DISTANCE MEASURING APPARATUS

摘要

Provided is a low-cost distance measuring apparatus that can measure a distance between first and second transmitting/receiving means with high precision by using a single radio frequency to perform time division communications between the first and second transmitting/receiving means. The first transmitting/receiving means intermittently transmits, as burst signals, radio signals, which include at least a starting point signal, in a time-division simultaneous-transmission/reception manner. When having received the radio signals, the second transmitting/receiving means reproduces the starting point signal from the received radio signals, and synchronizes a synchronous oscillation means with the reproduced starting point signal, thereby generating a distance measurement signal. Then, the second transmitting/receiving means intermittently transmits, as burst signals, radio signals, which include the generated distance measurement signal, toward the first transmitting/receiving means at time-division intervals. Then, the first transmitting/receiving means uses a clock signal, which is synchronous with or orthogonal to the starting point signal generated by the local station including the first transmitting/receiving means, to measure the phase of the distance measurement signal received from the second transmitting/receiving means and calculate the distance from the measured phase.