Monopulse Radar for Intelligent Cruise Control

This paper describes the Eaton VORAD Technologies monopulse radar system and its application to intelligent cruise control (ICC) systems using the SmartCruise^® ICC for light and heavy vehicles. The advantages of monopulse radar for continuous, independent measurement of the azimuth angles to multiple highway obstacles and vehicles are discussed. A comparison of the monopulse radar system to switched beam systems and mechanically scanned systems is presented. In addition, this paper describes the narrow band Doppler radar principles employed in Eaton VORAD radar technology and discusses its advantages over wide-band modulation techniques. The unique interference avoidance scheme of the radar system is presented. Radar sensor technology is compared with other sensor technologies and the advantages of radar are also discussed.