Build Your Own Drone Tracking Radar: Part 1

[@egeres14]

This guy is so professional, watching his videos feels like speed running the telecommunications bachelor, thank you so much for explaining everything with this clarity, I'm looking forward to see this series 🎉

[@timothybaldinger261]

He got my sub just by the way he is speaking to everyone.

[@phoneaccount6907]

He is Analog Devices employe

[@rmnwrkcnt]

@@phoneaccount6907 He is analog device himself!

[@AlexK-jp9nc]

finally a radar DIY that isn't actually a sonar

[@АлексейСергеев-ф6г]

Гидролокатор местами сложнее: среда очень неоднородная, да и широкополосных помех от животных бывает много.

[@nikitacheblokov8032]

​@@АлексейСергеев-ф6г Много проектов на Ютубе заявляют что делают "радар" когда на самом деле, они используют ультразвуковые дальномеры. Гидролокатор ещё никто на Ютубе не делал

[@blacklion79]

DIY? It uses ready-made hardware which costs $2800

[@AlexK-jp9nc]

@@blacklion79 and does anyone else assemble it? or do you Do that Yourself? and anyway i just wanted the design. I'm capable of getting the components around on my own

[@Bbhai24]

Pray for safety of innocent Bangladesh Hindu, Bauddh, jain and shikh, tribe and chirstian

[@MountainCatBob]

Slick! I'm a retired ET who maintained the first phased array military RADAR SPS 32 on Enterprise back in the 70's. The electronics for each panel occupied (I think) 3 units full of control circuits, 4'X4'X7' tall, one with a single 8-bit register to run the phase shifting function. And to see such a FANTASTIC handheld device demonstrated so flawlessly is simply delightful. I'm going to make one to see how low those bloody helicopters are flying! Cheers!

[@jonkraft]

Thanks! And thank you for your service! I think the job you were doing was much more difficult than doing this project in 2023. Very interesting to hear about phased array radars on an aircraft carrier.

[@NiteSaiya]

Will the police pay you a visit if a helicopter starts getting pinged from an unexpected location?

[@jum5238]

@@NiteSaiya I would guess that about the time you start registering the helicopter on your radar, you've already got bigger problems. Sounds like it's very short range.

[@Pwmclain]

I worked on GPS anti-jam in the 80s, on big military drones, wish we had the current capabilities then.

[@rbdan]

​@@NiteSaiya if you are using that much power on your personal radar system then the police are the least of your problems

[@AmitYadav-rp3ot]

This is gold. No unnecessary stuff. the SNR of these videos is just too damn high. love it. thank you so much. I wish your videos reaches to all the aspiring communication engineers

[@supremeleader5516]

Hi I am from India too, glad I found my countryman with similar interest

[@chaitubhojane6137]

@@supremeleader5516are you guys interested in 4d radars

[@bennydontplaythat]

High SNR video 😅

[@roipaz8671]

The room and the video itself seems like a 90s TV worshop show... I love it!!!!

[@2maracas432]

If KZbin and the various other social networks were made by people like you, with your professionalism, your simplicity, the real interest in the topic in question, the desire to learn from others, without the constant craving for having to get views, even the world in general would be a great place to live in.....

[@lifegettingintheway2710]

For quite a bit of the 1970s I worked in Marine Electronics, specializing in radar, gyro compasses, auto pilots, and telecommunications. I worked for Raytheon as a field engineer working on their commercial anti-collision radar. Some interesting radars I worked on were a Soviet S and X band radar where the S band wave guide and the x band wave guide were constructed like a coaxial cable - one inside the other. The slotted waveguide antenns were in the same scanner as a result. It was about 75' between the TR unit and the scanner and there were a lot of elbows in the wave guide along the route. Water was a serious problem and keeping them sealed was problematic. But my favorite radar was a hand-help chirp radar made by Whistler eponymously named Whistler Radar. It used headphones to listen to the beat frequency of the sent/received fm pulse. One curiousity is when aimed at a passing yacht one could here the vibrations of othe engine and stereo systems. These sounds vibrated the hull of the boat which modulated the radar echo (cw as you might expect) and speech was clearly understandable. Here and there in the internet are a few references to the Whistler Radar which was strapped on like an accordian and about the same size, head phones were donned, and targets were found to learn what the different sounds represented by visual objects, moving and stationary. I nearly got one recently on Ebay but it sold just hours before I saw it.

