Meteor radar prototype testing and data quality comparison analysis for Phase II of Chinese Meridian Project

The Phase Ⅱ of Chinese Meridian Project will deploy 10 meteor radar systems in China. To promote the advancement of domestic ground-based observation technologies, the project managing headquarters are engaged in a special campaign for the localization of meteor radar production. To ensure that the domestically manufactured product meets the requirements, prototype testing was carried out, including a technique indicator test and data quality evaluation. According to the results of the field technique indicator test, the prototype fully met the requirements. Further, the data quality was evaluated using the EMDR meteor radar data as a reference. The main comparison parameters included valid meteor count, space-time distribution of meteor number, height distribution of diffusion coefficient, and distribution of wind field at varying height and time. This study mainly explains data quality evaluation results, revealing some basic characteristics and laws of meteor radar observation, in an attempt to testify the capability of the prototype and provide a reference for future meteor radar data quality evaluation.