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I had one, but I also quit using it because I noticed laser guns becoming more prominent in the areas I spent most of my time driving. While most modern detectors do detect laser, due to the way laser works its more of a "hey you're going to get a speeding ticket in a minute" than a warning.
I have had only one speeding ticket in my close to 20 years of driving and that was in my second year of driving a car. After that I have been using radar detectors ever since. I'd mainly used cheap ones but a few years ago I stepped up to a Valentine One and it's the best one by far. I only use it for long trips or trips outside of my normal commute but it is has paid for itself. You still have to be vigilant. People need to understand that they are radar detectors not cop car detectors.
I have a Valentine 1 and it is excellent. I have been using radar detectors off and on for 20+ years going back to the original Escort.
Radar detectors are useful but cannot be relied on to protect you in all conditions. If you are the only car on the road, or the front car of a group of cars, you are vulnerable to instant on radar. The cop will wait for you, see you, then it your car. Your V1 will go full on but it is too late. If you are the 2nd or 5th or 10th car your V1 will see the radar hitting the cars in front of you. They'll get caught and you won't.
The V1 is superbly built, and the forward/backward arrows very useful. Highly recommended.
Laser is used occasionaly in Texas. Always from a stationary cop. They have to target exactly your car and cannot simply sample the traffic. You have less warning than with conventional radar, but laser detection is tull useful.
I've had my V1 since 2007. It has definitely saved me many times but it also has failed me. I have two tickets with it. But I would have got the tickets if I had the V1 or not. Some of the smarter LEOs use instant on and there is really nothing you can do about it, other than drive smarter like the post above me. Don't go speeding with no one in front of you, especially if there are bends and hills.
It really makes a road trip fun since you usually can get an alert 1+ mile ahead and know there is something out there.
Great thing with the V1, if you ever want to get rid of, it has great resale. So sure it cost you $400, but you can easilly sell it for $250 on ebay in a few years and upgrade to something better.
If you get a nice detector, spend the $10 and 20 minutes to hardwire it to your fuse block. I can't understand why people dangle a cord to their power outlet, looks tacky.
I have had one in every car for the past twenty years. Since local LE often prioritizes ticket revenue it is very good to know where they are and monitoring. Would not want to drive without them.
I use an old V1 and have no false sense of security. I know its limitations, mine, and generally those of the law.
I agree with many similar posts above on how to fly low but relatively safe from tickets. If you get silly and 'brave' you increase your likelihood of getting ticketed.
A good detector, used intelligently, improves your odds but it not a shield.
I have an Escort Passport 8500 and been using it off/on depending on which car I drive. From my experienced, it can be useful, but at the same time, I'm also aware of how I'm driving. I'm not driving like a maniac on the road.
It takes about a week or so to get use to which sounds are for the radar. It can trigger things like an automatic door opener from a grocery store but it will be obvious once you hear it.
Again this is from my experience, when it comes to detecting x,k,ka bands, it is more reliable in detecting it ahead of time for you to slow down (knock on wood). So, for me it's been useful while driving around town and has warned me many times, specially at night. You'd be amazed to actually see where the cop is hiding when it's telling you as the sound gets stronger that a cop is nearby. Sometimes they hide behind dumpsters, entrance of cemeteries, school yard ect.
But, I don't blame the cops for doing this, they are just doing their jobs and honestly there are some knuckle heads out there that drive like maniacs. On the other hand, it's also revenue and $$$ overtime.
Laser is the hardest to detect with this detector. Although it detects laser, it is too late for you to slow down if you were speeding. You need the cars in front of you to get "zapped" by laser in order for you to detect it. BTW, you will know it if it's laser with this detector specially if you are driving at night when all things are quiet on the road, it will sound off like a police siren is inside your car.
Well, what's my take on it, if you are a careful driver and don't drive like a maniac, you probably don't need it.
Note:The following is a writeup from "Solidjake" from a bmw forum and not from me:
Hello, there are many questions that are asked over and over again on radar detectors and laser jammers. This guide will answer almost all of the questions that you might have. I will discuss how radar detectors work by giving examples with some of the newer detectors on the market, then I will discuss how laser jammers work and throw in some examples for them as well. Thank you for taking the time to read this guide, enjoy and welcome to the world of speed enforcement counter-measures!!
