Improvement of Radar Performance Using LFM Pulse Compression Technique

One fundamental aspect in designing a good radar system is the performance of range resolution. The good range resolution performance is required in radar system to detect small targets at a long distance. It is already known that the longer pulse will increase energy and improve target detection. Conversely, shorter pulse will increase the range resolution of radar. Recently, one pulse compression technique frequently used is linear frequency modulated (LFM) pulse wave. This paper presents the LFM pulse compression technique for improving radar performance and its simulation in Matlab and GNU radio using audio and radio waves. The performance of radar resolution using LFM pulse compression technique is observed from the parameter of pulse compression ratio (PCR). A higher PCR value indicates a better radar resolution. From the result, it shows that the values of PCR in Matlab (R) simulation using audio and radio waves are 6000 and 300000, respectively. Moreover, in GNU radio implementation, the values PCR using audio and radio waves are 0.275 and 50, respectively.