Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!lll-tis!ames!ptsfa!pacbell!att-ih!ihnp4!inuxc!iuvax!silver!commgrp
From: commgrp@silver.bacs.indiana.edu (BACS Data Communications Group)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: Re: radar countermeasures
Message-ID: <1101@silver.bacs.indiana.edu>
Date: 4 Mar 88 14:32:27 GMT
Sender: commgrp@silver.bacs.indiana.edu
Lines: 29


Plans and semi-kits for speed-radar jammers are commercially avail-
able, ostensibly for use by racing drivers to keep competitors from 
timing them during trials.  Yeah, right! :-)

_Car and Driver_ magazine published a survey of radar jammers a few 
years ago (sorry, can't cite specific reference), in which they 
concluded that the jammers are worthless.  The most effective jammer 
was able to decrease radar acquisition range by 25%.

I knew a guy who worked in a Nike Ajax missle radar van while he was 
in the army in the '50s.  He said, "The cops used to set up a radar 
trap on the hill near our base... We'd point the antenna at them and 
burn out the diode in their receiver.  After a while, they'd figure 
out that it wasn't working and leave... Once on Armed Forces Day, a 
press photographer with his pockets full of flashbulbs walked across 
the field... We turned the antenna on him and they all went off!"

Good war stories, but this is whole discussion barks up the wrong 
tree.  Cops, being few in number, are least among the biological 
hazards of the highway.  The geeks who think they own the road because 
they have radar detectors ("No cops = no speed limit") are a greater 
threat.  ECMing their "fuzzbusters" is a lot easier than jamming cop 
radar and, until someone invents the orgasmotron, is the most fun you 
can have with electronics!  All you need is the microwave source from 
a junked radar burglar-alarm or door opener ($10 at a hamfest).

--

Capt. Blackout