ELECTRONIC

NAVIGATION
Lesson-10d:
OMEGA
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 Omega is a worldwide, internationally
operated radio navigation system.
 It operates in the VLF band between 10 and
14 kHz.
 It provides an all weather, medium-
accuracy navigation service to marine
navigators.
 The system consists of 8 widely-spaced
transmitters. 2
Omega stations and frequencies

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 There is no master-secondary relationship
between the Omega stations.
 The navigator is free to use any station pair
that provides the most accurate line of
position.
 Omega measures phase differences between
the two signals whereas Loran C measures
time delays between signal receptions.
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 Works on VLF band (10-14 kHz).
 It has 8 transmitter around the world and
distance between stations is 5000-6000
nm.
 There is no Master and Slave.
 Uses CW (continues waves).
 Each transmitter has different frequency.
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 WORKING PRINCIPLE
 Each station pulse a wave in different freq.
between 10-14 Khz. and receiver takes the
waves and calculate the difference of time
and phase of waves than fix the position on
hyperbolic lines that is occurred along
transmission process. Timing between
stations is made according to atomic clocks.
So level of error in transmission time gets
minimum.
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 İstasyonlardan gelen dalgalar gemideki
cihaz tarafından frekans ve zaman olarak
değerlendirilir.
 Herbir çift için hiperbolik eğri numarası
elde edilir. İki eğrinin kesiştiği nokta gemi
mevkiisidir.

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 Herhangi bir mevkiide en az beş istasyonun
yayımı alınabilir.
 İstasyonlar Yayım Çizelgelerine göre Time
Sharing-Zaman Paylaşımı esasına göre
yayım yaparlar.
 Aynı anda herbir istasyondan alınsaydı,
hangi istasyona ait olduğu ve faz farkları
tespit edilemezdi.
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 Each Omega station transmits: 10.2 kHz,
11.05 kHz, 11.3 kHz, and 13.6 kHz.
 Each station transmits on a unique frequency.
 No two stations transmit the same frequency
at the same time, and there is no overlap of
transmissions. Each transmission segment is
between 0.9 and 1.2 seconds long, with a 0.2
second interval between segments. Each
station continuously repeats its transmission
cycle.

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Ölçüm
 İnce ve Kaba Ölçüm vardır.
 İnce ölçümde A ist. gelen dalga ile (1.5 s
sonra) C’den gelen karşılaştırılarak faz farkı
ölçülür. Ölçüm için eş frekanslı dalgalar
seçilir.
 Böylece centi lane (şerit yüzdebiri) 2
rakamlı olarak elde edilir.

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 Kaba ölçümde; iki ayrı frekanstaki dalgalar
toplanarak her iki istasyon için düşük
frekanslı dalgalar elde edilir.
 Karşılaştırma ile faz farkı bulunur.
 Böylece şerit numarası (3 rakamlı) elde
edilir.

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 OPERATION
 An Omega receiver determines position in either the
direct ranging mode or the hyperbolic mode.
Some call the direct ranging mode the rho-rho
mode. In the direct ranging mode, the receiver
measures ranges from stations by measuring phase
shifts between transmitted signals and an internal
reference signal. In the hyperbolic mode, the
receiver measures position relative to transmitter
pairs by making phase comparisons between signals
coming from these pairs.
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 Direct Ranging Mode
 Omega wavelength is appr. 16 miles long. The
wavelength defines the width of each Omega “lane.”
Figure shows the lanes as concentric circles formed
around the transmitting station. Omega receiver
measures the phase of the received signal within a
known lane. This phase shift allows the receiver to
determine its position’s fraction distance between
lanes. Knowing which lane it is in and the fractional
distance between lane boundaries, the receiver can
calculate an LOP. The LOP is the line of points
corresponding to the fractional distance between 13
lanes calculated by the receiver.
Omega lanes formed by radio waves 14
 Fig. does not take into account that the transmitted
navigation signal forming the Omega lane is not
stationary. Rather, it propagates at the speed of light.
To account for this moving wave, the receiver
generates a reference signal at the same frequency of
the Omega navigation signal. This reference signal
“freezes” the Omega signal from the receiver’s
perspective in a manner analogous to the way a strobe
light flashing at the same frequency of a rotating disk
freezes the disk from an observer’s perspective.
Comparing these “frozen” reference and navigation
signals allows the receiver to measure the phase
difference between the navigation signal and the
reference signal. This phase difference is proportional
to the receiver’s fractional distance between two 15
Omega lanes.
 Fig. shows how the direct ranging mode
works. The operator initializes the Omega
receiver at point 1. This initialization tells
the receiver what lane it is in and the
fractional distance between the lane
boundaries. From this information, the
receiver calculates A1 and B1, the distances
between the receiver and stations A and B,
respectively. The receiver then travels to
point 2.
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Position fixing in the direct ranging mode

