Talk:Micropower impulse radar

Impulse radar was not developed in the 1990s.

Two of us discovered a foliage penetrating radar in the Spring of 1965. Initially we attached a 1 nS pulse generator to an L-Band horn antenna. For a receiver we used a Tektronix sampling oscilloscope that had a rise-time of about 0.3 nS.

The purpose of this effort was for another project where we working, MIT Lincoln Lab. The testing was done at the LL antenna range in Bedford, MA.

After connecting the equipment at the range we wanted to get a "feel" for its range. The equipment was moved outdoors. Unfortunately the 'scope display was quite dim on that April morning. So, I found a 'scope "hood" and wrapped the engineer's head & 'scope hood in my winter jacket. I also [placed the engineer's hand on the delay knob of the 'scope. This is so that he could follow me in range.

I took about a 2 foot section brass tubing in my hand to wave about as a reflector and started walking. After a bit of "do you still see me," (he never lost the return signal) I walked into the woods, he stall saw my return!

At that point I yelled at him to take a look. He did. Later in the day we had the radar pointed at deeper woods and were doing more serious range measurements.

From several weeks to months later the set-up took the interest of the military, and was developed by others into the ground penetrating radar.

The engineer was Darrell Sedvic (now deceased)

Jim Ussailis

ussailis@verizon.net