How A Radar Detector Works

Written By Chouhab on mercredi 3 décembre 2008 | 19:28

By Tommy Joe Canter

Police officers have used the science of radars to compute the speed of drivers and to help them keep the roads safe for years. However, there are many drivers who have been using radar detectors to keep them from getting caught speeding and paying costly fines as a results of these speeding violations. In spite of the popularity of radars and radar detectors, there are lots of people who still do not understand the science or technology behind them.

The cops use these radar guns which operate by transmitting radio waves from the radar to your car and then wait for the waves to bounce back. And because radio waves move through the air at a constant speed, which is the speed of light, radars can easily determine just how far away an object is based on the amount of time it takes for that radio signal to return. When an object such as a car is in motion, there is a change in the frequency of these radio waves.

Radars then detect this change and convert it into miles per hour that determine the speed of the target. Furthermore, radar guns also use different types of wave bands to determine the speed of the target, including X band, K band, and Ka band. What a radar detector does is alert the driver whenever it detects the presence of radars.

One of the newer technologies that have come along is lasers. Police officers can now use a laser beam to also determine the speed of a vehicle. A laser is nothing more than a concentrated beam of light. These laser radar guns measure the time it takes for an infrared beam of light to leave the gun, reach a car, bounce off and then return back. These units can determine how far away an object is by multiplying this time by the speed of light. Since this type of radar sends out many bursts of light to determine multiple distances, the system can evaluate how fast the car is moving by comparing these samples.

The thing is that while laser speed detectors have a much more focused beam and can detect lasers over great distances, these police laser guns are generally more difficult to evade. While modern radar detectors often include a light-sensitive panel that detects these light beams, the problem is that by the time the detector senses them, the vehicle is usually already in the sights of the beam.

While the traditional radar detector operates by alerting the driver to the presence of a radar or laser, there are now detectors on the market that also emit a jamming signal. This signal duplicates the original signal from the police radar gun and mixes it with additional radio noise, which will confuse the radar receiver, and thereby prevents the police officer from getting an accurate speed reading.

Some of these newer detectors can also jam a laser by that producing a light beam of their own. The beam prevents the receiver from recognizing any reflected light to get a clear reading on the speed of the vehicle.

So since you now understand how these pieces of electronics work, then maybe you can avoid getting speeding tickets in the future. If speeding tickets have been an issue for you, then perhaps you would want to consider buying one of these units. They will pay for themselves in a very short time.

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