Trackman, Is that really accurate?

[iacas]

4-5 feet

I am going on what my training was with flight scope, I heard it first hand from the trainer- unless he was wrong.

They track the ball for up to several hundred yards, as I showed. I have some fairly good ties to FlightScope, too, though I won't get into that because it's irrelevant - the facts of the matter will speak for themselves here.

In that time I have never seen two balls collide where it impacted the data so far down range.

I think you misread that part, or I wasn't very clear. I said that the unit tracks the ball until something prevents it from tracking it, then it extrapolates the remainder of the flight. Often a student steps in front of it (and they begin extrapolating). Once I saw a ball collide with another 150 yards down-range, and the unit extrapolated from there. It didn't keep tracking it.

But I have seen golf balls slice, block, hook or fade into a net running parallel to the driving range, never once did I see any indication of a change of ball flight on the gui interface or data.

I feel like you're not quite reading what I wrote: they track the ball until something prevents them from tracking the ball (hitting another ball, a net, a bird, a range sign, etc.), and then the flight is extrapolated from there. But if you're outdoors, the thing can track the ball for hundreds of yards. Way, way more than 4-5 feet from impact.

I have seen drives at 3 degrees of launch hit the 150 yard bill board dead on, yet the launch monitor still showed it rolled to 200yards.

Yes. It's extrapolating. But it's probably measuring until the 150 yard sign is hit, and then it extrapolates from there.

The numbers you supplied can be hard crunched calculations based on launch, spin velocity etc. Trackman nor flightscope are no simple radar only devices like what the police use, but they use a multitude of sonar, radar and advanced algorithms and mathematical calculations. A vast majority of these flightscopes are used indoors, especially here in the northeast.

That doesn't really speak to what I've said.

You said the ball isn't tracked once it leaves a window 4-5 feet from impact. That is wrong. Perhaps you confused when the clubhead is tracked or something… but the ball is often tracked for hundreds of yards (assuming of course it travels hundreds of yards :D).

P.S. We have used TrackMan and FlightScope indoors and still use almost every day a FS. They need about 10-12 feet of flight at a minimum, and do better with longer flights. We can get about 30 feet and it works quite well. It measures for 30 feet, until the ball hits the net, and then it begins extrapolating. You can't get good numbers at all if you have a net 4-5 feet from where you hit the ball.

[Spitfisher]

This what I mean and this is how it was explained to us in our training class , He did say 4-5 feet. This image was off the flightscope web site, each of those markers represents certain measurements, when the first markers dta is compared to the next one and the next one after that creates a balls flight path and each point of that flight path can be graphically analyzed for height, spin, velocity etc thru calculation. (One could argue that this is tracking) the remaining shot including the height, apex, spin carry decent angles are all based up formulas of the first section of flight after the ball is being struck, there are formulas of how a ball will slow down (drag) and descend.

These numbers represented in your excel graph above, they can be taken anywhere in the flight of the shot50, yards, 100 yards or 172.97 yards out.

But rather than go to much further in this discussion we can agree the benefits of launch monitors as a great learning and club fitting tool- when used correctly. I feel and you probably do too thinks its very accurate. Most Rec and amateurs get sucked up in the numbers too much. Sometimes it appears they are at a carnival swinging the mallet trying to ring the bell, meanwhile their numbers (distance) get worse and worse because they are trying to swing to hard, out of character and an exhaustive technique. Loft is your friend is what I say to most.

[iacas]

The trackman and other Launch monitors computes data and analysis based on phased array Doppler radar & proprietary optical systems, from the moment of impact to about4-5 feet feet from the tee, once the ball is gone from that window it is no longer tracked. Instead highly sophisticated software further calculates what the ball will do based on spin, velocity, smash factor, compression etc

To be clear, I'm responding to this, particularly the bold.

This what I mean and this is how it was explained to us in our training class, He did say 4-5 feet.

Then he must have misspoken, or something was misunderstood. The ball is tracked far more than 5 feet off the clubface.