I. Radar
1. What is radar?
a. From Wikipedia, "Radar is an object-detection system that uses electromagnetic waves (specifically radio waves) to identify the range, altitude, direction, or speed of both moving and fixed objects such as aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. The radar dish, or antenna, transmits pulses of radio waves or microwaves which bounce off any object in their path. The object returns a tiny part of the wave's energy to a dish or antenna which is usually located at the same site as the transmitter."
b. In short, radar are waves that travel in the environment and bounce back off an object and go back to the transmitter. So when an officer is using a radar gun, waves are going out into the road and bounce back if there is a car moving towards or away from the radar gun. Radar guns can obtain a speed with a car approaching or traveling away from the source and it will be accurate most of the time within one mile per hour.
c. In terms of radar detection, there are four types of radar frequencies; X: 8-12 GHz, Ku: 12-18 GHz, K: 18-24 GHz and Ka: 24-40 GHz.
2. How can radar be used?
a. A radar gun can be used in stationary or mobile modes. Units that allow both stationary and moving radar will allow the officer to either drive their cruiser and operate radar at the same time or they will be able to park and use the radar unit that way. There are some radar units that only allow one or the other. In states such as Pensylvannia, the State Troopers are only allowed to use stationary radar, so that means they are not allowed to run radar while moving to issue a citation.
3. Types of radar guns
a. Handheld: A handheld radar gun is a device that has a traditional hand grip with the radar antenna in an enclosure mounted above. This gun is primarily used in instant on mode, but constant on can also be used even though that is a rare instance.
b. Mounted: A mounted radar gun is usually one or two antennas that are mounted on the dash or pillar in the front area of the car inside or mounted on the rear deck of the car. There is a control panel that is mounted in the center of the dash or nearby where the speed readings are displayed. Normally, the display has a target speed, cruise speed and highest speed values. On units that allow more than one antenna, the display will have a second row to display the readings from the other antenna. The mounted radar units usually have a remote control, either wired or wireless, that allows the officer to turn on/off the unit, put it in hold mode, switch modes, etc.
4. Ways to operate a radar gun.
a. An officer can use a radar gun in constant mode or in a holding mode that allows him to press the button once where a burst of radar waves emit and obtain a speed in a second or faster. There are three methods of radar gun operation;
- Constant On: Constant on (C/O) is when the radar gun is on continiously and the radar waves are sent into the environment constantly. For a radar detector user, as they are approaching the radar source, their detector will start off with a weak signal/strength and it will eventually get stronger as you are right by the source. The steady increase of strength by the radar detector is known as "ramp up".
Note: youtube video was removed here by user
- Instant On: Usually instant on (I/O) can be picked up by a radar detector in two ways; first is a sudden full alert to a radar band and the second is a low signal alert to radar, but it will appear and dissapear right away most of the time.
In the case of a full alert, the officer most likely has your speed guaranteed. Since the alert is strong, that means the radar wave is in full view of your car, thus resulting in a speed reading. As for the low signal alerts, that most likely means that the officer ahead of you is using instant on and targeting the cars in front of you. Remember, radar are waves so they will travel past the cars in front of you resulting in an alert. With this alert it would be good to slow down until the source is identified. Even if you slow down with a full alert, it is probably too late to have a "save", but anything is possible so brake regardless.
- Quick Trigger: Quick trigger (Q/T) is similar to I/O, but the fire time is extremely fast. This operation is under one second and it will usually result in a radar detector to completely miss the alert since it was not long enough of a duration to be picked up.
a. Dash Mounted: A dash mounted radar detector is a detector that is usually attached to the windshield with one or more suction cups. The power cable, normally a telephone wire, is plugged into the unit and the other end plugged into the cigarette light, or tapped into a constant power source to the car (hardwiring). An example of this detector is the Valentine One and the Escort Redline.
b. Remote Mounted: A remote mounted radar detector is a detector that has a receiver (antenna) that is mounted in the front/rear of the car externally. The wires are routed to the interior of the car where it's plugged into an interface that has a display to show the alerts and a speaker. An example of this detector is the Escort 9500ci and the Beltronics STI R.
c. Concealed Display: A remote display varies depending on manufacturers. For the Valentine 1, the concealed display is the exact same thing as the main units front panel. What this CD does is turn off the display on the main unit and the information is relocated to the CD. This is a great item to have if your car has no tint and if you don't want people to see your radar detector lit up, especially at night.
6. Different features of radar detectors.
a. Arrows: The only current RD that has arrows is the Valentine 1. The arrows are only possible with the use of dual antennas that receive radar/lidar alerts in the front and in the rear.
b. Bogey Counter/Multiple Sources: Due to patents, the Valentine 1 is the only detector that has a visible number counter for the different amounts of radar signals that are being picked up by the unit. An alertnative that other detectors, such as the Escort branded ones, have a spec mode that shows the different radar bands and how many of each. Usually this is done by showing X K and Ka side by side with a bar used as the signal strength for each.
c. Radar Frequency: Some detectors are able to show the GHz frequency of the radar waves that they are picking up. This is a great benefit to those that live in areas with many falses and where the police use the same bands as the falses. An example of this would be your detector picking up 24.150 GHz which is a known K band frequency for a real radar gun.
a. From Wikipedia, "LIDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) is an optical remote sensing technology that measures properties of scattered light to find range and/or other information of a distant target. The prevalent method to determine distance to an object or surface is to use laser pulses. Like the similar radar technology, which uses radio waves, the range to an object is determined by measuring the time delay between transmission of a pulse and detection of the reflected signal."
