Picking Up The Signal In Stow | Radant Technologies protects the equipment that protects us
After about a year of false starts, Radant Technologies Inc. in Stow brought Jean-Claude Sureau on in 1981 as the company’s technical director. Over the years, his role grew to that of owner and today the company is made up of the corporate parent and two related companies: Radant MEMS, Robot Racing.
Radant itself makes something instantly recognizable but difficult to name: Radomes. They are the domed structures on the front tip of airplanes that protect the plane’s weather-detecting radar equipment.
Sometimes, you’ll see radomes atop a commercial plane’s fuselage or protecting communications antennas. You can also find numerous radomes on cruise ships.
What’s The Frequency
While planes and cruise ships are familiar places to find radomes, and Radant does do a limited amount of work for commercial clients, the primary user of its radomes is the military, according to Sureau.
In fact Sureau and John Maciel, vice president and COO of Radant MEMS, which is housed in the same Stow facility, both came to Radant from the military technology industry.
Sureau’s son Michael runs Robot Racing, which adapts the techniques used to make Radant’s radomes to shape carbon fiber components for use in high-end racing automobiles.
A radome's only job is to protect the equipment it shields while allowing microwave signals to pass through unimpeded.
As you might have guessed, that means the folks at Radant do a lot of testing. Interestingly, a lot of that testing is done on the roof of the company’s building.
Sureau said manufacturing a radome begins as a textile operation, where fiber material is measured and cut.
“Then we’re in the wallpaper business,” he said, as the material is mounted to large forms. Radant’s material contains a resin that when heated makes the material rigid and nearly indestructible. Once it hardens, it’s painted.
Testing, Testing
To test the finished radomes, certain of Radant’s about 75 employees hoist them to the roof high above Stow. There, the company keeps a radar system. In the distance, you can see a radio tower. From the tower, a signal is sent to the system on the roof. Then, the new radome is placed over the test system and the signal is sent again and the staff can determine if the signal is changing in any way due to the radome.
Within Radant MEMS (Micro Electrical Mechanical Systems) the company has developed tiny electrical switches that allow the antennas and other equipment Radant’s radome’s protect to receive and relay signals much faster than traditional electronic switches.
Certain radar equipment requires mechanical operation to turn as it receives signal. With MEMS, all of that directional switching is done without that mechanical motion. The result is a radar system that can now be operated at a much higher speed. And if the user of a radar system wants to see what’s off to his left, he can do it right away, without having to wait for a machine to move the radar system to his left.
Robot Racing takes carbon fiber and forms it for use in automobiles. In the facility recently, there were a few dashboards and other panels in various stages. The company works with Lamborghini, and there’s also a race car being prepped for competition and Robot Racing’s panels will help it be lighter and hopefully faster.
The company is also hoping that DiMora Motorcar, which when the economy was good, was working on a multi-million dollar sports car. Robot Racing is developing the roof structure for that vehicle.
Got news for our Industrial Strength column? E-mail WBJ Managing Editor Matthew L. Brown at mbrown@wbjournal.com
Watch as Radant tests one of its radomes:
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