This image was off the flightscope web site, each of those markers represents certain measurements, when the first markers dta is compared to the next one and the next one after that creates a balls flight path and each point of that flight path can be graphically analyzed for height, spin, velocity etc thru calculation. (One could argue that this is tracking) the remaining shot including the height, apex, spin carry decent angles are all based up formulas of the first section of flight after the ball is being struck, there are formulas of how a ball will slow down (drag) and descend.

No. That's incorrect. The ball is tracked (measured) and the rest of the flight is only extrapolated ("calculated" if you prefer) if something causes the tracking to be lost.

These numbers represented in your excel graph above, they can be taken anywhere in the flight of the shot50, yards, 100 yards or 172.97 yards out.

You seem to have misunderstood what those numbers are. They're the last measured data point in each of those balls. Not extrapolated/calculated data, but "measured" or tracked data. They're the last point that the TrackMan (in that case, but FlightScope works similarly) was still tracking (measuring) the golf ball and getting readings from it. From there , it extrapolates (calculates) the rest of the flight.

But rather than go to much further in this discussion we can agree the benefits of launch monitors as a great learning and club fitting tool- when used correctly. I feel and you probably do too thinks its very accurate. Most Rec and amateurs get sucked up in the numbers too much. Sometimes it appears they are at a carnival swinging the mallet trying to ring the bell, meanwhile their numbers (distance) get worse and worse because they are trying to swing to hard, out of character and an exhaustive technique. Loft is your friend is what I say to most.

Yes, I agree almost entirely with that.

And as for the above stuff, the tools are better than you seem to think (or realize)!

[saevel25]

Doplar radar can pick up objects over 300 yards easy. We use them in dayton to pick up cars up to over 1000 feet from the intersection. It will track the vehicle. Doplar is not limited to the first few feet.

[Lihu]

Doplar radar can pick up objects over 300 yards easy. We use them in dayton to pick up cars up to over 1000 feet from the intersection. It will track the vehicle. Doplar is not limited to the first few feet.

To be fair a car is metal and much bigger than a golf ball. I am testing out some LNA circuits to see if I can get more range. Pretty noisy out that far.

[iacas]

To be fair a car is metal and much bigger than a golf ball.

And missiles hundreds of miles away are really small. Fact: they track the ball hundreds of yards. Okay then… :-) Can we get back to the topic now? :-) To that: yes, trust the report.

[Lihu]

I should definitely get some readings. Was just waiting till I could swing well enough to get good readings. It's expensive to get them done around here.

[luu5]

Even if they track the club head they do not know the face angles. When do they start to track the ball after impact and when is the spin value measured?

[iacas]

Even if they track the club head they do not know the face angles. When do they start to track the ball after impact and when is the spin value measured?

As soon as the unit can "see" the ball. Spin and the other initial qualities are measured then. Perhaps that is what @Spitfisher is saying: these measurements often come in the first 10 feet. The actual ball flight is measured as long as possible after that.

[Gridiron]

This is a screen shot from a Trackman session with Poulter as seen in this video:

In the red circle it displays, in yards, how far away the ball ways when Trackman was last able to track it.  253.9 yards away in this case.  Definitely more than 4-6 ft.

[jclark]

Doppler Radar is highly accurate out to further ranges than you would expect. Like Lihu said, you would need a Low Noise Amp to try and keep the signal clean and quiet. As long as the ball is moving the radar can pick up that movement and distinguish it from the background noise at pretty vast distances.

[iacas]

This is a screen shot from a Trackman session with Poulter as seen in this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RS44P3hMqrM

In the red circle it displays, in yards, how far away the ball ways when Trackman was last able to track it.  253.9 yards away in this case.  Definitely more than 4-6 ft.

Yes. I think that what @Spitfisher may have been told (perhaps not as clearly as he could have been) was that a lot of the launch characteristics - ball speed, launch angle, etc. - are measured within about the first 4-5 feet of ball flight.

Then the ball is tracked long after that (when possible).

