DIY Drone-Borne SAR: 1.5km Imaging on a Budget

This project details the construction of a low-cost drone-borne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system for under €800 and 10 months of spare time. The system achieves imaging up to 1.5km (and potentially further), weighs less than 1kg, and supports HH, HV, VH, and VV polarizations. The author meticulously documents the design, hardware choices, software algorithms (including a PyTorch-based autofocus algorithm), and the resulting imagery. This project showcases the potential of low-cost hardware for high-performance SAR imaging.