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How Radar Works
Traffi c radar, which consists of microwaves, travels
in straight lines and is easily refl ected by objects
such as cars, trucks, even guardrails and overpasses.
Radar works by directing its microwave beam down
the road. As your vehicle travels into range, the
microwave beam bounces off your car, and the
radar antenna looks for the refl ections.
Using the Doppler Principle, the radar
equipment then calculates your speed by
comparing the frequency of the refl ection of your
car to the original frequency of the beam sent out.
Traffi c radar has limitations, the most
signifi cant of these being that it typically can
monitor only one target at a time. If there is more
than one vehicle within range, it is up to the radar
operator to decide which target is producing the
strongest refl ection. Since the strength of the
refl ection is aff ected by both the size of the vehicle
and its proximity to the antenna, it is diffi cult for the
radar operator to determine if the signal is from a
sports car nearby or a semi-truck several hundred
feet away.
Radar range also depends on the
power of the radar equipment itself.
The strength of the radar unit’s beam
diminishes with distance.
The farther the radar has to
travel, the less energy it has for
speed detection.
Because intrusion alarms and motion sensors often
operate on the same frequency as X, and K-band
radar, your detector will occasionally receive
non-police radar signals.
Since these transmitters are usually contained
inside of a building, or aimed toward the ground,
they will generally produce much weaker readings
than will a true radar encounter.
As you become familiar with the sources of these
pseudo alarms in your daily driving, they will serve
as confi rmation that your device’s radar detection
abilities are fully operational.
In-Vehicle Technology (IVT Filter)
Some modern vehicles are now equipped with
radar based in-vehicle technology (IVT) systems
for adaptive cruise control, predictive braking,
and blind spot monitoring. Because some of these
systems operate on the same frequency as police
K-band radar, many radar detectors will alert to
these signals as police radar. This radar detector is
equipped with our updatable IVT Filter which
rejects these signals.
Because these safety systems are continually
changing, the IVT Filter is updatable. Updates to
the IVT Filter are released as fi rmware updates for
your detector that are installed using our exclusive
Detector Tools Pro software.
How “POP” Works
POP works by transmitting an extremely short
burst, within the allocated band, to identify
speeding vehicles in traffi c. Once the target is
identifi ed, or “popped,” the gun is then turned to its
normal operating mode to provide a vehicle
tracking history (required by law).
Note: According to radar gun manufacturers, tickets
should not be issued in pop mode.
How Laser (Lidar) Works
Laser speed detection is actually light detection
and ranging (LIDAR). Laser guns project a beam of
invisible infrared light. The signal is a series of very
short infrared light energy pulses that move in a
straight line, refl ecting off your car and returning to
the gun. Laser uses these light pulses to measure
the distance to a vehicle. Speed is then calculated
by measuring how quickly these pulses are
refl ected, given the known speed of light.
Laser is a newer technology whose use is not as
widespread as conventional radar; therefore, you
may not encounter it on a daily basis. And unlike
radar detection, laser is not prone to false alarms.
Because laser transmits a much narrower beam
than does radar, it is much more accurate in its
ability to distinguish between targets and is also
more diffi cult to detect. As a result, even the
briefest laser alert should be taken seriously.
There are limitations to laser, however. Laser is
much more sensitive to weather conditions than
radar, and a laser gun’s range will be decreased by
anything aff ecting visibility, such as rain, fog or
smoke. A laser gun cannot operate through glass,
and it must be stationary to get an accurate reading.
Because laser must have a clear line of sight and is
subject to cosine error (an inaccuracy that increases
as the angle between the gun and the vehicle
increases), police typically use laser equipment
parallel to the road or from an overpass. Laser can
be used day or night.
Understanding Your Detector
How GPS Works
The Global Positioning
System (GPS) is made up of
twenty four orbiting satellites and was developed
by the U.S. military. There are at least four satellites
visible at any given time every day.
A GPS receiver is designed to locate and receive
data from four of these satellites. This data includes
the distance to your location from each of the
satellites. Once the distance from each satellite is
known, the receiver can calculate and pinpoint your
exact location.
TSR Signal Ranking Software
Your radar detector includes a new
optional boost in anti-falsing software
to eliminate excessive alerts from
erroneous X and K-band sources. One example of
this is traffi c fl ow monitoring systems. These
systems, which are becoming more widely used in
several countries, generate K-band signals to
measure the fl ow of traffi c on a given road.
Unfortunately most detectors see this as a real
threat and will alert you to it unnecessarily. Our new
proprietary software (TSR), intelligently sorts, ranks
and rejects this type of false alarm automatically.
The result is ultimate protection without excessive
false alarms.
The TSR software is set up as an option and can be
activated through the Programming section. We
suggest you turn TSR on if you are experiencing
extreme false alerts in your area. If not, your
detector is ready to start protecting you right out of
the box.
If you have any questions about this new feature,
please give us a call or visit our website for more
details.
