CA - New Camera's on HWY 280, Radar?

[nmaple]

Anyone else on this board commute on between San Jose and San Francisco on HWY 280 and notice the new camera's installed most of the way and activated in the last two weeks?

They set off the K-Band of my 8500, and unfortnatuely appear to be real K-Band signals. :(
The cameras themselves appear more to be just solar powered video cameras...

Any ideas ?

[V1 Dave]

I am experiencing the same thing this week on HWY 580 from Dublin to Oakland and back.
I thought it was the Bart tracks. Every few miles I get a weak or full tone on K band.
Drone radar's really suck.
If this keeps up it is going to force us to shut down K band.
I thought drone radar signals were illegal by the FCC :?:

[911crash]

They have been very busy on 280 of late. In the last 2weeks, they have installed at least 8 of what appear to be solar powered units between 92 and El Monte. Not sure if they are tied to a camera as it appears to be a solar panel and radar unit. Maybe a camera is buried in it as well. I am anxious to see what happens at night. I haven't been out there at night since I first discovered them.
I would like to know more as it ruins my commute.

[gustog]

I've just started to notice the drones as well on 280. I believe they are part of the expansion of the 511 information system in the Bay Area. See the link below for more info.

http://traffic.511.org/default.asp?reload=1

[nmaple]

Thanks all for your comments. Part of the 511 system seems like it could be a logical extension, and the 511 site does mention use of "off-pavment" technologies.....

Still as 911crash sates, ruins my commute also. For now I have had to disable K-Band, which I have noticed some local sheriff's still use.

I have done the trip at night, and the same effect is in place. I was faster than other traffic, and as best I know did not suffer....

[stimilon]

I've found some info on the CalTrans website about the cameras... I think they do work in conjunction with the 511 site. They seem to only monitor traffic flow and not specific drivers, but could be wrong. They're called "SideFire Radar Detectors" and more info can be found at http://ruralits.org/hq/research/roadway/sensorsresearch/sensorsresearch_hardware.htm
http://ruralits.org/hq/research/operations/ptzcamera/additional_functionalilty.htm
and
http://ruralits.org/hq/research/operations/videosync/analysis.htm

[Alexander]

Interesting discovery, stimilon. It looks like the radar is only being used to detect the presence of vehicles in the lane for flow rate, not the speed of individual vehicles, and the camera is only there for setup/debugging purposes. (Camera uses a WiFi link, which wouldn't be useful very far from the system.) So it probably has nothing to do with speed enforcement.

But, I also noticed quite a few motorcycle cops hanging out on the side of the road (CHP motorcycles use K-band, right?), and was actually pulled over by a CHP cruiser doing 83 in the middle of the day with moderate traffic, which seems a little unusual. It would certainly make radar speed enforcement easier, even if that wasn't the intended goal.

Anyway, if anyone has more information, I'd be very interested to hear it. I hope these are as temporary as that site seems to imply.

[V1 Dave]

Only found one so far on HWY 680. 580 is loaded with them.
It is between the 580/680 interchange and the Stoneridge exit.
When I am southbound in the morning I will get either a slow beep or a strong full tone K band like instant on as it hits the rear antenna.
Coming home Northbound it is always a slow beep.
Thanks to the arrows and the gradient audio I can tell that it is targeting the southbound lanes, shooting vehicles in the back.
http://www.radardetector.net/viewtopic.php?t=3140&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=

http://www.radardetector.net/viewtopic.php?t=3071&highlight=radar+drone

http://www.radarbusters.com/news/current/radar-drones.asp

[starwars]

Hello all,

I am glad I am not the only one experiencing this. I thought the last week that I was going batty. I have a Valentine One and commute from Dublin to Oakland up 580 each morning and night. I have noticed the highest concentration westbound from Tassajara Road all the way to Keller Avenue overpass. Thanks to the directional indicators on the Valentine, they definitely hit you from the back as well. I noticed 3 separate cops this morning writing tickets in a 5 mile stretch of 580 in Dublin. At night there does not seem to be as many, but they are definitely still active. This is annoying. So much for a 20 minute commute @ 85 mph.

[Jpandes]

I'm glad that you guys noticed this as well.

I wonder if the cops can use their radar guns to bust speeders in the areas where the radar/cameras are present? I'm guessing that if they use Ka or Laser that the false signal may be good "cover" them.

[TheGame]

I thought drone radar signals were illegal by the FCC :?:

Hmm ... is that really true? Here in Arizona I get decoy K-band signals anytime a Scottsdale Fire Dept. truck is near ... two of them and very strong too.

