Patent ID: 7542866

Claim:
A radar level transmitter for providing level detection of materials in a container, the transmitter comprising: an antenna; a transceiver coupled to the antenna and configured to transmit a microwave pulse, having a transmit pulse amplitude, using the antenna and produce a signal representing reflected wave pulses; a microprocessor system coupled to the transceiver and adapted to control the transceiver and process the signal; a threshold calculation module executable by the microprocessor system and adapted to receive information related a dielectric constant of a first material and a dielectric constant of a second material and calculate an estimated fiducial pulse amplitude related to a reflected wave pulse from an interface between the antenna and the first material and an estimated first pulse amplitude related to a reflected wave pulse from a first material interface between the first material and the second material, the threshold calculation module further adapted to set a fiducial threshold value based upon the estimated fiducial pulse amplitude and set a first threshold value based upon the estimated first pulse amplitude; and a level calculation module executable by the microprocessor system and adapted to establish a level in the container of the first material interface using the signal, the fiducial threshold value and the first threshold value.