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Thread: Radar van..

  1. #1
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    Default Radar van..

    In AZ and I am sure a few other states we have photo radar vans that sit on the side of the road giving tickets.. I though the V1 would easily pick up a van blasting constant radar down the road.. Boy was I wrong.. My V1 didnt go off until 200 feet in front of the van and I made a few U turns and kept passing the van over and over and same spot it would go from 1 bar (200 feet out) to 4 really quick (150 feet out) .. BTW it was blasting KA, normally I can pick up speed signs blasting K a mile away along with high patrol blasting KA from their cars a mile away and thats with someone pulled over and its reflecting off their car and bouncing back. But what makes this radar van different? Is it just shooting at a limited range to rule out possibility of another car interfering with it?

  2. #2
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    Ka band is a narrow band. What was across the street (field, wall, etc). Was there traffic or open road? If there was nothing for the radar to bounce off of this would be expected. They usually shoot at an angle to the road, shooting straight down it would be way to easy & they know it.


  3. #3
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    Would that be a reliable way to measure speed? With the cosine error and at that angle to the road, it seems you'd have to be speeding quite a bit for it to measure something over the PSL.


    Dax

  4. #4
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    It was in the middle of rush hour. I was headed north on the road away from traffic and had about 3-4 cars in front of me and I saw it visually about 400 feet out. On the southbound portion was car to car. I passed by it two more times to just test it out. And each time same result and even one time I was the only car.

    And I saw the black radar antenna it was on the side of the van folded out about waist height. I would say the angle was 190-200 degrees.. Assuming the font of the van is 0 and the rear of the van in 180

    What I dont get is how I can pick up KA band from a highway patrol car a mile out when he has someone pulled over and the radar is bouncing off the car in front of him. I have still yet to encounter a highway patrol car running radar that doesnt have someone pulled over but then again I have had a V1 for about 3 -4 weeks now..

    I was just shocked 200 feet...

  5. #5

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    Quote Originally Posted by andrewaz
    It was in the middle of rush hour. I was headed north on the road away from traffic and had about 3-4 cars in front of me and I saw it visually about 400 feet out. On the southbound portion was car to car. I passed by it two more times to just test it out. And each time same result and even one time I was the only car.

    And I saw the black radar antenna it was on the side of the van folded out about waist height. I would say the angle was 190-200 degrees.. Assuming the font of the van is 0 and the rear of the van in 180

    What I dont get is how I can pick up KA band from a highway patrol car a mile out when he has someone pulled over and the radar is bouncing off the car in front of him. I have still yet to encounter a highway patrol car running radar that doesnt have someone pulled over but then again I have had a V1 for about 3 -4 weeks now..

    I was just shocked 200 feet...
    i'm surprised noone answered this, let me give you some insight, those vans are probably low powered, angled across the road, and hard as **** to detect. There is probably not as much of a high out put as police mobile radar in the car which is easily detected miles away.

  6. #6
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    andrewaz,
    I have no idea if this would make any difference but, the next time you see the van try putting the V1 in euro mode and see if it makes a difference? Just don't forget to put it back in usa mode. I wonder what company produces those vans?

  7. #7
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    Generally photo radars have a method for compensating for cosine effect. Since they're stationary and are slaved to a computer of some sort, it isn't difficult to determine the angle across the road and then plug in a correction factor into the computer.

  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by KaPro
    andrewaz,
    I have no idea if this would make any difference but, the next time you see the van try putting the V1 in euro mode and see if it makes a difference? Just don't forget to put it back in usa mode.
    If K-band is the main threat in your area,then you'll gain a few dB,if you run V1 in Euro-mode.BUT,V1 in Euro-mode will cover only 33.9GHz to 34.65GHz of Ka-band spectrum.I heard some photo-radars in USA work on Ka-34.2GHz and Ka-34.6GHz(Lockheed-Martin photo-radar sistem).Do you know anything about that?

  9. #9
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    Most of these Ka units are very low power from my understanding. I have had best results with my Rx65 in USA mode rather then my V1 in cases like your describing.

  10. #10
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    We have heaps of these vans in New Zealand. They are running Ka 34.7 and shoot a narrow beam across the road at 22.5 degrees (out the rear window of the van). They are really hard to pick up, the cheap detectors generally only pick them as you hit the beam which of course is too late if you havn't already seen it.

    The V1 and RX65/Sti will generally pick them up in ideal conditions at about 200 to 300 yards but it is often a weak signal as the beam bounces of cars going through the beam ahead of you.

    Fortunately there are no demerit points on camera tickets (yet) so the only real pain is in the pocket if they do get you.

    My wife has got a couple of tickets from them and we have written in and got off each one. Told them that an ambulance was coming up from behind so she had to speed up to get around the parked van to get out of the way!

 

 

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