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Article
Publication date: 26 July 2021

Krystian Borodacz, Cezary Szczepański and Stanisław Popowski

The selection of a suitable inertial measurement unit (IMU) is a critical step in an inertial navigation system (INS) design. Nevertheless, inertial sensors manufacturers are…

Abstract

Purpose

The selection of a suitable inertial measurement unit (IMU) is a critical step in an inertial navigation system (INS) design. Nevertheless, inertial sensors manufacturers are unwilling to publish their products’ accurate performance parameters along with a price. This paper aims to summarise the current IMU market review and point out parameters important for short-term inertial navigation.

Design/methodology/approach

The market review is based on the information published by manufacturers in brochures, datasheets and websites. Some information, including price, was also collected from sensors distributors. The entire collection of data includes data of over 150 sensors from 32 manufacturers and is valid for the first half of the year 2020.

Findings

This paper answers the following questions: •Why and where use inertial navigation? •Which parameters should one emphasise during IMU selection?•What is currently available on the IMU market? •Which parameters have a significant influence on price? •What are the advantages of specific sensor technology?

Originality/value

This paper gathers data published by IMU manufacturers, allowing for a quick overview of the current market. Based on real data, different sensor technologies are compared. The performed analysis presents the statistical basis for the IMU selection. By theoretical considerations a significance of sensor parameters is drawn and an approach to an IMU selection based on limited number of parameters is proposed. Although the considerations have been carried out regarding inertial navigation, the results from an extensive analysis of commercially available sensors may also be useful for other applications.

Details

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol. 94 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1748-8842

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 29 August 2023

Krystian Borodacz and Cezary Szczepański

Before designing a navigation system, it is necessary to analyse possible approaches in terms of expected accuracy, existing limitations and economic justification to select the…

Abstract

Purpose

Before designing a navigation system, it is necessary to analyse possible approaches in terms of expected accuracy, existing limitations and economic justification to select the most advantageous solution. This paper aims to collect possible navigation methods that can provide correction for inertial navigation and to evaluate their suitability for use on a manoeuvring tactical missile.

Design/methodology/approach

The review of existing munitions was based on data collected from the literature and online databases. The data collected included dimensions, performance, applied navigation and guidance methods and their achievable accuracy. The requirements and limitations identified were confronted with the range of sensor parameters available on the market. Based on recent literature, navigation methods were reviewed and evaluated for applicability to inertial navigation system (INS) correction in global navigation satellite system-denied space.

Findings

The performance analysis of existing munition shows that small and relatively inexpensive micro-electro-mechanical system-type inertial sensors are required. A review of the parameters of existing devices of this type has shown that they are subject to measurement errors that do not allow them to achieve the delivery accuracy expected of precision missiles. The most promising navigation correction methods for manoeuvring flying objects have been identified.

Originality/value

The information presented in this paper is the result of the first phase of a project and presents the results of the requirements selection, initial sizing and preliminary design of the navigation system. This paper combines a review of the current state of the art in missile systems and an analysis of INS accuracy including the selection of sensor parameters.

Details

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol. 96 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1748-8842

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 25 January 2011

Wu Xiaojuan and Wang Xinlong

The purpose of this paper is to overcome the limitations of existing celestial horizon references, and improve the navigation accuracy of the strap‐down inertial navigation

1039

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to overcome the limitations of existing celestial horizon references, and improve the navigation accuracy of the strap‐down inertial navigation system/celestial navigation system (SINS/CNS) integrated system with an innovative scheme of deep integration.

Design/methodology/approach

First, a novel conception of mathematical horizon reference (MHR) provided by the strap‐down matrix of SINS is proposed. Then, the realization mechanism of the MHR‐based vertical vector is introduced from the viewpoint of vector rotation. Moreover, the MHR implementation scheme of high precision and reliability is presented, and on this basis, the method which utilizes vertical vector to achieve celestial navigation is introduced. In addition, with considering the characteristics of SINS and the MHR‐based CNS, the SINS/CNS deep integrated navigation system and its specific realization are proposed. Finally, simulation tests are implemented to validate this SINS/CNS deep integrated navigation method.

Findings

The innovative SINS/CNS deep integrated system could make full use of SINS and CNS navigation information to achieve higher navigation accuracy for the long‐duration and high‐altitude vehicles.

Originality/value

This paper provides a novel realization method of high precision MHR and the MHR‐based SINS/CNS deep integration.

Details

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol. 83 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0002-2667

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 19 June 2017

Xiaochun Tian, Jiabin Chen, Yongqiang Han, Jianyu Shang and Nan Li

This study aims to design an optimized algorithm for low-cost pedestrian navigation system (PNS) to correct the heading drift and altitude error, thus achieving high-precise…

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to design an optimized algorithm for low-cost pedestrian navigation system (PNS) to correct the heading drift and altitude error, thus achieving high-precise pedestrian location in both two-dimensional (2-D) and three-dimensional (3-D) space.