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 During the trip to point 2, the receiver keeps
track of how many lanes it crosses. When it
stops, it determines the fractional distance
between lane boundaries at point two. From
the lane counting and the phase comparison
at point 2, the receiver calculates A2 and
B2, the distances between the receiver and
stations A and B, respectively.
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 Hyperbolic Mode
 In the direct range mode, the receiver measured the
distance between it and two or more transmitting
stations to determine lines of position.
 In the hyperbolic mode, the receiver measures the
difference in phase between two transmitters.
 Fig. shows two transmitting stations, labeled A and
B. Both of these stations transmit on the same
frequency. The stations transmit such that their
waves’ phase is zero at precisely the same time.
Because each signal’s phase is zero at each wave
front, the phase difference where the wave fronts
intersect is zero. 19
Omega lanes formed by hyperbolic isophase contours 20
 Connecting the intersecting wave fronts yields a line along
which the phase difference between the two signals is zero.
This line forms a hyperbola called an isophase contour.
At any point along this contour, the phase difference
between the stations is zero. At any point between the
isophase contours, there is a phase difference in the signals
proportional to the fractional distance between the
contours. The set of isophase contours between station
pairs forms a series of lanes, each corresponding to one
complete cycle of phase difference. The hyperbolic mode
lane width on the stations’ baseline equals one-half the
signal wavelength. For a 10.2 kHz signal, the baseline lane
width is appr. 8 miles. Each of these 8 mile wide lanes is
divided into 100 centilanes (cels). The receiver measures
the phase difference between stations in hundredths of a
cycle. These units are termed centicycles (cec). 21
Direct Ranging and Hyperbolic
Operation
 Originally, the hyperbolic mode was more accurate
because the direct ranging mode required a precise
receiver internal oscillator to remain synchronized
with the atomic oscillators used by the transmitting
station. Since these oscillators would have made
the receiver prohibitively expensive, the receiver
carried an oscillator that was subject to clock error.
In the direct ranging mode, this clock error would
have been critical because this mode relies on a
direct comparison between one transmitter’s signal
and the clock internal oscillator. 22
 In the hyperbolic mode, the receiver
measures the phase difference between two
transmitted signals and the receiver’s
internal oscillator. When the receiver
subtracts one phase difference from another
to calculate the difference, the clock error is
mathematically eliminated. In other words,
as long as the clock error remained constant
between the two measurements, subtracting
the two phase differences canceled out the
error.
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 The microprocessing of modern receivers allows the
direct ranging mode to be used. The methodology
used is similar to that used by GPS to account for
inaccuracies in GPS receiver clocks.
 Omega receiver makes three ranging measurements
and looks at the intersection of the three resulting
LOP’s. If there were no clock error present, the
LOP’s would intersect at a pinpoint. Therefore, the
receiver subtracts a constant clock error from each
LOP until the fix is reduced to a pinpoint. This
technique allows a receiver to use the direct ranging
method without a precise atomic oscillator. This
technique works only if the clock error is constant for
each phase difference measurement.
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Omega Haritaları
 Aynı şekilde Markator üzerine Omega
Hiperbolleri mevcuttur.
 AD775
– A istasyonu
– D istasyonu
– 775 şerit yüzdebir sayısı

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Omega Hataları
 Yaklaşık; gündüz 1 mil, gece 2 mil hata
vardır.
 Dalga Kılavuzu (Wave Guide) Etkisi: 10-14
kHz’lik dalgalar yerden yaklaşık 80 km
yükseklikteki D iyonesferinden yansımalar
yapar ve büyük uzaklıklara ulaşır.
– Dalga Kılavuzu içinde ilerleyen em dalga değişik
şekil ve yönlerde elektrik ve mıknatıs alan
oluşturur.
– Bu değişik şekillerden her birine MOD denir.
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 – Mod’lar yanlış ölçümlere neden olur, özellikle
650 mil dahilinde.
– Haritalarda bu hata için uyarı Modal
Interference-Mod Karışımı verilir.
 Kutup Emme Etkisi-Polar Cap Absorption:
Yerin mıknatıs alanı em dalgaların fazını
etkiler. Bu nedenle dalgaları kutuptan
geçmeyen istasyonların kullanılması
önerilir.
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 Günlük Yayılma Değişmesi: İyonosfer’den
kaynaklanan (gündüzden geceye geçişler)
değişimler faz değişimine Diurnal Shift –
Günlük Kayma’ya neden olur.
 Gök Dalgası Düzeltme Çizelgesi: Gök
dalgasının kullanılmasında yayımlanan
çizelgelerdir.

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Diferansiyel Omega
 Mevkii belli Omega monitor istasyonları,
Omega istasyonlarından aldığı dalgalara
göre düzeltme sinyali oluşturur ve bunu
gemilere iletir.
 Ancak, gemilerin bu sinyali alması için
Omega cihazına ilave cihaza, Diferansiyel
Omega Alıcısı olmalıdır.

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OMEGA

Error in position
at

Daytime 1 nm

Night 2 nm.

IT CAN
CHANGE
ACCORDING
TO LAYERS IN
THE SKY.
 ?

kumse@itu.edu.tr

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