[@chimpo131]

k Boomer😂😂😂

[@lifegettingintheway2710]

@@chimpo131 Get off my lawn, kid! :)

[@emptech]

Way back in the '60's in school we built a simple doppler radar. We used cans similar to what you are doing. Back then we used a klystron to generate the microwave signal, with what was called a hybrid junction to provide the detector and mixer. In the '80's I would have used a Gunn plexor to generate the microwave and do the mixing. I remember the term "radar mile," the time it took for a radar signal to leave the transmitter, reflect from an object a mile away, and return. My memory says about 63 microseconds, but I'm probably wrong, it's been many years. I'll have to follow your videos, thanks for sharing. Jim H.

[@hashtaglobotomy2655]

Can we take a moment and realize how relevant this is to NJ right now? This guy should be given a medal!

[@seeker4430]

Wow... It was my childhood dream to learn and build RF electronics... Radar, radios etc... Thanks a lot for making this series

[@axoidmax]

your contribution is that you want to learn. Thank you. My dad was an Air Force JTAC/TACP and he tried to explain this to me but I didn't get it till I watched you learn and teach it.

[@Shkvarka]

No way.. exactly what im trying to do, here in Ukraine, Odesa. Some sort of early alarm for Iranian/Russian UAV (shahed-136, shaded-129)... Really hope I will make it..

[@jimk8520]

Good luck with your project! Slava Ukraine!🇺🇦

[@sergiskenderov1310]

Hi, I'm also from Odessa, glad to see that so many people are trying to make great tools to save lives.

[@dano6187]

Probably not good to deploy an active radar system in a war zone if you wish to stay out of HARMs way.

[@letsgetsteve]

​@@dano6187I am pretty sure he will be fine... Being over 100km from the front, in friendly territory, and usings something super rudimentary, the risk is about 100 times greater that he gets yelled at for radio spectrum band or power infringements then to be targeted by anyone... I say, good luck man, and I hope you make something that works like a champ and saves more Ukrainian and other innocent lives.

[@timargentum7265]

Greetings from Chernihiv ;) Beware of anti-radar missiles, they used some of them in Dnipro region on yesterday's massive strike -_-

[@peanutbutterdijonnaise]

This content makes me wish my dad were still around these days, he loved tinkering with radio tech.

[@NotSure416]

Analog Devices have some amazing engineers. It's always a pleasure to work with their products.

[@floydwolverton2504]

Great video, Jon. I like your "practical engineer" presentation without all the self-praising word salad so many otherwise good engineers feel they have to impress us with. Nice job!

[@thereverant5203]

I served on a SAM site for quite some time so PAR/CW systems are not unknown to me. We used PAR for longer, over the horizon tracking and CW for shorter and low-altitude tracking. I've been fascinated with radar systems ever since and always wanted to build a small, portable one at some point as I I'm an electronics engineer but my focus is on digital systems and uCs, never analog or RF. Maybe this is the chance to begin.

[@ashotyayloyan1296]

For a while I couldn't follow your videos. john, great job! Everything you provide in your videos is excellent material, especially for students of relevant specialties. Thanks very much!

[@lazerusmfh]

As a radar guy, (I have many many radars) look forward to the rest of the series

[@MrHeuvaladao]

"As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord" I've found a wise man. Subscribed!

[@geofftaylor8913]

I have always been fascinated by phase array technology. Very cool.

[@justice32legends]

I don't think I can afford the phaser. But this clip's got me interested, so I'm gonna keep tabs on this playlist. Thanks man for all the references, sure helps!

