From: John De Armond Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel Subject: Re: Warning to Virginia Travelers Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 05:13:06 -0500 dtblank3&&@worldnet.att.net wrote: > > Greg Surratt wrote: > > > And some of the cops have > > radar detector detectors just to make sure you aren't breaking THAT > > particular law. > > Just how would a radar detector detector operate? I worked > on radar and passive ECM some thirty years ago. I presumed > that radar detectors functioned as a passive ECM. I'm not > sure I grasp the concept of an RF receiver being detected. It's simply a receiver tuned to the radar detector local oscillator, for most brands 1 ghz below the radar band center frequency (10.520 and 24.5 ghz, X and K band respectively). The better radar detectors manufacturers quickly re-designed their units to use a different IF frequency and to not emit much LO radiation. This results in a sort of highway darwinism - those drivers without a clue who think they can plop a $99 radar detector on the dash and speed with impunity get caught and occupy the fee grabbers while us serious drivers with the good detectors are left unmolested. One of my favorite tricks when I had to drive in Va was to take a little Gunn oscillator, tune it to the detector detector frequency and go out and annoy the pigs. The Gunn oscillator had enough power that I could light up Smokey from far away. He'd either go nuts looking for the source or pull over the nearest car. With smokey occupied with a bogey, the roads become safe again. For anyone who wants to try this, one of the larger microwave motion detectors for burglar alarms works well. Simply bypass the pulse driver to the Gunn, tune it to 9.520 GHZ (Measuring frequency with a Letcher wire is close enough, as the detector detector is very broad band.) and fire away. Be sure to put a push button and an "ON" LED on it and not a toggle switch so that you won't accidentally leave it on and broadcast bear bait! John From: John De Armond Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel Subject: Re: Warning to Virginia Travelers Date: Fri, 30 Mar 2001 04:04:17 -0500 Greg Surratt wrote: > The problem was that cops are not stupid (duh!). Somehow, a truck > running 80 mph just looks too obviously different from a truck that > registers 55 on the radar gun. I still got the ticket and I couldn't > fight it using the old "show me how you calibrate the radar gun" > argument - because the cop never said anything about his > "malfunctioning radar" on the ticket or in the courtroom. That's the bottom line. When I play with a radar gun for a little while, I learned that I can estimate the speed of an oncoming car within a couple of MPH before I key the radar. That ability doesn't stick around - I can't just go out on the road and tell you how every vehicle is going. But with a radar gun to provide me instantaneous and continuous feedback, I certainly can judge the speed of the odd vehicle that my gun doesn't pick up for whatever reason. A cop who does this every day will surely be MUCH better than I am. The other thing that is important to realize is that once one learns the characteristics of his radar gun, it is trivially easy to make the gun register whatever reading is desired. Panning the gun across traffic while locking in the reading is one technique. Having a filed down tuning fork is another. Just saving the reading from the last stop is yet another. So even if you jam the cop, if he really wants you, he will get you and he will be able to show you the reading on the gun when you ask after having read one of those "beat the system" books. If he thinks you've jammed him or perhaps he just doesn't like your looks, that reading might be enough to make it reckless driving instead of simple speeding. As long as we allow the cops to be the ones with the guns, anyone who tries to go toe-to-toe with them will lose! The best way to drive fast is to learn to think like a cop, stay alert and if you get stopped, be polite (so the cop won't remember in court how big an asshole you were) and then either pay the tax on driving fast or fight it in court where you do have a chance. From: John De Armond Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel Subject: Re: Warning to Virginia Travelers Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2001 03:06:24 -0500 JPSJPS wrote: > > John, I hope this is not lost in the crap. > Nice collection on your site!! > Question please: What kind of radar detector do you recommend? Tickets > here in California plus insurance increases offset a few hundred bucks > for a detector. Of course, I need enough range and wide enough antenna > pattern to detect an "instant on" radar on the guy way in front of me. I > would not mind buying two different brands if necessary. I try not to > intentionally speed since it is too expensive, but sometimes it