Wide band stepped-frequency ground penetrating radar

Abstract

 The stepped-frequency continuous wave (SFCW) ground penetrating radar (GPR) combined with wideband bow tie antennas and a handheld vector network analyzer (VNA) is successfully demonstrated and compared with three types of commercial pulse GPRs for the detection and identification of the buried targets at depths of 20 cm, 80 cm and 2.5 m. It has the performance of the better signal to clutter ratio than all of the tested commercial pulse GPRs for the metal pipe at a depth of 20 cm and also the better range and azimuth resolutions than the pulse GPR having a center frequency of 250 MHz. We conclude that the proposed SFCW GPR has a great potential to meet the conflicting needs of deeper penetration and high resolution.