Estimation method combining aircraft kinematics, GPS, and low‐quality rate gyros

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to estimate aircraft roll angle and rate gyro biases using aircraft kinematics with GPS and low‐quality rate gyros.

Design/methodology/approach

The proposed method is motivated by observing the fact that, in typical flight applications with transport, reconnaissance, or surveillance missions, the aircraft flies along relaxed flight paths, and the associated aircraft motion can be considered as the sum of the coordinated flight, low‐frequency motion and non‐coordinated, high‐frequency motion. The proposed scheme utilizes the coordinated flight kinematics to form the relatively simple, low‐order Kalman filter that estimates the aircraft roll attitude and rate gyro biases.

Findings

The associated frequency analysis reveals that, for the estimation in the relatively low‐frequency region, the method relies primarily on GPS with the help of coordinated flight kinematics in removing the bias effect from the low‐quality rate gyros. Also, for the estimation in the high‐frequency region the method relies mainly on the numerical integration of the rate gyro for the roll attitude, which enables a high‐bandwidth estimation.

Research limitations/implications

The proposed method is not suitable for flight manoeuvres where a non‐coordinated flight, such as steady heading sideslip, is sustained for a long period of time.

Practical implications

The proposed method has been implemented in a small UAV. The associated flight tests and simulations indicate that the new method has a potential to be used as a backup or a replacement for other complex conventional methods for many flight applications.

Originality/value

This paper has been the first to promote the estimation method that combines aircraft kinematics with GPS and low‐quality rate gyros.

Citation

Park, S. (2011), "Estimation method combining aircraft kinematics, GPS, and low‐quality rate gyros", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 83 No. 3, pp. 160-170. https://doi.org/10.1108/00022661111131258