VISSS snowfall camera
   First-generation VISSS installed next to AMF2 facility in line of sight of LIMRAD94 with horizontal distance to LIMRAD94 of approximately 525 m. VISSS has pixel resolution of 58.832 μm px⁻¹, frame rate of 140 Hz, observation volume of 75.2×75.2×60.1 mm³, total observational volume of 0.000339 m³.
   Quantities: 58.832 μm px⁻¹ resolution, 140 Hz frame rate, 75.2×75.2×60.1 mm³ observation volume, 0.000339 m³ total volumeDuration: November 2022 to June 2023Conditions: Surface level observations, co-located with AMF2
   Equipment: VISSS, AMF2 facility
3. Collect meteorological data
   Additional data acquired at AMF2 including 2 m temperature, pressure, relative humidity, wind speed, ARM 3-channel microwave radiometer liquid water path, integrated water vapor. Vertical temperature profiles provided by ARM interpolated sonde and gridded VAP. Radiosonde data collected twice daily at 11:00 and 23:00 UTC transformed into continuous daily files with 1 min time resolution.

Typical Equipment

• LIMRAD94
• KAZR
• VISSS
• CSU X-band radar
• GPS module

Output Measurements

• azimuth alignment accuracy
• beam overlap distances
• range gate comparability

Papers Using This Protocol (1)

Places Where Used