Glen McCartney

Anyone have experience with these. Here is the link to their website:
<a href="http://www.lidatek.com/specs.html" target="_blank">http://www.lidatek.com/specs.html</a>
I travel on the NYS Thruway alot and they always use Laser radar. Wonder if these jammers really work. The Valentine One radar detector I have works great, just not good enough when you're out there alone.

TIA
Glen

ViribusUnits

I can't realy see enough about it on the web site to justify it one way or the other.

I can tell you what I've learned about lazar jamming.

Basicly, you've got to put a pretty decent sided amount of energy, on a narrow frequency band, in the properly timed fashion to get the result you want.

All lidar guns are not on the same frequency. So, the jammer has to cover all frequencys with it's transmitter. This means all the energy put into frequencys that the Lidar gun is not opperating on is wasted.

The lidar puts out a very narrow beam of energy. This allows it to lose very little in the transmittion of the energy to your car. I'd say, nearly none. It this has to pick up the faint, tuned signles that are refflected off your car. If your driveing a white, chrome, or realy glossy car, the jammer is going to have to put out a fraction of the energy transmitted by the Lidar. This is multiplyed by the fact that the jammer has to cover a 90 or so degree arc, and the fact that it has to be srong enough to drown out the Lidar's reflected pulse. Add it all up, and thats probably a small bit more energy than the Lidar gun transmitts, on that frequency.

Finaly, it has to be timed right. The Lidar gun works by timeing a set of pulses, and then checking the diffrence in the duration of the pulses. Basicly, it is a range finder that works the math backward, finding the diffrences in the range over time. The idea of jammers is to send pluses back so that the Lidar gun gets confused which pulse is which, and thus confuses the ranges. This means that it has to respond very very very quickly. The transponder can't wait a fraction of a second, because in the fraction of a second, the Lidar gun might just have gotten enough pulses to figure out your speeding, and then it doesn't matter.

Now is it possible to build a Lidar jammer, yep. It is easy, nope.

I'd need to find out more about that specific unit before I say one way or the other.

I can tell you about tests from other units, they were not encourageing.

Good luck.

Ron_H

I have a "friend" who is currently installing Lidatek in his 928. What would you like to know about installation? I have had the opportunity to work closely with him during the installation which is not yet completed. There are critical steps to follow. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

Glen McCartney

I was more interested to see if anyone had any experience if these units can "mask" your speed when being hit by the radar unit. Can you elaborate on what the critical steps are. I read some info in the past. Thanks

Ron_H

Once it is installed, my friend will test it and report. There is a sign on the way to Devek that triggers the laser warning big time on the V1, and the Lidatek will be put to the test. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />
Stay tuned to this station... <img border="0" alt="[bigbye]" title="" src="graemlins/xyxwave.gif" />

Scott G

Just read a review on the Lidatek LE-20 on AudiWorld and remembered this [not so recent] thread.

The unit was installed in an Audi Allroad and worked well on the Stalker laser gun. The reviewer also reported that his personal Lidatek that he has in his Audi S4 has saved him twice.

<a href="http://www.audiworld.com/news/03/lidatek/" target="_blank">AudiWorld Lidatek Review</a>

DaveW

I've heard that they are quite effective if you get a good one, not worth the bother for a cheap one. Bear in mind that most laser guns now have a detector that can pick up when they are being jammed so again the expensive ones have the edge. The best one seems to be the Target LRC100 which is the only one that uses the same transponder as the radar guns themselves - harder to detect and more powerful.

This is the best speedtrap review site i have come across. It's a UK site but the technology is the same - actually things are almost certainly a bit more active here so you can see all the delights that will be headed your way over the next few years!

<a href="http://www.ukspeedtraps.co.uk/frames.htm" target="_blank">http://www.ukspeedtraps.co.uk/frames.htm</a>

Cheers
Dave

tobinr

One of the major car magazines (Car&Driver or Road&Track) tested a bunch of laser jammers a year or two back. Their conclusion was that dash mounted jammers were only about 20% effective. If I remember correctly they did test one model that was a front license plate holder that appeared to be just a black license frame. It contained laser diodes that were inconspicuous to the casual glance. But in operation was able to defeat laser radar 100% of the time! The only downside was that it could only be operated for 7 seconds at a time, due to thermal limitations of dissapating the heat from the laser diodes.
I am sure with all of the $29 CD and DVD players that are out now, the state of the art in laser diodes has taken a quantum leap forward.
I would love to see that same test repeated today.