[edweird]

I noticed 3 separate cops this morning writing tickets in a 5 mile stretch of 580 in Dublin.

Within just a square mile or so, you've got a CHP office, Alameda County SO, Dublin PD, and Pleasanton PD. I think that particular intersection (580-680) was singled out as a enforcement zone for agressive driving if I remember an article from the Valley Times correctly.

Folks that use Crow Canyon to cut through from San Ramon to Castro Valley also get to see the CHP on a regualr basis, usually right where it goes to 4 lanes, and you finally get a chance to pass the slow cars. :oops:

Ed

[edweird]

I thought drone radar signals were illegal by the FCC :?:

Hmm ... is that really true? Here in Arizona I get decoy K-band signals anytime a Scottsdale Fire Dept. truck is near ... two of them and very strong too.

Could that be SWS (Safety Warning Signals) you are picking up from the firetrucks?

Ed

[MLPanzer]

When we drove to Sacramento July 4th, we went via 280, and my V1 with V1.7 guts (per their site) was going nuts as others have described every few miles. I noticed some new mounted hardware on the roads but could not make out what it was for. I just found this thread here so now I know! The detection pattern was wrong, did not match normal CHP deployment of the radar, so I suspected it was something weird, especially since my V1 worked fine and as expected everywhere else.

On July 4th I saw 15 to 20 CHP and Sheriff cars nailing cars from San Jose to Hwy 92 North and Southbound. I ran up to to the city on July 14 and encountered a less intense but similar operation, with one CHP pulling two vehicles over at the same time. So watch out for a while if you use 280.

This section of 280 was highlighted in the local papers as being targted for enforcement because it is an autobahn and very few CHP or Sheriff cars bothered with it in the past.

I am considering upgrading my V1 to eliminate Ka false alarms and just update the unit, as it is 5 years old and I run it constantly when driving. It has saved me from a lot of tickets.


Interesting discovery, stimilon. It looks like the radar is only being used to detect the presence of vehicles in the lane for flow rate, not the speed of individual vehicles, and the camera is only there for setup/debugging purposes. (Camera uses a WiFi link, which wouldn't be useful very far from the system.) So it probably has nothing to do with speed enforcement.

But, I also noticed quite a few motorcycle cops hanging out on the side of the road (CHP motorcycles use K-band, right?), and was actually pulled over by a CHP cruiser doing 83 in the middle of the day with moderate traffic, which seems a little unusual. It would certainly make radar speed enforcement easier, even if that wasn't the intended goal.

Anyway, if anyone has more information, I'd be very interested to hear it. I hope these are as temporary as that site seems to imply.

[TheGame]

I thought drone radar signals were illegal by the FCC :?:

Hmm ... is that really true? Here in Arizona I get decoy K-band signals anytime a Scottsdale Fire Dept. truck is near ... two of them and very strong too.

Could that be SWS (Safety Warning Signals) you are picking up from the firetrucks?

They're not from regular fire trucks themselves but from utility vehicles used by the FD. Could be though.

[starwars]

Has anyone noticed that in the last day or two the signals from the 580 drone cameras now grow and fade like traditional radar guns? On my commute Thursday and Friday, there was no instant on signals, but instead each one was easily detected in time to slow down and then speed up again. :) Anyone else experience this?

[V1 Dave]

Yikes they are multiplying!
They are very sporadic with their signals from nothing to gradual beeping or just a full tone all 8 LED's at once in the front or in the back.
Hwy 580 Livermore to Oakland
Hwy 101 at Bernal Ave in So San Jose to San Martin or Gilroy Ca
Hwy 101 NB between Rengstorff and San Antonio
Over the 08/06/05 weekend Hwy 680 from Pleasanton to San Jose became saturated with drones.
At one spot there is a double drone in the center divider shooting both directions but never at the same time.

[dcsmitty]

Check out http://www.speedinfo.com/sensor.htm
A whole new system soon to be Bay Area Wide.
Anyone interested in doing a story on this system and letting a photographer from local station NBC 11 Ride along, as your radar detctor constantly goes off. Are you angry?... got a question for the CEO of the company? We're going to talk to him. Get in touch, please.

[maxslug]

Is there a list of detectors that allow you to turn off the K band alone?

I drive up and down the 280 a few times a week and my god these new things are driving me insane!

What I would love is a unit that has a few setable modes like :

* City
* Hw1 (no K band)
* Hw2 (all bands)


Anyone know if there is a unit that matches?