happens. There's really only one detector to have for the serious speeder - Valentine 1. Other brands will occasionally score equal to or maybe even a little better than the V-1 on one feature or another but the V-1 is the best package there is - pretty much the cost-is-no-object detector. Back during the magazine days I invented this little game I called Trolling for Tail Lights. Involves a radar gun and the illumination of a passing speeder and then scoring his response. The radar beam, also known as the Tractor Beam and the Negative Velocity Insertion Vector, would stimulate some very interesting responses from speeders. Everything up to and including hopping the median and speeding off in the other direction :-) That is, except most V-1 owners. The V-1 indicates the band, the field strength and DIRECTION of the radar. Since pacing radar didn't then yet exist, if the driver got a bogey from the rear, he could do a quick mirror check and continue on. In later versions of the game I even awarded bonus points for stimulating responses from V-1 owners. Anyway, I published the game in the magazine. Only thing I've ever done that got me death threats :-) > > Are one of those guys in the bushes that put 70 mph Doppler on your Gunn > oscillator to get some local dignitaries doing 30 mph nailed on radar? I know nothing..... And I can't say a word about my 10 watt 10 ghz traveling wave tube transmitter.... John From: John De Armond Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel Subject: Re: Warning to Virginia Travelers Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2001 14:59:59 -0500 JPSJPS wrote: > Thanks John, Am gonna get a Valentine 1 then. Any suggetions for a > source? On-line store is fine with me. > John They only sell direct. Grab an issue of Car & Driver (or search the web) for the 800 number. John From: John De Armond Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel Subject: Re: Warning to Virginia Travelers Date: Wed, 11 Apr 2001 14:04:49 -0400 Joe Hoechst wrote: > Thay don't smash the radar detector. That would be destroying > evidence. I have been pulled over and caught with a radar detector in > Virginia. He asked to see it, I showd it to him. He called it in to > make sure it was not stolen. Then he gave it back. And these are the > officers words "It's not illegal to own it, you just can't use it." (in > Virgina) The way it was written up in the National Motorist League, the cop would give the driver the option of either destroying the detector or getting written up. Usually the driver did the stomping. That was back in the fiscal feeding frenzy of the 55 mph debacle. No doubt they've mellowed a bit in Va now like they have here. In Tn, the staties are practically a non-issue as long as you stay under 80 on the interstate. Looks like they're concentrating on the 2 lane roads where they should have been all along. John From: John De Armond Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel Subject: Re: Speed trap listing Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2005 22:03:50 -0500 Message-ID: <u15k41ho21kbv9vid5u99jfd0lilmdut4e@4ax.com> On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 00:18:01 GMT, Ken Bosch <xjobfpu@rneguyvax.arg> wrote: >>They are illegal in VA - Cops have detectors and will ticket you. >> >Radar detectors are passive receivers. They can't be detected that I >know of other than by sight. Sure they can be. The radar detector detectors listen for the local oscillator in the radar detector. Almost all radar detectors use a 1 ghz IF frequency so one simply need listen 1 ghz away from center frequency of each band. Any detector that incorporates the mixer diode in the waveguide (almost all of 'em) and doesn't employ a good circulator (again, almost all of 'em) emits a LO signal that is almost as strong as the radar, particularly the newer low power radars. Some of the high end detectors (Valentine, high end Escort and a couple others that I can't recall the names of) have changed their architectures to use double conversion IFs and low leakage LOs. These same detectors contain radar detector detector detectors. Whew! And in turn the enemy is making detectors for these. The enemy is fighting a losing game, though. The detector detector has to be manipulated manually to pinpoint which vehicle the emissions are coming from. Meanwhile the alert driver has detected the detector and turned his unit off. Un-alert drivers serve as decoys for the rest of us :-) The really funny thing is, these fee grabbers spend the big bux for the frequency agile pulse mode instant on radars to hide the speed trap until it's too late for the victims and then they turn around and leave the detector detector on all the time, radiating a CW (that nasty old local oscillator again) signal that yells "speed trap" for miles around to anyone with the proper detector. John |
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