Design/methodology/approach

A novel heading correction algorithm based on smoothing filter at the terminal of zero velocity interval (ZVI) is proposed in the paper. This algorithm adopts the magnetic sensor to calculate all the heading angles in the ZVI and then applies a smoothing filter to obtain the optimal heading angle. Furthermore, heading correction is executed at the terminal moment of ZVI. Meanwhile, an altitude correction algorithm based on step height constraint is proposed to suppress the altitude channel divergence of strapdown inertial navigation system by using the step height as the measurement of the Kalman filter.

Findings

The verification experiments were carried out in 2-D and 3-D space to evaluate the performance of the proposed pedestrian navigation algorithm. The results show that the heading drift and altitude error were well corrected. Meanwhile, the path calculated by the novel algorithm has a higher match degree with the reference trajectory, and the positioning errors of the 2-D and 3-D trajectories are both less than 0.5 per cent.

Originality/value

Besides zero velocity update, another two problems, namely, heading drift and altitude error in the PNS, are solved, which ensures the high positioning precision of pedestrian in indoor and outdoor environments.

Article
Publication date: 19 January 2015

Wen Liu, Yingjun Zhang, Xuefeng Yang and Shengwei Xing

The aim of this article is to present a PIN (pedestrian inertial navigation) solution that incorporates altitude error correction, which eliminates the altitude error accurately…

1021

Abstract

Purpose

The aim of this article is to present a PIN (pedestrian inertial navigation) solution that incorporates altitude error correction, which eliminates the altitude error accurately without using external sensors. The main problem of PIN is the accumulation of positioning errors due to the drift caused by the noise in the sensors. Experiment results show that the altitude errors are significant when navigating in multilayer buildings, which always lead to localization to incorrect floors.

Design/methodology/approach

The PIN proposed is implemented over an inertial navigation systems (INS) framework and a foot-mounted IMU. The altitude error correction idea is identifying the most probable floor of each horizontal walking motion. To recognize gait types, the walking motion is described with angular rate measured by IMU, and the dynamic time warping algorithm is used to cope with the different dimension samples due to the randomness of walking motion. After gait recognition, the altitude estimated with INS of each horizontal walking is checked for association with one of the existing in a database.

Findings

Experiment results show that high accuracy altitude is achieved with altitude errors below 5 centimeters for upstairs and downstairs routes in a five floors building.

Research limitations/implications

The main limitations of the study is the assumption that accuracy floor altitude information is available.

Originality/value

Our PIN system eliminates altitude errors accurately and intelligently, which benefits from the new idea of combination of gait recognition and map-matching. In addition, only one IMU is used which is different from other approach that use external sensors.

Details

Sensor Review, vol. 35 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0260-2288

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 28 November 2018

Qigao Fan, Jie Jia, Peng Pan, Hai Zhang and Yan Sun

The purpose of this paper is to relate to the real-time navigation and tracking of pedestrians in a closed environment. To restrain accumulated error of low-cost…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to relate to the real-time navigation and tracking of pedestrians in a closed environment. To restrain accumulated error of low-cost microelectromechanical system inertial navigation system and adapt to the real-time navigation of pedestrians at different speeds, the authors proposed an improved inertial navigation system (INS)/pedestrian dead reckoning (PDR)/ultra wideband (UWB) integrated positioning method for indoor foot-mounted pedestrians.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper proposes a self-adaptive integrated positioning algorithm that can recognize multi-gait and realize a high accurate pedestrian multi-gait indoor positioning. First, the corresponding gait method is used to detect different gaits of pedestrians at different velocities; second, the INS/PDR/UWB integrated system is used to get the positioning information. Thus, the INS/UWB integrated system is used when the pedestrian moves at normal speed; the PDR/UWB integrated system is used when the pedestrian moves at rapid speed. Finally, the adaptive Kalman filter correction method is adopted to modify system errors and improve the positioning performance of integrated system.

Findings

The algorithm presented in this paper improves performance of indoor pedestrian integrated positioning system from three aspects: in the view of different pedestrian gaits at different speeds, the zero velocity detection and stride frequency detection are adopted on the integrated positioning system. Further, the accuracy of inertial positioning systems can be improved; the attitude fusion filter is used to obtain the optimal quaternion and improve the accuracy of INS positioning system and PDR positioning system; because of the errors of adaptive integrated positioning system, the adaptive filter is proposed to correct errors and improve integrated positioning accuracy and stability. The adaptive filtering algorithm can effectively restrain the divergence problem caused by outliers. Compared to the KF algorithm, AKF algorithm can better improve the fault tolerance and precision of integrated positioning system.

Originality/value

The INS/PDR/UWB integrated system is built to track pedestrian position and attitude. Finally, an adaptive Kalman filter is used to improve the accuracy and stability of integrated positioning system.

