Not sure if this should be in DIY, Technophiles, or here...

I just bought one of those in-car GPS units (Garmin c330) and I'm going to get a police scanner soon.

I was thinkin', how would I go about making a GPS/Police Scanner that would show an icon on the map where the radar is coming from? I assume I would have to start almost from scratch and write a whole new program to do this and then put it on the GPS. Plus whatever hardware I would need to put in to scan for radar.

So I guess it would somehow, whenever it picks up a signal, tell the GPS to show it on the map? The police scanner I have and all the ones I've seen tell you about how close the pig is, so I assume it could SOMEHOW show that on the gps.

(I know nothing about any of this stuff)

How would you do that, and do you guys know of anything cool I could do with this GPS (nothing in mind, just wondering)?

Without an array of ariels (3 at VERY minimum) to do the trigonometry, you couldnt get any idea of where the signal was coming from.

the only way I can think of that the scanner would be able to show you how close the other radio was would be by signal strength, which can get pretty interfered with if you use any external ariels, or if theres walls etc in the way of line of sight.

your best method would probably be to find a computer linked scanner, that has a flexible API, and the ability to lock to a particular transmission (if that capability exists). you could then write an app that, also using the gps data from a gps device, trigs up the signal readings from the ariel and scanner data, and plots it on a map, tomtom style :P :)

short answer: not easily.

A nice and simple solution is to get the scanner find out how far away it will detect a laser/radar for each warning level, like level 1 warning 50ft level 2 60ft so on and so forth. Then set up the gps to make a ring around your cars location with a radius of 50 feet for level one or what ever you found to be the case. A step up from that which I have not seen been done yet is to write into the program not to animate the circle any where not on the road. Choice is yours I personally have never tried this but I have seen it done before.

short answer: not easily.



Quote for Truth

Tracking them wirelessly would be real time, which would be better than gps in your situation.

But if I was going to go beyond just worrying about speeding tickets, .. I would somehow identify each criminals (ie. police) vehicle, in all ways possible.

I would get as much data on their names, vehicle info, schedules, etc.. either legally, illegally,.. anyway possible.

Then use this data to use tracking systems such as triangulation, radar, gps, face recognition, cameras, *spotters* (ie. fellow likeminded civilians) etc, to monitor these animals.

One example would be to track their radio, or gps singles.

If their radio used something odd like APCO , using triangulation would pin point them, because almost NOONE uses that protocol.

Another idea could be to use previous recordings of their transmissions (apco or regular), to cause them confusion, where they would have to transmit on frequencies that civilians (their Masters) can monitor.

Either way, constantly letting these morons know that we are waiting, patiently, to 'get them', is more than enough to make them eventually hang themselves, if we don't get to them first.

Remember, these are the 'First Responders'.. that are at the forefront of protecting the filth of the earth, otherwise known as: homosexuals, niggroes, feminists, Jewish Mafia, and the American fanatics (ie. the real terrorists of our age).


Extremely interesting & challenging project...