Radar Gun for swooping?

[Chris-Ottawa 0]

Hey,

Has anyone seen or tried one of these Radar guns on swoopers? I read a review thta it picks up model airplanes up to 70 metres away, but I'm not sure what the radar signature of a human/canopy is.

Anyone have ideas/recommendations?

Thanks

http://www.bushnell.com/products/other-products/speed-gun/101901/

"When once you have tasted flight..."

[diablopilot 2]

Yep, and we couldn't get it to work worth a shit.

Now when the CHP jumper brought out his patrol unit and the laser.....

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You're not as good as you think you are. Seriously.

[Chris-Ottawa 0]

Perfect! Thanks for saving me the $100

"When once you have tasted flight..."

[AggieDave 6]

I've used the one you linked. It worked *ok.* You do really need to know how to use it and understand cosine effect and the such. It would only take someone who has training about 10 minutes to demonstrate how to clock swoopers and why you have to do it that way.

This one works really well: http://www.stalkerradar.com/law_basic.shtml But it costs around $1000.

I've also used this a LOT (not for swooping, though): http://www.kustomsignals.com/product_body2.asp?product_id=21&cat_id=10&strpagename=lidar which works like a champ. Although it costs around $4,000.

In the world of radar and lidar, you get what you pay for.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[DFWAJG 4]

Quote

Yep, and we couldn't get it to work worth a shit.

Now when the CHP jumper brought out his patrol unit and the laser taser.....

[normiss 622]

so much for challenging you in court....

[JPWoerner 0]

There used to be one of those police radar detectors that showed you your speed on the road that my dz was off of a while back and after a fun night at the dz... Let's just say the next morning, it was out by the swoop pond!!! Haha

[morris 0]

I remember a video of a landing (can´t remember 100% who it was, could have been Stu, very likely someone from Fastrax) with a radar gun being used.
The numbers seemed to be very much "jumping" up and down and all over the place like the gun couldn´t deal with the very dynamic and threedimensional type of movement.

[AggieDave 6]

I promise you that even a low end doppler radar device (if its worth a crap) can handle a swooper. It comes down to the operation of the device. You have to decide if you want to radar the dive or the swoop or both. Then you have to be in a proper position for what you want.

If you want to get the dive, you need to be under the dive, at the entrance to the pond. If you want the swoop, you need to be at the exit of the pond pointing back towards the gates. If you want both, you need be at the entrance of the pond and back well before the pond. It has to do with the cosine effect and having the correct angle for the radar to provide an accurate reading.

Here's a very quick and basic explanation of the cosine effect: http://www.sportsradargun.com/pdf/COSINEEFFECTDETAILS.pdf

Standing off to the side of the pond will give inaccurate readings and provide errors from the radar's counting unit.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[Derekbox 0]

I got clocked doing 87 just as I rolled out of my turn at The Farm. I would love to break triple digits someday.

[jumpwally 0]

When that becomes possible on a daily basis so will the body count unfortunatlly...

smile, be nice, enjoy life
FB # - 1083

[Chris-Ottawa 0]

I'd love to know how fast I am landing, hence the thread. I suspect somewhere in the 30-40mph range.

Anyone interested on guessing my speed based on these 2 landings? Or feel like providing constructive criticism on them?

FYI...they are downwind with only a fairly light wind (<5mph)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFTc5o1V__Q

Setup at 600ft on Katana 97 loaded at 1.5
-Double fronts
-Carve (normally only 90 degrees, but setup was off)
-Double Fronts
-Plane out
-Ride rears
-Flare

I couldn't begin to tell you altitudes after I start the double fronts as it's all visual. This could be good or bad, but in my eyes, I think it's good because I can focus on what's coming at me instead of breaking the focus to view my alti.

"When once you have tasted flight..."

[Spizzzarko 0]

I had a radar gun that I used quite a bit around the DZ. It was a decatur electronics prospeed radar gun. It was much better than those POS bushnell toys that they sell for about $99. I was able to get good speed readings on a lot of things Birds, golf balls, Cars, planes, people running, ect ect ect) . Swoopers were very easy to radar. The video that morris was talking about was probably shot by me or someone else filming while I radared stu. The only thing you had to keep in mind was the cosine error when something wasn't coming directly at or away from you. The more of an angle that you were at compared to the movement course of the object, the more cosine error you got. You just had to keep that in mind when you were setting up your location for radaring the people. The most accurate numbers you were able to get was the speed entering the course as they were coming directly at you if you were at the end of the course. Also it was fun to turn on the radar gun while you were driving home and watch all the people with radar detectors slam on the brakes. I would turn it on for about 5 seconds and then turn it off for about 30 -60 secs. The cars would slma on the brakes and then speed back up, then I would turn it on again and watch all the brake lights turn on again. Half the fun of having the thing was radaring cars.

[Snowwhite 0]

Quote

Hey,

Has anyone seen or tried one of these Radar guns on swoopers? I read a review thta it picks up model airplanes up to 70 metres away, but I'm not sure what the radar signature of a human/canopy is.

Anyone have ideas/recommendations?

Thanks

http://www.bushnell.com/products/other-products/speed-gun/101901/

At the Free Fall Convention, we borrowed the Rantoul PD's. It worked great. (Kept it off the street for 10 days too!)

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