2. How does a lidar gun operate?
a. A lidar gun is basically just like a laser point. The beam is very narrow and the officer is able to shoot one car at a time, unlike radar where the highest speed is displayed from a group of cars traveling together. The further the distance, the bigger the beam is and the closer the distance the more narrow the beam is. Many of the current lidar guns have a different PPS (Pulses Per Second) and it will determine how fast it can acquire a speed.
Note:youtube videow were removed by user here.
3. How does a lidar jammer work?
a. A lidar jammer operates on the same frequency of a lidar gun, which is around 904nm. What the jammer does is within a fraction of a second, it detects the lidar hit, calculates why type of gun/pulse rate is being used and then it will send out signals to the gun to prevent a reading from being obtained.
Note:youtube videow were removed by user here.
b. There are two types of lidar jammers; LED and laser diode. The LED's are a cheaper alternative to diodes, but they do work well. Diodes on the other hands are exactly the same component that a lidar gun has, that means it will be easier to jam a lidar gun with a diode jammer system.
a. Installation is CRITICAL!!!!!!!!! If you do not install the jammers properly you will risk having a "punch through." A punch through is when the lidar gun being operated by the officer gets through the jammers pulses and is able to get a reading off of the car.
b. Depending on how many laser jammers heads you get the installation areas will vary. Let's take this Mercedes as an example, we will be installing 2 heads on the front of the car. As you can see in the pic below, the heads are in the upper grill where it will be easier to protect the majority of the front of the car. A common problem with installtions is that the heads are TOO LOW. Having the heads TOO LOW will allow the officer to get a speed by hitting the hood/lights of your car when you're going over a hill and that's when the heads still do not have a clear view of the road and they will NOT fire since they do not see the laser beam.
c. For systems with more heads, you can install the system with the following scenarios; all 4 in the front, all 4 in the rear, 2 in the front and 2 in the rear. The mores heads you have the better the protection you will have. In this game there is no such thing as OVERKILL. For a system with 4 heads in the front you can put two in the upper grill and two in the lower grill (bumper area). Remember, do not have the heads close to each other, that will reduce the protection on the outer edges of your car. Having them more than 12" apart will be fine.
e. Make sure that the heads are PERFECTLY leveled with the road horizontally and perpendicular to the road vertically. Also, makes sure that the heads are perpendicular to the road facing forward. Do not having them angled/toed out, that will only reduce the performance of the system or cause the system not to work properly.
d. For the interior installation, the wiring from the heads are routed into the car (through fire walls, etc) and they are connected to a CPU box. The other wires from the CPU box are for power, ground, mic/speaker and audio mute cable for those systems that offer that. The wiring for the power/ground is just like hardwiring a radar detector. Tap the red power wire to a 12v switched power source and the ground to a suitable bolt/screw that will offer a secure ground. Make sure that all of the wires and taps are TIGHT/SECURE. If a wire gets loose the system will NOT be on and you wouldn't like it if the system turns off on the highway when you're driving over the posted speed limit.
a. There are three steps of jammer usage: SLOW DOWN, TURN OFF THE SYSTEM ONCE YOU ARE AT OR NEAR THE POSTED SPEED LIMIT AND ENJOY YOUR SAVE.
b. The most important part of using the system in the real world is DO NOT JAM TO GUN!!!!!! MAKE SURE TO TURN OFF THE SYSTEM AS SOON AS YOU SLOW DOWN. LEAVING ON THE SYSTEM FOR A LONGER TIME THAN NEEDED WILL AROUSE SUSPICISION AND IT WILL ONLY MAKE THESE SYSTEMS ILLEGAL IN THE AREA WHERE YOU LIVE.
a. There are a few reasons as to why your detector did not go off. One, your detector is out of tune and the bands for radar or laser are not working properly. (will be discussed later) Two, the officer was targeting another car, most likely with laser, and your detector did not pick up the laser beam. Three, the officer is using radar, but he has it in the hold position and is currently not targeting any cars. Or simply he wasn't doing anything related to speed enforcement. A radar detector detects radar, not cops.
