Re: [Paddlewise] Visibility

"M. Wagenbach" wrote:

(regarding active radar reflectors)

> The general term for these things is "transponder."  Most light aircraft
> have them for the same reason being discussed here, with some additional
> data reply features (and even higher price tags, last I heard).
> 
> I have a cousin who is a radar electronics engineer for a major defense
> contracter, to whom I posed just this issue about 4 weeks ago.  His
> opinion was that a broad band transponder for kayaks was totally
> impractical due to the multiple frequencies used by the different radars
> of boats and ships of various sizes, vintages and nationalities.  ...  I
> wonder if the model Dan referred to might
> be designed to work with shore based traffic control radars.  This would
> be highly analogous to the aviation usage. ...<snip>...

This is interesting speculation, but based on the manufacturer's claims
it would seem to be incorrect. Pains Wessex markets the device as
something that is useful in the context of ship radar, not shore-based
radar. The device works with all marine X-band radar frequencies (9.2 to
9.5GHz). Of course not all ships' radars are X-band (some are S-band,
and there may be others--I don't know much about radar), but it seems as
though this would cover a significant percentage of ships in U.S.
waters.  For example, a quick look at the specifications for Raytheon
ship radars (a popular brand in our area) shows that all of the current
models are X-band radars.  So while this may not be a perfect solution,
it seems as though it would improve visibility in a significant
percentage of cases.  Now if it were only cheaper...

Dan Hagen
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