Ground penetrating radar prototypes developed in COST action TU1208

In this contribution, two prototypes of Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) are presented, developed in the framework of COST Action TU1208 “Civil engineering applications of Ground Penetrating Radar.” The first prototype is a reconfigurable stepped-frequency GPR: the original version of this system was designed and implemented in 2008 and represented an outcome of the Italian research project Aitech. During the Action’s lifetime, the prototype has been improved and widely tested. Particular care has been taken to develop a technique for the reconfigurability of the integration time of the harmonic tones. The second prototype is a Frequency-Modulated Continuous Wave radar, which is still under development. It takes inspiration from a system implemented by the MIT Lincoln Laboratory. The radar is conceived to be cheap and easy to be built, so that it can be smoothly replicated and used for training purposes or to carry out basic experiments, in order to get acquainted with the GPR technology and methodology.