SATURN

COMPARISON OF
SATURN AND HAVEQUICK

Trent Trpkosh
Collins Aerospace
Cedar Rapids, Iowa
[email protected]

March 2019

Authored by Boyd Kaiser and Jarod Droll

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 The HAVEQUICK program was a response to

jamming and has remained a vital capability to

counter adversaries’ jamming efforts. However, as

technology advanced and became more robust and

precise, a new technology was needed and it is

rapidly becoming the standard for military

communication….SATURN.
Figure 1. SATURN Secure Coalition Communication

BACKGROUND INFORMATION SATURN (Second generation Anti-jam Tactical UHF

Since the end of World War II, the United States and Radio for NATO) is the most recent UHF coalition

Coalition military aircraft have used AM radios in the waveform for military airborne operations, defined by

225–400 MHz Ultra High Frequency (UHF) band for the Standardization Agreement (STANAG) 4372.

short-range air-to-air and ground-to-air SATURN is a fast frequency hopping waveform that

communication. Frequency hopping for secure was developed as a replacement for the HQ

communication for aircraft and helicopters did not waveform.

become essential until after the Vietnam War.

SATURN AND HAVEQUICK COMPARISON
Progress in electronics in the 1970’s reached a point
While the newer SATURN waveform shares some
where anyone with an inexpensive radio frequency
similarities with the legacy HAVE QUICK waveform,
scanner-receiver could intercept or jam military
a number of differences exist between the two
communications. Once the target frequency was
waveforms. Error! Reference source not found.
known, radio frequency jamming could easily be
(below) compares some of the basic characteristics
employed to degrade or completely disable
between SATURN and HAVEQUICK.
communications.

Table 1. SATURN and HAVEQUICK Comparison

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Characteristic HAVE QUICK SATURN

Frequency Range UHF Band (225-400 MHz) UHF Band (225-400 MHz)

Channel Spacing 25 kHz 25 kHz

Modulation Voice: Amplitude Modulation (AM) Minimum Shift Keying (MSK)

Data: Amplitude Shift Keying (ASK)

Waveform Type Frequency Hopping Frequency Hopping

Analog: Digital

- Information sent during tune - All information is sent digitally

times (i.e. when radio is (either data or digitized voice)
switching from one frequency to and is burst out between radio
another) is lost. tune times so no information is
lost.

Full band and sub- Yes Yes

band hopping nets

Plaintext/ Ciphertext Yes Yes

Operation

Setup Parameters Time, WOD/MWOD, Net Number Time, WOD/MWOD, Net Number

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Characteristic HAVE QUICK SATURN

- WOD/MWOD WOD: WOD:

Word-of-Day, consists of 6 segments Word-of-Day, consists of 6 segments that

that “look like” UHF frequencies “look like” UHF frequencies

Example: Example:

300.050 300.050

235.050 235.050

225.150 225.150

252.925 252.925

239.950 239.950

271.950 271.950

MWOD: MWOD:

Multiple Word-of-Day, similar to WOD Multiple Word-of-Day, similar to WOD but

but with a date tag with a date tag

Example: Example:

300.050 300.050

235.050 235.050

225.150 225.150

252.925 252.925

239.950 239.950

271.950 271.950

25 25

NOTE: Information extracted from the WOD/MWOD for HAVE QUICK and SATURN
is waveform dependent.

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Characteristic HAVE QUICK SATURN

Net Number Format: AXX.XXX Format: AXX.XXX or BXX.XXXX

X is an integer 0-9 X is an integer 0-9

Time Radios on a net require similar time in Radios on a net require similar time in
order to communicate order to communicate

While both waveforms require similar time between terminals on a net to

communicate, SATURN requires tighter time accuracy in order to communicate. In
order to support this, SATURN provides a number of schemes for transferring time
between terminals on a SATURN net. (See “User Initiated Time Corrections of Time
of Day Differences Between Members of a Net” below).

Analog Voice Yes Yes

Communication
Small portions of the analog voice signal Digitized voice is burst between frequency
are lost during the frequency tune tune periods so no information is lost.
periods.

Data Yes Yes

Not ideal since data will be lost during Data is buffered and burst out between
frequency tune periods frequency tune periods so no information
is lost

Data Rates Does not inherently provide data rates, Supports both continuous and fixed length
data timing provided by external protocol (50 bytes) data communication.
(e.g. data terminal, encryption device,
network protocol). Synchronous Data Rates:

- 300 / 600 / 1200 / 2400 / 16000

bps

Asynchronous Data Rates:

- 300 / 600 / 1200 bps

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Characteristic HAVE QUICK SATURN

Data Interleaving None Includes Interleaving process to spread

out burst errors.

Forward Error None FEC included for all Synchronous data

Correction (FEC) rates below 16 kbps.

Data Overlay None Provides pseudo-random overlay on all

data.

User Defined Yes (User can define up to 16 Yes (User can define up to 40
Training Nets frequencies) frequencies)

Supports Relay Yes Yes

Operation

Provides Monitoring No Yes

of Separate Fixed
Frequency Channel Can be set up to monitor a user
(Hailing) selectable fixed frequency channel for
activity and will alert user if signal is
present.

SATURN Page 6 of 9
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Characteristic HAVE QUICK SATURN

Received Signal Yes Yes

Recognition
Via squelch Via message synchronization

NOTE: Along with normal message

synchronization, the following variants
exist:

Split Synchronization:

Receiver uses the front portion of dwell to

synchronize to combat a follower jammer;
which may be disrupting the later part of
the dwell.

Extended Preamble:

Transmitter sends extra preamble

information to assist message
synchronization in a noisy environment.

Break-In Capability Yes Yes

Conferencing: Receiver Break-In:

When enabled, allows two radio to When enabled, allows a receiving radio to
transmit simultaneously such that other temporarily cease the reception from first
radios on the net can receive both received transmission and start receiving
transmissions simultaneously. from a second received transmission.

Transmitter Break-In:

When enabled, allows a transmitting radio

to temporarily cease its transmission to
receive a transmission from a second
radio.

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Characteristic HAVE QUICK SATURN

Automatic Time No Yes

Updates
Nets are set up where one member is a
Time Master. When other members
receive a transmission from the Time
Master, they update their internal clocks
to the timing of the reception. Therefore,
all members of the net stay time
synchronized to the Time Master rather
than potentially drifting off in time.

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Characteristic HAVE QUICK SATURN

User Initiated Time Yes Yes

Corrections Between
Members of a Net Supports sending user initiated time Supports various methods for distributing
updates to other members of the net. time to other members of the network:

Passive Time Error Correction (PTEC):

When commanded, a terminal will

automatically offset its internal time in an
attempt to receive from other members on
the net; which have a different time of
day. Allows for relative small time
corrections.

Active Time Error Correction (ATEC):

When commanded, a terminal will

automatically send system messages to
the Time Master. The Time Master will
then respond with a command message
to the terminal causing it to update its time
to that of the Time Master. (Allows for
larger time corrections than PTEC).

Time of Day (TOD) Beacon:

When commanded, the Time Master will

periodically send out a Beacon message.
When commanded, a terminal will enter a
mode where it searched for the Beacon
message. When it is received, the
terminal will updated its time to that of the
Time Master. (Allows for larger time
corrections than ATEC).

While SATURN and HAVEQUICK waveforms appear similar, the waveform performance is different. SATURN is
a robust anti-jam waveform that greatly outperforms HAVEQUICK; which is why all Coalition UHF
communications are transitioning to SATURN by 2023.

SATURN Page 9 of 9
© 2019 Collins Aerospace, a United Technologies company. All rights reserved.
This document contains no export controlled technical data