Homebrew radar?

Probably do-able but challenging; remember the 1 foot = 1 nanosecond thumb rule. This would need some narrow pulses and fast electronics.

"steamer"

** Very.

** An infrared viewer may do a better job of seeing through dust.

Warm objects like people, bitumen roads and car exhausts will be seen very easily

A speed radar gun ( facing straight ahead ) would indicate if you are approaching a stationary or oncoming vehicle.

...... Phil

There are many marine radar units available...

Hi, Ed. If you're looking for a homebrew radar setup, you could do worse than look at the Ramsey Electronics SG7 - Speedy Radar Kit. It's relatively inexpensive, and the radar output itself is pretty hackable.

I'd recommend using a *very* well regulated supply instead of a wall wart. Make sure you follow the checkout instructions on the radar section before you seal it up in the can -- once you enclose it in the shield, you'll have a hard time fixing it if it isn't right.

Good luck Chris

Silicon Chip did a home made radar gun project:

Dave.

You mentioned a crt... you want a picture of whats in front of the car? That sounds tricky. How about a sector scan display?

--Note prices not listed; I'd bet dollars to donuts I can't afford it; that's why I'm going homebrew. No landmarks where I want to use it either, so GPS maps and other fancy stuff like terrain overlays won't help.

--
        "Steamboat Ed" Haas         :  A steaming pile of           
        Hacking the Trailing Edge!  :  obscure information...
                          www.nmpproducts.com
                   ---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

--Do you mean the kind of thing that displays a slice-of-pie, rather than a whole circle? Yeah, that's a possibility. Trouble is, 'targets' (bicycles and other cars) might be coming at me from any angle but they'd be moving pretty slow in the same kind of weather..

--
        "Steamboat Ed" Haas         :  A steaming pile of           
        Hacking the Trailing Edge!  :  obscure information...
                          www.nmpproducts.com
                   ---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

--Oh, hey, forgot about that. I guess one could envision a way to swivel the thing with a stepper, then output to a crt, yes? Gotta buttonhole the inventor (met him at a conference once) and see if that's a possibility.

--That's the easy part! :-)

--
        "Steamboat Ed" Haas         :  A steaming pile of           
        Hacking the Trailing Edge!  :  obscure information...
                          www.nmpproducts.com
                   ---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

============================================== Can you describe how a car or bicyle would appear on your crt? You imagine it to be like a tv picture? You want moving images? Many pictures per second? Have an algorithm for doing that? Have a pencil beam transmitter on a gimbal and paint it back and forth? Too mechanical? The you want a phased array like on an Aegis cruiser? That would probably cost more than that Foruno marine radr I think.

I don't know.

About 1971, Popular Electronics had an article about "personal radar" for boats, at least one of which was portable (hence could be used in a row boat if one really wanted it), and while they were pricey at the time, they were not out of the range of all personal boat owners.

Given that electronics has generally become cheaper, and presumably almost

40 years of having "personal radar" making the notion more acceptable (hence more demand), such radar may be more in range of the average person than back in 1971.

Michael

I would think a re-worked Electronic Tape measure would make sense ! I would think that 12 miles per hour/17.6 ft. per second would be the upper limit for driving in white-out conditions.

Readout would be listening to the audio output of the Range to Target!

Why would you want to watch a video monitor (scope, radar display) under these conditions.

You would NEVER drive 60 miles an hour under white-out conditions ???, That's FATAL. Hitting a tree at 12mph is usually survivable !

Enhancing the Transmitter and receiver for an Acoustic Tape measure would be relatively simple. I could imagine that Acoustic Clutter would become a real problem at ranges greater than 100 ft.

Yukio YANO

I re-read your post ! You are describing, driving in a Convoy ! An Acoustic Tape measure would work great to maintain ~ 20ft spacing in a dense fog . Yukio YANO

(snip) --Clueless newbie here; I'd settle for any blobby shape; big for car and small for bike but would also like to be able to get something for nonmetallic objects; i.e. pedestrians...

--Not needed; any indication would do..

You want moving images? Many pictures per second? --One image per sweep?

Have an algorithm for doing that? --Remember that 'clueless' part? ;-)

--OK by me; not too mechanical: that's my strong suit.

--
        "Steamboat Ed" Haas         :  A steaming pile of           
        Hacking the Trailing Edge!  :  obscure information...
                          www.nmpproducts.com
                   ---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

--Not so much a convoy as a melee! Imagine a space, a mile and a half in diameter, flat, dusty and filled with all manner of vehicles and people milling about in no particular direction and you'll have an idea..

--Hmmmm. Sounds interesting! Even better to have the thing mounted on a helmet so anywhere I 'look' I could tell object nearness, yes?

--
        "Steamboat Ed" Haas         :  A steaming pile of           
        Hacking the Trailing Edge!  :  obscure information...
                          www.nmpproducts.com
                   ---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

Sorry if this is a bit late answer but here it is anyway.

A Slovenian chap - S53MV, build a 4GHz altimeter. This is a small radar that tells you the distance to objects in front of the antenna. No fancy sweeps etc, just a raw plot on a cheapo LCD.

If you place the antenna in the front of your car, you should go reasonably free of ground clutter.

This little gadget works many hundred yards...

//Dan, M0DFI

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