Article
Publication date: 8 January 2021

Xianjun Liu, Xixiang Liu, Hang Shen, Peijuan Li and Tongwei Zhang

Motivated by the problems that the positioning error of strap-down inertial navigation system (SINS) accumulates over time and few sensors are available for midwater navigation

Abstract

Purpose

Motivated by the problems that the positioning error of strap-down inertial navigation system (SINS) accumulates over time and few sensors are available for midwater navigation, this paper aims to propose a self-aided SINS scheme for the spiral-diving human-occupied vehicle (HOV) based on the characteristics of maneuvering pattern and SINS error propagation.

Design/methodology/approach

First, the navigation equations of SINS are simultaneously executed twice with the same inertial measurement unit (IMU) data as input to obtain two sets of SINS. Then, to deal with the horizontal velocity provided by one SINS, a delay-correction high-pass filter without phase shift and amplitude attenuation is designed. Finally, the horizontal velocity after processing is used to integrate with other SINS.

Findings

Simulation results indicate that the horizontal positioning error of the proposed scheme is less than 0.1 m when an HOV executes spiral diving to 7,000 meters under the sea and it is inherently able to estimate significant sensors biases.

Originality/value

The proposed scheme can provide a precise navigation solution without error growth for spiral-diving HOV on the condition that only IMU is required as a navigation sensor.

Details

Assembly Automation, vol. 41 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0144-5154

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 9 August 2021

Lijun Chao, Zhi Xiong, Jianye Liu, Chuang Yang and Yudi Chen

To solve problems of low intelligence and poor robustness of traditional navigation systems, the purpose of this paper is to propose a brain-inspired localization method of the…

Abstract

Purpose

To solve problems of low intelligence and poor robustness of traditional navigation systems, the purpose of this paper is to propose a brain-inspired localization method of the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV).

Design/methodology/approach

First, the yaw angle of the UAV is obtained by modeling head direction cells with one-dimension continuous attractor neural network (1 D-CANN) and then inputs into 3D grid cells. After that, the motion information of the UAV is encoded as the firing of 3 D grid cells using 3 D-CANN. Finally, the current position of the UAV can be decoded from the neuron firing through the period-adic method.

Findings

Simulation results suggest that continuous yaw and position information can be generated from the conjunctive model of head direction cells and grid cells.

Originality/value

The proposed period-adic cell decoding method can provide a UAV with the 3 D position, which is more intelligent and robust than traditional navigation methods.

Details

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol. 93 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1748-8842

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 August 2014

Sanketh Ailneni, Sudesh K. Kashyap and N. Shantha Kumar

The purpose of this paper is to present fusion of inertial navigation system (INS) and global positioning system (GPS) for estimating position, velocities, attitude and heading of…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to present fusion of inertial navigation system (INS) and global positioning system (GPS) for estimating position, velocities, attitude and heading of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV).

Design/methodology/approach

A 15-state extended Kalman filter (EKF) and a split architecture consisting of six-state nonlinear complementary filter (NCF) and nine-state EKF are investigated in detail. In both these fusion architectures GPS and inertial measurement unit consisting of three axis accelerometers, three axis rate gyros and three axis magnetometer have been fused in open loop fashion (loosely coupled) to estimate the navigation states.

Findings

These architectures have been implemented in MATLAB/SIMULINK environment and evaluated in closed loop guidance of Black-Kite MAV with software-in-the-loop-simulation (SILS) setup. Furthermore, both the algorithms are validated with flight test data obtained from on-board data logger using an off-the shelf autopilot board (Ardupilot Mega APM-2.5) on SLYBIRD UAV.

Originality/value

The proposed architectures are of high value to accomplish INS/GPS fusion, which plays a vital role in autonomous guidance and navigation of an UAV.

Details

International Journal of Intelligent Unmanned Systems, vol. 2 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2049-6427

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 14 June 2013

Christian Ivancsits and Min‐Fan Ricky Lee

This paper aims to address three major issues in the development of a vision‐based navigation system for small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) which can be characterized as…

1043

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to address three major issues in the development of a vision‐based navigation system for small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) which can be characterized as follows: technical constraints, robust image feature matching and an efficient and precise method for visual navigation.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors present and evaluate methods for their solution such as wireless networked control, highly distinctive feature descriptors (HDF) and a visual odometry system.

Findings

Proposed feature descriptors achieve significant improvements in computation time by detaching the explicit scale invariance of the widely used scale invariant feature transform. The feasibility of wireless networked real‐time control for vision‐based navigation is evaluated in terms of latency and data throughput. The visual odometry system uses a single camera to reconstruct the camera path and the structure of the environment, and achieved and error of 1.65 percent w.r.t total path length on a circular trajectory of 9.43 m.

Originality/value

The originality/value lies in the contribution of the presented work to the solution of visual odometry for small unmanned aerial vehicles.

1 – 10 of 976