[@diegob.p.9546]

This video was very good, it gave a presentation on the main aspects of radar systems. With practical examples from the most accessible to the most complex available for students and researchers. I just have to thank for your contribution.

[@chrisbritt9790]

Oh man! Jon Kraft! I have bought so many semi-conductors from you! This is amazing!

[@neogeo8267]

Jon, this is excellent content! Your presentation is excellent - I look forward to seeing more from you. Thank you for sharing!

[@migalito1955]

Very interesting. Being a retired math guy with a love of radio astronomy and radio in general I will definitely follow your series. From the two prices I looked up, Pluto, & two low noise amplifiers, which together sums to about $360 & by guessing the mixers are not terribly pricey & guessing the phaser might add another $200 to the whole it's not terribly cost prohibitive. Especially if pursued over time. Regardless of whether I attempt to build a system which I'd love to do Pluto has really caught my attention & I think its on my next radio gear list. Look forward to the sequence & thanks for documenting & sharing.

[@kckoellein]

The Phaser is in the neighborhood of $2800... Q.Q Still investigating if I can sell a kidney to pay for it, tho...

[@Grafkartoffel-r5o]

OMG finally a vid without a sonar system! Thanks for the vid man

[@AerialWaviator]

Fascinating series. Love the idea of starting simple and building to more complex experiments using a common base of hardware. It was the reference to Phaser, or phase-array antenna that got my attention on seeing the reference to this video. Watched a couple of prior videos, and am subscribed, ready to follow along.

[@michaelfuchs1467]

Perfect! Since a few months back I'm having a phased array radar project in my head and on my bench - for detecting small drones! In addition I have acoustic profiling on my mind... 😉

[@marcbonomini2751]

Fantastic content... I hope it remains in the public realm without much difficulty.

[@MaxR52]

this guy has tim and eric confidence, great vid

[@AstroCharlie]

Thank you so much for taking on this material in an approachable, hands-on manner. I've been trying to use a 900 MHz radar to ranging on amateur rockets, and I'm hoping to apply these concepts!

[@laulaja-7186]

If 900 MHz is wavelength 30 ish cm then can it even detect small drones? Might work better, to locate the drone based on its own emissions.

[@kurtttttttt]

glad you're back! looking forward to the rest of the series!

[@bradlambert4140]

Fantastic work, Jon. The series is off to an auspicious start!

[@edu0604]

Wow! So nice, so professional and so clear the way he explains. Well done!!!

[@rubhern8187]

Stumbled your channel by accident and found your delivery of contents very excellent. Such a complex field to grasp and understand you made it quite approachable and motivational. Remember the late Mr Jon Pease who delivered complex hardware into understandable real applications. Maybe a suggestion to explain math equations found in text books into real applications. Liked and subscribed

[@rowanjones3476]

Nice work. I appreciate you applying your industry experience in explaining why you selected the components you did. Would not have thought to take an off the shelf SDR and modify the signal path! Can’t wait to see the rest of the series.

[@alexpetrov656]

Thank God I came across this video! Big respect to the author!

[@random-604]

Looking forward to it! Subscribed. Edit: Please stick with Python instead of MATLAB for video 6!

[@bt1578]

Fantastic content mate. Been waiting for something like this. Your facilitation style and content presentation is top notch. Keep it up!

[@wahswolf88]

Fantastic. Subscribed. I am in the sports simulation space and have been working for a little while with vision based ball tracking systems. I know very little about radar but I always wanted to see if I could build something to track short range ball flight. Looking forward to this series!

[@kevinburke5213]

I say a very humble and gracious thank you for the help and support. I'm so glad to have found the videos and once again I know it's only words but I really do appreciate the hard work put into these videos. More and more things like this need to be taught from a young age. I wonder can you recommend any software for a android user or maybe windows that I can carry out simulation builds. Before anyone thinks come on there is loads that's my problem which to use, I hate the thought of committing to a particular platform to then find it's not suitable. Also imagine when vr and augmented reality allow us to simulate all of this.

[@KamilT-f8d]

this is what i love YT for! Greetings!

