Precision navigation for aerospace applications

Navigation is important in a variety of aerospace applications, and commonly uses a blend of GPS and inertial sensors. In this thesis, a navigation system is designed, developed, and tested. Several alternatives are discussed, but the ultimate design is a loosely-coupled Extended Kalman Filter using rigid body dynamics as the process with a small angle linearization of quaternions. Simulations are run using real flight data. A bench top hardware prototype is tested. Results show good performance and give a variety of insights into the design of navigation systems. Special attention is given to convergence and the validity of linearization.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Mechanical Engineering.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2004

Author dc:creator

• Stimac, Andrew K. (Andrew Kenneth), 1977-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• David L. Trumper.

• Mechanical Engineering.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/16676

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/16676