ISAR Imaging of Near-Shore Maritime Vessels using a Low-Cost X-band Radar

This study presents a demonstration of using a low-cost off-the-shelf X-band radar system for ISAR imaging of maritime vessels. The system consisted of the CN0566 kit from Analog Devices, a WR-102 horn antenna, and a computer. The radar receiver consisted of an Analog Devices CN0566 X-band dual 8 element linear array of 98 mm aperture, while the transmitter antenna was a 15 dB gain horn. The radar bandwidth was 500 MHz resulting in an ISAR image resolution of 0.3 m in range and 0.66 m in cross-range. Data was collected on two boats passing by the radar. Images were focused using simple track estimation, and the resulting images were reasonable representations of the vessel dimensions.