[V1 Dave]

You can shut off individual bands with most top of the line RD's.
But with a V1 you can go one step further as you can totally silence K band volume only, and still see the LED's from the drones hitting you in the front & back if you choose. Codes (7) (b) (E) (F) logic mode (l).

[maxslug]

Thanks for the Info.

I checked out the manual for the V1 and it looks like it has a lot of K-Band options.

Two more questions for you experts though :

1. If I were to hang a V1 above my rear-view but below the tinted strip on my windshield do you think it would reduce my rear sensor's sensitivity?

2. How annoying is it to turn the K-Band on and off? I go between mountain roads with local sherriffs and CHP so I would need to turn it on and off occasionally.

Thanks!
-m

[V1 Dave]

(1) It should not hurt to mount high.
(2) If you use the automute codes for K band all you have to do is simply switch to (A) mode to override all automute settings.
Unfortunately these drones just went to continuous on mode which is breaking my 30 second maximum threshold forcing us to manually mute the signal more than 1-2 times then rely on the bogy lock tone if we run into a LEO on a different band.
http://www.radardetector.net/viewtopic.php?p=813&highlight=#813
Click to print how to reprogram V1 and keep it in your glove compartment (http://valentine1.com/lab/MikesLabRpt3.asp)

[maxslug]

Thanks for the info!

[ancientintegra]

If you use the automute codes for K band all you have to do is simply switch to (A) mode to override all automute settings.
Unfortunately these drones just went to continuous on mode which is breaking my 30 second maximum threshold forcing us to manually mute the signal more than 1-2 times then rely on the bogy lock tone if we run into a LEO on a different band.

Hey V1 Dave,

I'm newly back to the Bay area and am contending with the drones. I have a couple questions on your advice. When you say, "Codes (7) (b) (E) (F) logic mode (l)", do you mean to switch each of these from the factory setting? In other words, 7 down, b down, C up, d up, E down, F down? Is the idea here to disable K band as much as possible in the audio domain, leaving the lights active? The drones I have seen are not continuous and I would be tempted to leave b, C, and d up for a 10 s limit.

Also, how slowly is "slowly" for feature F? It seems like the drones are low power and/or aimed off the road, so they tend to rise quickly in signal strength. Since I don't live right on top of any drones I haven't experimented yet, but it seems to me that I would try 7 down, b up, C up, d up, E down, F up as a first start. I'm scared to put G down.

And off topic, I fully agree with 1 down in CA, haven't seen X in CA in 15 years of RD use, except in a national park, and even that was 10 years ago.

[V1 Dave]

ancientintegra, Ten seconds seems to hold K band automute on the drones except for the one that was on full time of course and I did get more breakthrough with traffic on the way home because of more exposure.
Another nice thing about V1 is that it has a ten-second reset time unlike the competition. In other words if a signal is muted then lost and comes back within nine seconds it will stay muted.
I personally like the maximum 30 second automute because it goes that extra mile in taking care of city falses.

[ES13Raven]

I posted this in another thread, but I thought I'd add it here too 8)

I took a trip this weekend with my GF, to see Dave Attell (http://www.daveattell.com) at the Improv in San Jose. The show was a blast. On the way up, I had my first experience with the K Band drones...

Driving up 101 past Gilroy, I started to get intermittent K Band alerts on my RX65. I didn't think anything of it until they kept happening. Every 30 seconds or so, I would get a strong or a weak hit on K Band.

Thanks to V1 Dave and others from this forum, I realized what was happening and I started to look for The Drones (http://traffic.speedinfo.com/District4Sensors/images/Sensor.jpg). At first, my GF and I made it into a game to see who could find them first. But after a while, it got too annoying.

Let me be the first one to say that AutoMute does nothing on these drones. They blast K Band for 5 seconds or so every 30 seconds. Depending on how close you are to them, you will receive a weak K Band alert or an Instant-On type full blast. By the time Auto-Mute can kick in, the drones have stopped.

