Where to get a radar-on-a-chip?

[wyndham]

Folks, I'm newer than newbi and I have been searching for several days to find an inexpensive way to get a "Radar-on-a-Chip" or also known as Micro impule radar.
I have read of it's uses, and found the inventor, but the license fees are about $25k a yr and all I want to do is learn about it. I am told that some electronic's students can build one from "off the shelf components" but I am not one of these.
I understand a bit of the logic but needs a hands on to take apart or maybe a schematic on how's its built.
If this post needs to move to another area, please by all means. Anyone havwe any ideas, Wyndham

 

[Roff]

A gold prospector?
A metal detector that could "see" gold beneath the ground certainly would be revolutionary. I don't know of any "radar-on-chip", but I am interested in metal detector design. PM me if you want.

Ron

 

[wyndham]

Hey Ron, This might be an interesting idea, but as I said, where does one go to get the chip. This is not a RS item, wish it were.
Wyndham

 

[Roff]

Hey Ron, This might be an interesting idea, but as I said, where does one go to get the chip. This is not a RS item, wish it were.
Wyndham

And as I said, "I don't know of any "radar-on-chip"." I'll do a little searching, and if I find anything, I'll let you know.

 

[_nox_]

radar on a chip ? Where's the problem of building such a device ?
If you know how a radar works, you can create that in a miniature variant,too

 

[Oznog]

There's a big problem!! Radar frequencies do not travel normally across PCB traces, let alone through a chip. The transistors have to be of a very special design too to handle the frequency.

 

[_nox_]

yes, but a semiconductor device exists which can create radar frequencies.
Now you "just" need a quite similar device capable of generating the required radar scan image.

 

[Roff]

radar on a chip ? Where's the problem of building such a device ?
If you know how a radar works, you can create that in a miniature variant,too

Yeah, I used to work with a guy who failed to see the "gotchas" in a project. He seemed to feel that if it only took 10 seconds to think about something, well, hell, it couldn't take more than 10 minutes to do it.
He got into all kinds of trouble when he got into project management.

I'm not implying that radar on a chip can't be done. Just that it ain't simple. And it takes the right team, with the right resources.

 

[_nox_]

I've never said that it is simple. But I do not see any problems building one.
Either you need a very sensitive sensor on that chip or a very powerful pulsed emitter.

 

[jbeng]

I've never heard of a "radar on a chip" but you can get microwave source/detector units like the ones used in law enforcement radar guns. **broken link removed** to a company that sells them. It is up to you to design the appropriate signal processing/display circuitry.
JB

 

[philba]

Yeah, I used to work with a guy who failed to see the "gotchas" in a project. He seemed to feel that if it only took 10 seconds to think about something, well, hell, it couldn't take more than 10 minutes to do it.
He got into all kinds of trouble when he got into project management.

I'm not implying that radar on a chip can't be done. Just that it ain't simple. And it takes the right team, with the right resources.

yeah, I hear you on that one. frankly, the term "radar-on-a-chip" sounds like a marketing gimick.

 

[dknguyen]

Yeah, the smallest radar I have seen was on a small PCB and cost $3000 for the evaluation license and demo device.

Well, I am an far into my undergraduate program as an electronics student and let me tell you, I am nowhere near able to build any kind of radar so far. If you are a newbie as you say, chances are you can't either. For all we know, the electronics student in question is a graduate electronics student. They know a lot.

 

[wyndham]

I can barely make a 110 plug fit in a 220 receptical(had a fellow try that once).
Yea I saw the demo $$$ also, Just thought I'd give you guys a try. Wyndham

 

[oldtimer]

I worked in Radar for a few years at Marconi Marine in the test dept. and anybody who can build a device with any usable range on a chip has my eternal admiration.

 

[zachtheterrible]

Maybe the chip doesnt actually produce the RADAR signal. Maybe the chip just does the timing calculations?

 

[dknguyen]

A chip like that one hell of a chip and is half the battle.

 

[hjames]

Might be referring to this article...

http://www.llnl.gov/IPandC/technology/profile/sensor/MicropowerImpulseRadar/index.php

UWB tech is still pretty cutting edge, FCC just went through some contortions to allow use of some of the frequencies. I don't know of any companies providing sample chips though.

 

[wyndham]

That's the site as well as another at Caltech. The LLNL one has a working model in a fluid level detection set up for tankers. The thing that gets me is that the components are off the shelf and can cost as little as $20.
The original inventor started out to make a high speed digitizer of short lived events. Wyndham

 

[hjames]

Well, I'll be the first to say that something like this is (at first glance) over my head. The high frequency stuff would be a bit tricky - I think I skimmed over a paper which implemented a ground-bounce altimeter with parts of a CPLD running at 500(!) MHz, and an analog delay line to get some higher resolution - but doable. However trying to figure out how to get a directional antenna/front-end is pretty alien stuff to me. And as for imaging radar... utterly scary.

 

[oldtimer]

Then it's not RADAR on a chip is it.