The experimental study of possibility for radar target detection in FSR using L1-based non-cooperative transmitter

The Forward Scatter Radar (FSR) system is a special case of bistatic radar. In such bistatic FSR, the receive and transmit antennas are fixed and directed at each other, so the target detection takes place when the baseline is crossed. This type of radar provides a countermeasure to stealth technology because in the area of the forward scatter effect the targets´ RCS depends only on the size and the shape of their silhouette. Passive radars use transmitters of opportunity as signal source, and therefore they are very attractive due to their inherit low cost. The advantage of considering Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) satellites as transmitters of opportunity is the high availability that these satellites offer. Anywhere on earth, around eight Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites are continuously in view. This provides an optimum scenario for implementation of a GNSS-FSR system. In this paper, some experimental results of a GPS-FSR system, where the signal at the output of the Carrier&Code tracking block is coherently integrated, are described and analyzed.