This radar avoiding material decreases the tanks and armored vehicles’ radar, infrared and thermal marks and it was developed by a defence company that manufactures also composite material for Air, Land and Naval platforms by absorbing radar frequencies, namely the TDU Engineering&Consultancy operating within Hacettepe Teknokent. The company displayed its products for the first time to the countries of the region and to participants of the fair at DIMDEX 2014. 

TDU Engineering & Consultancy’s General Manager Ümit Öztürk informed Defence Turkey on the company’s products and future projects and mentioned that they have been deeply interested in this project for years and managed to covert this R&D technology into a project within past two years with the support of KOSGEB. Öztürk stated that they accomplished the first prototypes consisting of the first phase of the project and received successful results from the tests executed at TÜBİTAK. Ümit Öztürk expressed that they are in close contact with Turkish defence companies and Undersecretariat for Defence Industries on the industrialization of this product and said, “Our talks with the Industrialization Department are continuing. We will be able to make this product producible if we manage to invest in it”. 

Turkey Competes with United States and Israel with the Radar Avoiding Material 

Öztürk stated that the Project is composed of two main groups namely woven fabrics and composite materials and underlined that the woven fabrics are merely manufactured in United States and Israel for the time being and added that with the product they developed, Turkey became the third country with radar avoiding material technology. Öztürk mentioned that Tanks and Armored Land Vehicles are clothed with the material they developed while fixed armored vehicles and buildingsare covered with it. Öztürk said that visual, thermal and radar avoiding capacities enable invisibility in both types of usages aforementioned. Öztürk added that these materials with anti-radar capacities are woven with fibers with special geometry and the woven patterns are based on nano-technology and continued: “We are able to print our product in various colors and patterns. We can manufacture desert color, forest green and special colors for steppe conditions. This material has been manufactured with durable material and when it is clothed on fixed tanks and armored vehicles, it brings in anti-radar and anti-thermal capabilities. Moreover, by developing the camouflage system, we enabled the mobile tanks and armored vehicles not to be distinguished even in their mobility and reduced their visibility from the radars and thermal cameras. 

Structural Composite Material to Provide Invisibility for Naval and Air Platforms

Ümit Öztürk underlined that their product in the second main group - the composite material with anti-radar capacities is a first in the world. Öztürk mentioned that in order to provide invisibility to Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV), special paints are being used presently and added “These paints are affected from rain corrosion and increase the weight of the UAVs. Their substitutes, renewal and maintenance are very expensive. Turkey is in a search of radar avoiding material especially in structural composite and our talks with the Undersecretariat for Defence Industries and TAI on this matter continue. We intend to apply this product first on the UAV “Turna” and then on other UAVs such as “ANKA”. 

Öztürk underlined that the competitiveness of the indigenous, local products in international markets would increase by the application of this product on Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and said that merely by covering Turkish Armed Forces demand for the multispectral camouflage net through national resources, more than hundred million US Dollars would be saved. 

Öztürk added that this Structural Composite Radar Avoiding Material could be used in Naval Platforms in addition to the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and said, “If the material used in composite hulled boats and fast intervention boats were made of the material with radar avoiding capabilities we produce, then these boats would not be caught by the radar”. Öztürk mentioned that they have a demo study with Yonca-Onuk Company on this issue and added that to this end they were aiming to test their products on field through a demonstration.

TDU Engineering & Consultancy has been continuing its studies on this issue for more than 10 years and its efforts to industrialize this product remain in prototype phase and establishment of facilities for mass production is in full flow.