2. My detector keeps alerting to radar bands even there is no cop around!
a. Remember, a radar detector is NOT a COP detector. It's purpose is to receive and alert to any radar bands that are emmited nearby. So if there is a train, airport or automatic door openers around it will alert to them. Many detectors offer a few options to reduce the number of falses.
3. How can I reduce the number of falses?
a. A lot of detectors have a Highway/City mode or for the Valentine 1 Auto/Logic modes. What these modes do is filter the radar of certain frequencies and alert all the time to the frequencies of a properly working police radar gun. What I recommend is running in city mode/logic in the city and highway if you're on the highways or long local roads with higher speed limits.
4. Are radar detectors and laser jammers legal everywhere?
a. No, there are restrictions to using these electronics. For radar detectors, they are illegal in Washington DC and Virginia (for other countries please search for yourself). Radar detectors cannot be used in commercial vehicles or in some, but no over a specific weight.
b. For laser jammers, they are currently illegal to use in the states of California, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Illinois, South Carolina, Virginia, and Minnesota.
5. Should I hide my detector if an officer is going after me?
a. Yes and no. Normally it is a BAD idea to fumble through your car with the officer watching, that will only making him a lot more alert and you will have a tougher time dealing with him. But, if it's at night or he's a good distance away you can try to take it down. I once had a friend who was hit at night with instant on radar, he was trying to take the detector off and the cop asked if he had one. Not only will they know you have one by you trying to take it down, but by noticing an extremely fast decrease in your speed.
6. I accidently jammed the cop, what will happen?
a. Well, it depends. If he shot you extremely close (100 feet or less) then usually there is almost no chance to slow down and turn them off. But if you jammed them from 500+ feet away after the fact that you slowed down then you should just uninstall the system and sell it.
7. Can I use two radar detectors/ laser jammers at once?
a. Yes and no. For laser jammers NO, you cannot combine two different types at on side of the car at the same time. If you want four heads in the front, you will have to use one system with one CPU dedicated for the front and then another system for the rear if you want protection there.
b. For radar detectors, you can have two windshield mounted detectors running at once, but there are certain types that are not compatible with each other because they will interfere with each other and reduce the range of the units. But if you get a remote radar detector, you can run any one windshield detector inside if you want. A lot of enthusiasts run one remote and one windshield detector at once since one detector can miss an alert while the other one alerts to it.
8. How should I mount my detector?
a. I highly recommend installing high up and on the side of the rearview mirror. Also make sure that the unit is perfectly or close to perfectly leveled with the road. For a remote detector, the head should be placed with a clear view of the road. Mounting in the lower grill is the preferred spot.
9. What if I use a radar detector/laser jammer in illegal states?
a. In the United States, possessing a radar detector and using it in Washington DC and Virginia will result in a fine. In DC I have yet to hear them enforcing radar detector usage since they actually have REAL crimes to deal with. As for Virginia, they will cite you for using one and the cost is around $110 including court costs. There is no point value for this ticket. They do not confiscate the detector, just write the serial number down for reference in any court case. In Canada they do take away the units and destroy them.
b. For laser jammers, usually it is the same thing, but they will probably ask that you uninstall the system. Most just pay the fine. Remember, these jammers are parking sensors too and if you JTK (Jam To Kill) then there should be no suspicion brought about.
10. How do the police in these states know I have a detector/jammer?
a. In terms of radar detectors, they either visually SEE the detector in plain sight or they use an item called Spectre. What Spectre is is a radar detector detector. Yes, it may seem funny, but this system works just like our detectors but alerts to other detectors being used in the area. For a list of detectors and their range by these units see the link below.
Thank you for taking the time to read this guide. I hope that I answered most of your questions. If you have another questions please feel free to ask them.
My personal recommendations for a good working setup is the Valentine 1 radar detector and the Laser Interceptor system (quad front and quad rear if funds allow). Then if you have some spare cash I would invest in a Beltronics STI R remote radar detector unit, a CB radio with a good antenna and a police scanner if you really want that.
I DO NOT recommend the following products AT ALL:
- K40 radar detector/laser jammer
- Any Cobra radar detector
- Any other radar detector other than Whistler, Escort, Beltronics and Valentine
- Any plate covers that say they diffuse laser
- Any products that claim that they will pay your ticket
Mrs. NBP got me one years ago and then complained when I used it.
It did get me a ticket one time. I got painted up, took a few RPMs off and the cop signalled me over. He told me the only reason he stopped me was because I was the only car that slowed down so he knew I had a detector.
I've been using a Passport 8500 for about four years now. Yes, I'm glad I have it and I'd get it all over again. It picks up radar and lasers from a good distance off. I don't speed very much, but I always like to know if there's a cop scanning me.
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Radar detector owners, are you glad you got one?