[Stretch]

The FlightScope X2 tracks the ball (almost) all the way downrange. It is lost when it gets close to the ground on landing due to scatter, but this is the least relevant portion of its flight. I assume TrackMan does the same. You can see this happening if you turn on the Real Time Landing Area display in the FlightScope app. Player hits the shot and immediately you get a little roundel/target overlaid onto the display showing where the ball is predicted to land given the launch conditions. Then (assuming you havent normalized) as the wind on the range starts influencing the flight of the ball, that landing area starts to move. The radar can see that the ball is curving away from the track it was "expecting" it to take and starts to compensate on the fly. As the ball lands, the live ball track and landing area marker come together.

Edit: Whoops, I missed a whole page of further discussion! D'oh.

[Lihu]

Doppler Radar is highly accurate out to further ranges than you would expect. Like Lihu said, you would need a Low Noise Amp to try and keep the signal clean and quiet. As long as the ball is moving the radar can pick up that movement and distinguish it from the background noise at pretty vast distances.

My little "dark closet project" that I have been trying to build is something like this, except for golf:

http://www.highfrequencyelectronics.com/Archives/May12/1205_HFE_industryOrig.pdf

I gave up on my 10GHz plan. It was just so tempting because there are so many cheap movement detection radars available. If they could have been used, it would cost something like $10 to $15 for a quad patch array. An array of 4 of these measures balls out to 30meters or so (too little output power), but at lower velocities the frequency is too low to get enough readings for instantaneous velocities. $60 is very compelling, but didn't work that well.

24GHz seems to be a bare minimum for reliable operation. I'm using some Sirenza (Now RFMD) LNA and PA prototype boards, but might prototype with the complete modules (which are more expensive) rather than layout my own VCO/AMP/LNA board from discrete parts. Using modules, I might end up spending roughly half as much as a $2500 Xi Flightscope without the nice small compact case. It looks a little like a science fair project. I can import my data to matlab with a USB dataq and compare it to my prototype optical system as well. Worst case, I could teach everything to my son and it could be his "science fair" project for next year.

I would not recommend this project for anyone else. I think if I were to build this into a commercial product it would cost me on the order of $350 (weighted complete BOM), and would need to retail for at least $1500. Flightscope Xi has some nice SW developed for it as well so that's why it probably retails for $2500.

[iacas]

24GHz seems to be a bare minimum for reliable operation. I'm using some Sirenza (Now RFMD) LNA and PA prototype boards, but might prototype with the complete modules (which are more expensive) rather than layout my own VCO/AMP/LNA board from discrete parts. Using modules, I might end up spending roughly half as much as a $2500 Xi Flightscope without the nice small compact case. It looks a little like a science fair project. I can import my data to matlab with a USB dataq and compare it to my prototype optical system as well. Worst case, I could teach everything to my son and it could be his "science fair" project for next year.

Paging @NCGolfer . :)

[Lihu]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lihu

24GHz seems to be a bare minimum for reliable operation. I'm using some Sirenza (Now RFMD) LNA and PA prototype boards, but might prototype with the complete modules (which are more expensive) rather than layout my own VCO/AMP/LNA board from discrete parts. Using modules, I might end up spending roughly half as much as a $2500 Xi Flightscope without the nice small compact case. It looks a little like a science fair project. I can import my data to matlab with a USB dataq and compare it to my prototype optical system as well. Worst case, I could teach everything to my son and it could be his "science fair" project for next year.

Paging @NCGolfer . :)

I'm thinking that he might work there and possibly be able to "discount" some modules???

[iacas]

I'm thinking that he might work there and possibly be able to "discount" some modules???

Yes and no. But let's not veer from the topic.

You should start a different thread about your project, @Lihu .

[Lihu]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lihu

I'm thinking that he might work there and possibly be able to "discount" some modules???

Yes and no. But let's not veer from the topic.

You should start a different thread about your project, @Lihu.

I know there's already a thread on a "DIY trackman". I'm digging, to avoid making too many more duplicate threads.