But I am glad for 2 things:
1. CHP uses Ka - not K
2. I have a high-end detector that has selectable bands

I ended up turning off K Band on the RX65, but continued to scan for Ka and Laser. I feel bad for those guys that can't turn off K Band on their RDs. Those drones are annoying as hell. :roll:

I was able to turn K Band back on about 10 minutes later. Only a few highways have them. I found them on 101 and 17. :wink:

[V1 Dave]

ES13Raven, Glad to see that you finally got a dose of them.
Know you can imagine how K band automute shines so well on the V1 as there is no initial alert which can be light to full blast or all eight LED's yet you can still see the LED's and arrows hitting you in the front and back in (l) logic mode.
Advanced logic mode would be no lights or sound or the equivalent of K band off.
All other bands including laser report at regular volume, plus you still have the option to increase the muted volume lever of K band anywhere you want.
Hwy 580, 680, 84-dumbarton bridge is loaded with them as well.
There is one on 680 by the truck scale that has two mounted on a pole in the center divider one for each direction.
There is also one drone in this area that has been constant on breaking my 30 second maximum threshold just like a speed sign does.
It is not uncommon for me to pick up two drones at the same time and yes I am K band ghost free.
When you finally decide to take a V1 test drive you should strategically buy it right before you come to the area again.

[Ricochet]

I too commute on Hwy 280 from Pacifica to Mountain View each day. Just purchased a new 955 which I owned for 8 days.... falsing like crazy - K Band. I traded it for a v995 two days ago. It's better, but these drones put doubt in anyone's lead foot. They are an "instant on" nightmare.

I came across this thread... and now know the source of my false alerts. Hwy 280 is plastered with these drones... I'm sure there are more now... a year later than when this thread was started.

Thanks for the info.....

[Phillip559]

I think the absolute worst has the be on the 101 N coming into San Jose. About halfway between Gilroy and San Jose I will get full blast (like instant on) K band signals. Its really nerve racking because I get a lot of falsies on this freeway and many of them don't appear like a traditional false because they are so strong.


I remember when i first traveled to San Jose with my RD I got the **** scared out of me.

What part of the I280 are these cameras on? I'm imagining its closer to SF than San Jose? I was on the 280 quite a bit recently and never saw this. Is it on both the North and the South?

[Phillip559]

This is also ironic because people in the bay area speed a lot (in my opinion anyway).


In all of the freeways in CA, i think I-5 is probably the worst though. Sometimes I would be going 80 and most cars would try to run me off the road (looked like they had no rd either haha).

Can you say ticket??

[V1 Dave]

Thanks for replying back. What are the k band drone tones you are talking about? Is is something in the B-G option on the v1 programming. I know that 101 has horrible drones around gilroy. The k band alerts on my bell used to scare the *BEEP* out of me.

They are not like normal drones (they just end up going full blast instead of gently ramping up). I wouldn't be suprised if the 280 has laser as this is a very active route. Laser interceptor is in my future plans list
Phillip
Programming For K Band Drones:

The drone shot lasts three-seconds or less, so depending on how close you are at trigger time determines how hard your RD gets hit.
The cycle between blasts is thirty-seconds for most, however I have seen ten and twenty-seconds between blasts on one of them.

Non V1 RD's equipped with automute that start the initial K band alert with regular volume have no effect because the drone shot is over before automute has a chance to kick in, such irritation would quickly force you to turn K band off, the unit off, or turn down the volume which would block alerts from X, Ka, Ku, laser.

With the V1 you are obviously getting hit harder from rear shots, but the V1's advantage is that by using maximum K band automute signal strength thresholds (7) (E) (F) (arrows down) logic mode (l) enables all the LED's and the muted volume lever but all eight signal strength LED's of regular K band volume will be disabled until your selected time threshold is over.

Advanced logic mode (L) disables all the LED's and both volume knobs basically rendering K band off until your selected time threshold is over.

The three-second minimum automute time threshold will silence a single drone shot on regular volume as long as the maximum strength threshold (E) (F) arrows down are being used.
When using the three-second minimum automute time threshold occasional drone breakthrough occurs when getting hit with two separate drone shots (one in the front and one in the back) within the V1 ten-second reset period.
Raising the time threshold to ten-seconds (factory default) silences the two shot breakthrough.

Most people without drones in there area prefer the minimum four LED strength threshold and the maximum thirty-second time threshold and wish time was longer because it silences a larger variety of K band falsing encounters in town or in traffic.

When using the maximum strength and time threshold, time still runs out before passing speed signs giving V1 a sudden full tone on K band regular volume before passing the sign.

(A) mode gives V1 the ability of overriding all K band automute settings like you never set any of them.

Try these codes at a place with automatic doors using logic mode (I) so you can see what is going on by watching the LED's with regular volume disabled.

Then after you are done and don't have any drones in your area then remove codes (E) (F) arrows up which will give you the minimum four LED strength threshold for around town yet still keeping the maximum time threshold (b) for extended quietness.