Hi,
My project is range finding by calculating time difference between transmission and recieving at light speed.
I understand the resolution won't be great with most boards at 16mhz and ESP at 160mhz.
In C++ there is a library chrono that gives time in nanoseconds. Will it work in Arduino? If not then what code/library be useful for this project?
GPS does things like that. On an Arduino multiply micros() by 1000 to get ns.
You know the differenz between mHz and MHz?
Perhaps describe the actual project ?
Project is:
1- Transmit a pulse of radiowave at Time A
2- Receive that pulse at Time B
3- Calculate time difference = TIme B - Time A
4- Calculate Range based on that difference.
Sounds simple, as long as you can keep A and B very accuratly synchronised.
There are radio devices that can already do ranging or distance measuring and are capable of measuring distances from maybe 50m up to 100km or so.
Yes in GPS triangulation. Wouldn't multiplying 1000 just add 3 zeroes at the end rather than giving resoution in nanoseconds?
I don't know the difference between mHZ and MHZ.
Oh really, do you know what code or library to use here.
What are those radio module that find range? From what i know they cost arm and a leg.
The cheap ones in the market only find speed using doppler.
Semtech SX1280, you need a pair, around £5 each.
Read about them here;
The difference is a factor of 1000000000.
mHz = milli Hertz
MHz = Mega Hertz
Right! For higher resolution you need a 1000 times faster controller.
I don't think resolution will be an issue. I think the issue would be actually receiving a signal at a reasonable distance.
Light travels ~ 3.3 M/ns I don't see how any of the devices you will require will have a low enough latency to make a useful measurement in a direct manor.
I can't be sure but I expect GPS devices had ASIC that resolve the satellite signals without a processor being in the middle.
But that's just me.
1000/160 = 6.25 ns . ESP will do that resolution theoretically. was wondering if there is a code for nanos like there is for micros.
Potentially you could use GPSs to synchronise a TX and RX to within circa 30nS. When the GPS has a fix the edge of the 1PPS output is fairly accurate.
However that does not help you that much, how would you know to a handful of nS when your signal\packet arrives ?
Are you going to reveal what the actual, practical application you are wanting to design is ?
Oh, according to what theory? Can that processor, or a Nano processor as you have suggested, complete an entire RF ranging operation in a single clock cycle? Just because the CPU can twiddle a few bits in that time, doesn't at all mean it can send commands to send and receive, and interpret RF echoes in that time.
Of course there can't be a nanos() function, even though it wouldn't help you for the reason stated above. The MCU internal timers that micros() and millis() utilize for timing, don't run even close to that fast. Also there is a few microseconds (hence a few thousand nanoseconds) overhead to any function call, even disregarding any work that it has to do.
Practice, not theory. Internal counters/timers typically run up to the controller clock frequency. For the timing of external signals kind of the ATmega input capture should be available, that holds the timer value when a signal arrives. Then the real-time aspect is finished and post-processing can take as long as it takes.
That only allows you to produce and capture simple digital pulses on specifically equipped I/O pins. A hypothetical "nanos()" function would time program events only, just as micros() and millis() do now.
You can ignore for a moment the possible timing resolution issues of the microcontroller, the main issue is how would you know how to stop the 'reception timer' ?
The OP has not revealed any details of what they are actually trying to do in practice (another hint!), so we are guessing.
How would you accuratly time stamp the arrival of some sort of signal from a remote transmitter ?
The first bit of noise or some form of data decode that takes many kilometers to carry out ?
Hey srnet, thank you for suggesting the LORA transciever, will look more into it.
As for the project you asked, it is to map drone range from ground. Most modern radars rely on FMCW to process range but we are want to try pulse radar model as it is cost friendier.
Right now experimenting with HB100 doppler module, but that is one module out of many. Since it is doppler, only motion objects will be detected.
If you send 10 Ghz you only recieve back the same 10Ghz which goes through a mixer and bandpass filter and final output is the Intermediate Frequency, a small band something like 1-400 Hz.
If there is anything other than 0 than that is the doppler effect.
Now the idea here that we want to mod is if we pulse ON the transmit signal for 10 nanos and an object is detected, then it will echo return 10 nanos IF signal. Calculating the time between the beginning of the the transmit and recieve will solve the range.
You're assuming that the entire ranging operation will be handled be the processor.