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Digital Frequency Control Loop for Continuous-Wave and Stepped-Frequency Radars
Publikationstyp
Conference Paper
Date Issued
2022-01
Sprache
English
Institut
Start Page
18
End Page
21
Citation
IEEE Topical Conference on Wireless Sensors and Sensor Networks (WiSNeT 2022)
Contribution to Conference
Publisher DOI
Scopus ID
A common technique to control the transmit frequency of modern radar systems are phase-locked loops (PLLs). This paper presents an alternative PLL-free design, where a microcontroller (MCU) is used in a digital control loop to stabilize the output frequency of a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO). Using a commercial 24 GHz integrated radar transceiver and the MCU, a discrete proportional (P) control algorithm tunes the VCO in real time without requiring a hardware PLL. In continuous-wave (CW) mode, a measurement precision of 7.6 μm is achieved. In a pulsed dual-tone operation mode, the unambiguous range is extended to 1.4 m by still achieving an accuracy of 25 mm.
Subjects
distance measurement
Doppler radar
frequency control
frequency-locked loop