NTL Record

Title Reliability of Navigation Service Provided by the Global Positioning System
Record ID 42202
Personal Name
Creator
Kalafus, Rudolph M.
Source 73p. in various pagings
Corporate Creator John A. Volpe National Transportation Systems Center (U.S.)
Publisher United States. Department of Transportation. Federal Aviation Administration
Publication Date 19850901
Language English
Abstract The planned NAVSTAR/GPS satellite constellation of 18 satellites plus 3 active will provide excellent coverage over the continental United States (CONUS) if all are operating properly. This report examines the coverage under conditions of one satellite failure. It turns out that the failure of any satellite results in service outages of up to half an hour somewhere in the CONUS. While altimeter aiding eliminates most of these outages, still remain 14 outage events each day. Furthermore, 'coasting' the navigation solution with a stable clock is not effective in handling these outages. One technique which does appear to be effective is using a mask angle of 5 degrees or less. At these low angles the signal is down in amplitude due to antenna rolloff, and it is more affected by tropospheric refraction and multipath, but it is better to use even a corrupted signal than to suffer a service outage. Also examined in this report is the impact of adding satelites to the constellation. It is shown that a 24-satellite consellation still provides 100% availability in the CONUS when one satellite fails. Keywords include: Navigation, GPS, Satellites, Avionics, Aviation, Ranging systems, Altimeters, Stable oscillators, and Dilution of precision.
Public Note Introduction, Approach, GPS service reliability under conditions of unaided receiver operation, GPS service reliability under conditions of altimeter aiding of user receiver, Clock quality required for "coasting" during outages, Conclusions and recommendations, Appendices
Rosap ID dot:9413
Rosap URL https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/9413
TRT Terms Global Positioning System; Navigation devices; Altimeters; Signal generators
General Subjects Navigation; Global positioning system; Avionics; Ranging systems; Altimeters; Stable oscillators; Dilution of precision
Classification NTL - AVIATION - Air Traffic Control
Geographical
Coverage
United States
OCLC 12931144
Report Number DOT-TSC-FAA-85-04; DOT-FAA-ES-85-4
Availability Volpe National Transportation Systems Center, Technical Reference Center
Resource type Tech Report
URL https://ntlrepository.blob.core.windows.net/lib/42000/42200/42202/DOT-TSC-FAA-85-4.pdf
Format PDF
Database NTL Digital Repository