[@Rachelebanham]

Nice Jon - I work with a few drone radar companies. this came up in my feed. enjoying watching you building this from ground up.

[@polbarrull]

This is the best series on youtube!!

[@andrewmunro671]

Outstanding video Jon. I write a lot of software and am fascinated by the combined engineering and software problem that is RADAR. I've been playing around with Vayyar's Walabot dev kit and its pretty robust and powerful. Still, I'd love to see more of this tech in the hobbyist/maker world, so these videos are an amazing resource.

[@MikeMagTech]

I just found your channel and subscribed. I am a self taught "electrical engineer" specializing in vacuum tube high-end audio, particularly custom transformers, although in the course of my studies I came to really love math and electronics generally. I look forward to learning and working along with this project!

[@namanvu2651]

I work in digital design. Recently, due to project requirements, I had to learn more about embedded systems, specifically SDR. Actually, I feel a bit bored with this field. However, luckily I came across your channel. Keep it up, sir 🔥

[@melkhoulyihp]

Great content Jon, Being a chip designer myself, I find it very informative to follow your videos I will be following this video series and will try to get the hardware as well

[@maverick9708]

Nice, my best friend works at analog devices too so maybe I should send him this, its a wonderful project!

[@uploadJ]

Been using the Doppler returns from VOR and ATSC tv pilot carrier signals for some experiments ... many A/C returns can be seen using waterfall type SDR receiver displays. Subbed to keep informed of your progress too. Thanks.

[@willernst8376]

So good as always, perhaps some SAR, though that may be outside of the scope of this series. Though just the SAR algorithms are fascinating. The best radar channel on youtube, thanks!

[@jonkraft]

Thanks! Yes, SAR is a great idea -- I'm going to add that to the poll. And its definitely something I want to learn and experiment with too.

[@jram261]

I work at a university with an opportunity to experiment in the Structural Collapse environment for now progressing to Wildland Fire, Search and Rescue, hazmat, etc. how do we get in touch maintaining contact information security?

[@Parkhill57]

Very interested, thank you for series! I've enjoyed CW only radars for many years, but ready to move on in experiments.

[@viktoreimar1240]

Holy crap yourube recomended part 3 of this series a hundred times i had to search for part 1 - it just seemed logical to see part 1 before part 2 or 3.

[@viktoreimar1240]

I just felt the frustration building up. "Oh god why are you recomendimg part3 before part 1" The series seemed interesting, it was just that i didnt want to watch the series in reversed order.

[@theoriginalpauly]

Fascinating subject! For a future video, I would be curious about a directional passive radar, but maybe I can figure it out from this series. Thanks!

[@bob_mosavo]

Awesome! I can hardly wait for the rest of the series 😁 Thanks 👍

[@jamesbonds3232]

Very interesting video. I trying to understand the current cheap human tracking FMCW radar module made in china aka HLK-LD2450 etc. currently very popular in the home automation community until recently but can not make any sense into that modules of how do they work. Your video gives me a lot explanation on that matter. Thanks for a great video

[@bernard2735]

Wow - can’t wait to watch the series. Liked and subscribed 😊 Beamforming and clutter would be great to include.

[@jonkraft]

Thanks! Yeah, I'm kind of hoping people vote for those 2 also..... There's a lot to do and learn on both those topics.

[@nullptr472]

This looks quite interesting. I'm looking forward to your upcoming videos in the series

[@ArsenioDev]

Oh this is gonna be right up my alley, thanks for this!

[@jonkraft]

Great, I hope its useful!

[@nufosmatic]

14:00 Kuel. A few years ago I ported an Analog transceiver FMC from an Analog Zynq prototyping board to a compact embedded Zynq board, modifying just the blocks in the FPGA code to accommodate the different architecture. The goal was to build a compact programmable receiver for a direction-finding system on a small UAV. Choosing Analog as a vendor is never the wrong choice...