I am just waiting to install that 20 megawatt laser turret to the front of my car so that I can vaporise those who feel that the left lane need not be the passing lane, it should also take care of any LIDAR sources without a problem...

Lagavulin

Here are a few interesting articles I've found regarding laser jammers; apparently they work, and work well, with the best being the Passport ZR3.

Defense Against Traffic Laser Guns:
<a href="http://www.motorists.org/mi/laser.html" target="_blank">http://www.motorists.org/mi/laser.html</a>

BMW Car Club Laser Jammer Test:
<a href="http://64.70.201.88/Roundel/1997/0197oth.htm" target="_blank">http://64.70.201.88/Roundel/1997/0197oth.htm</a>

Six Laser Jammers Tested: Passport #1
<a href="http://www.radartest.com/article.asp?articleID=8502" target="_blank">http://www.radartest.com/article.asp?articleID=8502</a>

Passport Shifter ZR3:
<a href="http://www.escortradar.com/zr3.htm" target="_blank">http://www.escortradar.com/zr3.htm</a>

Passport ZR3 for $399
<a href="http://www.cartoys.com/cartoys/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Product_ID=20170&pid=gg&CFID=961465&CFTOKEN=22986385 " target="_blank">http://www.cartoys.com/cartoys/showdetl.cfm?&DID=7&Product_ID=20170&pid=gg&CFID=961465&CFTOKEN=22986385 </a>

ZR3 the Best:
<a href="http://www.radar.co.nz/nz/report1.html" target="_blank">http://www.radar.co.nz/nz/report1.html</a>

Cobey

You should also make sure that they are legal in your state. As Dave mentioned, "The Law" is fighting back with detectors themselves and will be on you in a second if you use one illegally.

tobinr

Be aware that radartest.com never has a bad word to say about any Escort product. Matter of fact, it almost seems as though radartest.com is the testing arm for Escort. I would take any review that they give with a grain of salt. Other reviewers seem to have significantly different results.
I would prefer to see reviews from a more unbiased source before I plunked my money down.

Just my 2 cents worth
....

tobinr

Here are a few other resources:

February 2002 Car and Driver Radar Detector Test which includes laser detectors:
<a href="http://www.caranddriver.com/article.asp?section_id=4&article_id=1993" target="_blank">Radar Detector Test</a>

March 2003 article - BMW M3 had the Escort SRX installed for testing:
<a href="http://www.caranddriver.com/article.asp?section_id=4&article_id=4227&page_number=3" target="_blank">M3 review with unit</a>
Note: SRX is the Escort LIDAR/RADAR detector combo

From this article:
"On the X- and K-band radar tests, the range at which the SRX detected the radar gun was roughly one-fourth of the Valentine's range. On Ka-band, the SRX detection range was about two-thirds of the Valentine's (detailed results of all tests can be found at <a href="http://www.CARandDRIVER.com)." target="_blank">www.CARandDRIVER.com).</a>

This reduced performance might be partly due to the SRX radar receiver's low mounting point in the front grille—an inherent characteristic of permanently mounted detectors. The Valentine One, mounted on the windshield, had a higher perspective, which is likely advantageous.
This low mounting position didn't seem to diminish the SRX's sensitivity to lidar—it was roughly 20 percent better than the Valentine, both front and rear. To determine how well the SRX's jamming capabilities worked, we simulated a police lidar trap at 1200 feet using three different lidar guns: a Kustom Signals Pro Laser, an Applied Concepts Stalker, and a Marksman LTI 20/20. We tested the SRX with the M3 approaching and receding from the guns.

The SRX successfully jammed the Pro Laser, both coming and going, preventing it from registering a speed at any distance. It was also pretty effective against the Stalker gun, forcing error messages from 1100 feet down to 200 feet coming at the gun, and from 0 to 1000 feet going away.
The SRX had a tougher time with the newer LTI 20/20 gun. When approaching the LTI, the SRX reduced the gun's effective range from 1000 feet to 800. Going away, the LTI tracked speed out to 900 feet then flashed an error code, but reestablished tracking at 1000 feet. Against the LTI, you'd have to be very quick on the brakes to avoid a ticket. "