pencil beam

American  

noun

1. a cone-shaped radar beam.

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Etymology

Origin of pencil beam

First recorded in 1945–50

Example Sentences

“And this light,” he said, adjusting the angle of the pencil beam, “and that’s it.”

From Literature

Dr Kavanagh explained: "We will have digital beam-forming and steering, which means in practice that we can generate multiple beams looking in multiple directions, so that we can cover a volume of the sky rather just look at what we like to call a pencil beam."

From BBC

Astronomers need hundreds and thousands of such pencil beam observations towards different stars before such maps begin to make sense.

From Forbes

They formed a slender pencil beam that hardly spread out at all.

From Time Magazine Archive

A few of those waves escape through the silver of one mirror, which is not quite thick enough to be totally opaque, and form the pencil beam of red maser light. 25-Mile Beam.

From Time Magazine Archive