[@suncrafterspielt9479]

so excited for this series, thanks a lot

[@paristo]

This is very interesting. These are golden for hobbyists and amateurs to create something new. I can already think purpose like detecting a rodents or other harmful animals for farmers and have a systems to scare them off based to that.

[@pallabmaji1085]

This is amazing. We are tying to build a low cost fmcw radar for Indian road safety.

[@j0hnny_R3db34rd]

CW works great over long range for communication. Can even bounce CW off of meteor trails in the ionosphere.

[@Flamenawer]

I had this claim time ago and said you I wanted this , Oh my GOD what a present

[@zainkhalid5393]

I'm a dummy when it comes to electronics. I've always been interested in Military tech especially radars and missiles. Unfortunately, I could not study the related course but still I ended up with my other passion for Computer Science. I wanted to build a drone for my final year project but was refused by my supervisor. Now that i've graduated, i dream to pick up my passion for radars & missiles as a hobby and build something cool. I've been following another series for building a guided rocket. I was looking for a video for radars as well and this looks promising, but the technology involved is beyond my understanding. I hope i can follow through this series. My end goal is to build a miniature missile defense system, at least for drones. 🤣 I don't even if it's possible especially with my nonelectrical skillset. But let's see!

[@catfunt5583]

As someone who switched from Comp Sci to electrical engineering. The hardware that we use is basically just physical if/and/or statements. People were constantly surprised at how fast I picked up and understood complicated circuitry, but if you know how to code it will lighten the learning curve _dramatically_. Best of luck friend

[@dmytro.andreyev]

Thanks for the video. Most drones emit themselves quite well (video and telemetry). Accordingly, do you have plans for a passive radar(detector) with RC protocol identification?:)

[@user-rs1fo2dd9b]

thank you sir for sharing your expertise and knowledge - what a treasure!!

[@douglasmontgomery6315]

Jon, thanks so much for your time and effort. Looking forward to all the videos

[@Native_love]

About time! I LOVE YOUR VIDEOS! ❤❤❤❤❤

[@jonkraft]

Ha, thanks! Yeah, its been awhile since I've done a video, they take a surprising amount of time to put together.... But I get a lot of questions on these kinds of topics, so I thought I should just do a series on it. I hope you like it!

[@Native_love]

@jonkraft I love this stuff! I do Healthcare IT consulting and would love to branch out into one of the defense companies here in Chandler, Arizona! I truly love studying your videos! I want to build this exact project but need some more storage space. I buy way too much stuff and my wife said 'no more toys' until we get a bigger place or I get rid of some stuff (I'll just wait until we get more room). Seriously, why would I sell my sword, boxing gear, books, or ...... Darn it! She's right! I have too many toys! Lol!

[@Just_An_Idea_For_Consideration]

I have just run across this channel, and subscribed! An idea for a future project: Create a similar system that can do ground radar, to look several hundred feet into the ground, using an array of ground probes, to detect anomalies deep below the surface, such as water, or minerals, etc.

[@hellnawnaw]

Or sinkholes!

[@krj1979]

I am looking forward to seeing this series evolve. Great job!

[@astra_joe]

This is next level!

[@campbellmorrison8540]

Excellent thank you. I have no idea about radar so this will be a wonderful resource for my learning

[@theelectricwalrus]

This is awesome. I'd love to see a focus on calibration and adc frontends, mixers, gain budgets

[@spectaor]

This what i am interested in!!! pure hobby

[@zaikindenis1775]

Dear Jon. Thank you for the great videos. Could you clarify about TX_OUT1 and TX_OUT2? There is difference in the picture from this video and the CN0566 page about which TX is 1 and 2. In the code I can see that we use TX 2. I cannot see clear from which connector TX cable go out. It looks like TX 2 is that you use and it is farer from the PCB edge. Thank you very much!

[@jonkraft]

Yeah, that's a good question. We had a change from our initial prototype to the released version, and that has created some confusion. Would you mind re-asking this question on our official support forum: ez.analog.com/adieducation/university-program/ Putting that question on this forum provides a searchable repository for others with this same issue. Thanks!

