Multiple beam receiving array signal processor

Claim 1

A signal processor for a multiple element radar receiving antenna array of N-1 spaced antenna elements, comprising: N-1 mixers each discretely responsive to the received signal on a corresponding one of said antenna elements, said mixers operating against a local oscillator frequency off-set by a predetermined amount from the radio frequency of said received signals to generate N-1 intermediate frequency signals; means for sampling said N-1 intermediate frequency signals periodically and simultaneously to provide N-1 sample signals: a phase weighted transversal filter and means for transferring said sample signals serially to said filter in a sequence which is a reordering of the linear phase sequence of said antenna elements according to the prime number transform algorithm p=g i modulo N, where i is the original sequence, p is the reordered sequence, and g is the primitive root of a prime number N; means within said transversal filter comprising a tapped delay line with the outputs of successive taps thereof being individually phase weighted corresponding to the reordered sequence of said sampled signals; and means for summing the phase weighted taps of said delay line to effect a convolution of the input signal sequence and the phase weighting sequence.