Novel FMCW radar system concept with adaptive compensation of phase errors

A new high-performance FMCW sensor system concept is presented. The approach is based on an adaptive signal processing scheme compensating phase errors caused by VCO phase noise as well as the non-linearity of the frequency modulation. The key component of the low-cost sensor is a SAW (surface acoustic wave) delay line representing a miniaturised high-precision radar reference path. A correction algorithm equalises the target signal according to the phase errors simultaneously measured with the reference path. Employing this method, an excellent range resolution as well as a high dynamic range and multi-target selectivlty is obtained, which has been experimentally demonstrated at millimetrewave frequencies.