[@thomapapa4006]

Excellent video and information. Looking forward to the next video parts.

[@icarus901]

Would love to see an implementation using one of the now common automotive radar modules -- they're off-the-shelf (or out of the parts bin) after all. Doable?

[@jarretta2656]

This is insane. I was literally trying to search this on dec 28. Could you look at anti-jamming?

[@anthonydelagarde3990]

Thank you for putting this together. Appreciated!

[@algorithminc.8850]

Great channel. Will be fun to go through your other videos. Subscribed. Cheers ...

[@seantedesco6851]

very excited for this series - thank you for the time and effort put into these.

[@maninthemiddleground2316]

0:22 amen to sign on top 🙏🏻 God Bless you and your family 👍🙏🏻🙏🏻

[@frequencywatchers]

Seriously Cool Stuff Man. Keep Learning, Keep Experimenting, LOVE IT !

[@Stelios.Posantzis]

Happy new year! A very exciting project - a great start to 2024!

[@DantalionNl]

Hi I work on the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) at ASTRON and found this really interesting, looking forward to the video on LO stretching as well as how to generate FMCW chirps. Wondering if you have to account for dispersion at these distances when computing the distance from the time delay if the doppler shift (velocity delta) is large

[@jonkraft]

Very nice to meet you! You mean like range ambiguity? I've kept my distances and velocities small -- like 50m and

[@MRKLYESTEP]

This is cool as hell. Subscribed to see these builds. Thanks for breaking it down.

[@jerseyshoredroneservices225]

"Coffee can antenna" Instantly reminded me of the AT&T long lines towers that fascinated me as a young kid ❤

[@Fluxo-vc7qj]

Ive searched for such a project!

[@ATMA3Weapon]

ok this is cool as hell. thanks for this video was really informative and fun.

[@reneweise]

Great teach and presentation skills! Can't wait to see the other videos!

[@Dlck.C.Normous]

@14:02 does anyone know the model of that dell keyboard? Its actually quite cool. I love muh media keys

[@phil.willoughby]

Interesting - I'm certainly starting to see why a Trackman Golf unit costs $20k. I'm curious what the outer range limit of this system is, and whether it could track a normal golf ball for a 250 yard flight - If it can I might want to build one of these, combined with a GPS receiver, so it can track the ball and then tell me the GPS location to start looking for it...

[@johnshite4656]

Golf. Yuck. 🏌🤮

[@jonkraft]

Yeah, that is interesting. And a perfect sphere has a very small radar cross section, so it makes it even harder. Maybe I can add some tests to see how small an object we can see at 100 yards or something. But I'm sure this setup can't see a golf ball at this distance. Not without more advanced processing, and probably higher power PA.

[@completeamateurgolfer]

I thought Trackman just 'sees' the ball at impact and figures out the ball distances & trajectory etc, based on club head speed & orientation and doesn't track the ball in flight.@@jonkraft

[@TehMagilla]

100% into this. Subscribed. Can the beamforming RX section be used without the TX to locate RF signals? That would be REALLY useful to me.

[@jonkraft]

Yes, absolutely. There's some videos on wiki.analog.com/phaser that will demonstrate tracking an RF signal -- but only in one dimension (i.e. left or right, it can't also do up and down).

[@fredrikhansson4326]

I went for mechanical degree and took some electrical and programming course but this is really what i want to do. I can go for mechatronics in my masters to work with this

[@alexparkison4593]

I'm hyped for this

[@thewyliestcoyote]

AEWSOME! looking forward to more videos

[@GregoryCharvat]

Excellent tutorial Jon! Yes and yes to all of this. Can’t wait to show you what we’ve been working on recently. I’ll send you a message offline.

[@jonkraft]

Thank you Dr. Charvat! I'm humbled, and a bit embarrassed, that you watched my video. You've inspired me and 1000's of others. Thank you!

[@DandSCreations]

What do you think would have better detection range on a flying drone? A radar like you have presented here or using a flir camera and object detection tracking and correction computing via a microcontroller?