Idea for radio triangulation

Greetings sci.math,

Sleepless last night I had a new idea for radio triangulation. The
original spark for the idea was that if you only have a very short
signal pulse (such as radiation from lightning striking) come into your
listening station, there is no way you can triangulate it because it'll
be gone by the time you even have the thought of doing so.
At first I figured that with an array of antennas each with a unique
channel I should be able to calculate the origin of the signal with
direction AND distance, provided I know the distance between each
antenna and the speed of light. After this I got the idea that I really
don't need an entire array, and that six antennas arranged in two
groups of thee antennas in a like-sided triangle (Direct translation
from the Swedish term, apologies.) would do a fine job as well. Then I
reduced it to four antennas in two groups, each pair aligned
perpendicular to the other. Then finally before falling asleep I
contemplated whether only three antennas aligned in any triangle would
be sufficient for the task.

I keep doubting that such a simple design would suffice since I figure
that surely it would have been implemented already if it worked.
However, every thought-experiment I do keeps saying that it works, the
latest in the line the most convincing thanks to some rather lateral
and intuitive thinking. In this experiment I imagine being at the
position of the origin of the signal, looking at tree antennas with
equal distance between them. One antenna is red, one is green and one
is blue. No matter how I spin this arrangement of colored antennas
around they look different from each position, and no matter what the
distance is they look different thanks to this 'depth compression' you
sometimes see on TV when the camera moves away from the subject while
zooming in. (I really should know the technical name since I'm an
amateur photographer as well.)

Is there something I'm forgetting here? I know that at greater
distances the change (Think of the focus on a camera lens, on mine
being marked with the symbol for infinity right after the mark for five
meters.) would be evanescent, but I figure that the accuracy of modern
technology would still be able to come up with data that can be used.
....But still, no implementation that I know of.

Thank you for reading, and please do inform me why exactly I'm being a
dolt. =)

--
Nosforit

.

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