Philip Gallman, who has written several radar-related articles for Ocean Navigator, has a website, The Radar Reflector Site, for all those voyagers who are buying radar reflectors or who just want to know more about these safety devices. There is a great deal of info available on the site that the average voyager will find useful.
Gallman’s site introduction: This website is an outgrowth of my effort to find the best radar reflector for my sailboat. I approached the advertisements and magazine articles in the boating literature from the vantage point of a strong academic background and lifelong career in radar (see bio). It seemed to me that much of the information available to the public was either incomplete, misleading, or simply wrong. I launched a project to understand the problems associated with detecting recreational boats with radar, how and why radar reflectors work, how to evaluate and compare different designs, and their role in minimizing the risk of collisions at sea. The result, my book Radar Reflectors for Cruising Sailboats: Why they Work; How to Evaluate Them; What the Limitations Are, was published in 2005.
I also decided to develop this website to make the information more readily available to the boating community. My vision for this website is to make it a central source of information and data relating to marine radar, radar reflectors, radar target enhancers, and their role in avoiding collisions at sea. Detecting recreational vessels is emphasized as their small size presents unique challenges. Any and all comments, suggestions, questions, and input from visitors are welcome. With everybody’s participation this site can be a valuable resource for the boating community.
