LOW COST GPS/INS SENSOR FUSION SYSTEM FOR UAV NAVIGATION
Chang-sun Yoo, lee-ki Ahn, Korea Aerospace Research Institute, Daejon, Korea
Abstract
The performance of UAV is dependant greatly
upon onboard sensors due to its characteristics of
unmanned operated vehicle. The navigation sensor,
which informs where UAV is flying, also is one of
those onboard sensors. Small UAV needs the
navigation system with the compact, light, cheap
and precise navigation solution. As the inertial
sensor for precise air navigation is very expensive,
it is not popular in small aircraft and UAV. While
GPS services a seamless navigation with cheap
receiver, it may not receive the satellite signal by
the obstacle or the signal jamming. It is GPSiINS
sensor fusion that might overcome these
constraints. GPS receiver on air vehicle may happen
to lose the signal in a dynamic environment such as
aircraft maneuver. The multiple GPS antennas were
used to increase the coverage of GPS receiver. The
ground test showed that GPS/INS sensor fusion
system could provide well the attitude infomation
as well as the trajectory according to a vehicle
movement.
Introduction
Inertial sensor has the characteristics of a drift
in navigation solution due to a bias accumulation in
the process of integrating acceleration and angular
rate. In order to correct this drift, the error
compensation for the inertial sensor is required [I].
Inertial sensor for air navigation with a bias drift
below 1" /hr is very expensive [2]. The GPS
receiver which provides a seamless navigation
information is cheap but may lose the navigation
information of satellite due to the interruptionby
the obstacle or the signal jamming. GPSiINS
system must be a good altemative to overcome the
weakness of each sensor 131. In order to obtain the
compact, light, cheap and precise solution in small
UAV navigation, GPSANS sensor fusion system
has been developed. This system consists of three
I-axis gyroscope, one 3-axis accelerometer,one
GPS receiver and a digital signal processor. The
gyroscope has a bias 2.4%ec, a range of5100%ec
and the accelerometerhas a bias lOmg, a range of
fig. GPS receiver of 12ch, L1 CIA and MPC860
C7803-7844-X/03/$17.00 0 2003 IEEE
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DSP were used. This system was aimed to have the
performance specification of a weight below 5kg, a
size below 12Ox1OOx1OOmm, a navigation
precision below 10m position and 5°attitude[4].
GPS/INS system generally is dependent upon GPS
navigation information for INS error compensation
and GPS receiver on air vehicle may happen to lose
the signal in a dynamic environment such as aircraft
maneuver. Based on this problem, multiple GPS
antennas were used to increase the coverage of GPS
receiver even though vehicle moves dynamically
and its effectiveness was verified in the ground test.
The ground test also showed that the sensor fusion
system could provide well the attitude as well as the
trajectory according to a vehicle movement.
GPSKNS System Requirements
In the development of navigation system, its
goal is to accommodate the maneuver
characteristics of UAV. The strategy of
development is to select the sensor unit, to integrate
them with navigation software and finally to test
and evaluate them. Table 1 is the target
specification of the GPSmJS development.
Table 1. Target Specification of GPSANS
Items Specifications
Weight
<12ox1oox1oomm
Power < low
Position Hot. Ver. QOm
Accuracy
Attitude <so
Uudate Rate >SOH2
Data Transfer 19,600bps
Based on these requirements, sensor units were
selected and the structure configurationswere
desigaed.
Software Configurations r.(td=r(t,) (8)
Software of GPS/INS fusion system consists of Now we can produce the main expressions of
navigation algorithm, real-time processing and YO SDlNS software as follows
data processing.
*to +At) =Aq(At)[vo+U* xro+v,(Af)]-u, xr(t, +At) C9)
Spap-Down Inertial Navigation Algorithm r(to +At) = A,(At)[r, +At .(vu cumxr,)+r,(At)] (1 0)
Navigation algorithm of strap down M S where the following new notations are introduced
consists of translation part and rotation part. The
translation pat is to conduct the integral of
acceleration into velocity and translation of a
vehicle as follows [5][6][7][8]. i s f*

Kinematic equations of attitude used for a,W = AT(t)a(t)+ A:(t)tg(r) - wm1 (1 1)

rotational mechanization have the following form
60) = ~ @ ( U l ) W
A(t) = -oxA(t)
where k(t) is the quaternion that describes the
rotation of vehicle into inertial frame, A =A@) is
the transformation matrix related to quaternion h ,
w is the angular rate vector of the vehicle with
respect to inertial fiame,O(w) is the matrix of
kinematic differential equation in quatemions and
wx is the skew-symmetricmahix defining the
vector's cross-product.
Here At would be the sampling interval of
(1) sensors and cp is latitude of the navigation frame's
origin. qO=h,(t,), rO=r(t,) and vO=v(t,) stand
(2) for attitude, position and velocity respectively of the
vehicle in the initial time instant to.All these
variables are given in the navigational -e.
The attitude of the navigation frame with
respect to the inertial frame is the function of the
earth angular rate Q and the local latitude p . The
vector of the angular rate of navigation frame
relatively to the inertial one is given by
u,=R[cosql 0 -sin# (12)
(3)
Tangent velocity and centripetal acceleration
of navigation h n e origin could be expressed as

1,:
mx =
1-.2
-0"'
0 1 0 i
General navigation equations for translational
mechanization have the following form
(4)
follows

I[
v,=mcosrp= 1 ' w,=u,xv,=Rn'co ]I!:{ (13)

For given value of latitude cp the solution of

*At) = AT(t)a(t)+ g(rJ (5) these kinematic equations could be expressed as
- sinasintp

1
i*(t) = v*(t) (6) cos asin' rp+ cos*g (cosa -1)sintpcosg
cosa sin a cosg
where r. and v. are the position and velocity (cosa-l)sinvcosg -sinacosv cosacos'v+sin'p >
vectors of the vehicle with respect to inertial frame.,
a is the acceleration vector due to all non- (14)
gravitational forces and g is the gravity vector. h,(t)=Eosa/: sina/:cosv 0 -singsing]T (15)
Initial conditions for these equations in accordance
with the given frames are determined by the In accordance with expressions (12), (13), (14)
following expressions: and (15), the vectors of earth angular rate U, and
v.(t,)=v(t,)+u, xr(t,)+v, (7) centripetal acceleration w, in navigation frame as

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well as matrices dA = A,(At) and PS= Y(X*(At))
are computed with necessaIy accuracy as functions
of the local latitude and the sampling interval. At
each step of algorithm, the following operations are
performed. On the basis of gyro’s readouts quasi-
coordinate vector are computed, which used for
determination of quaternion of small turn
dq = %(At)
The attitude of vehicle in inertial frame is
calculated using the formula of quatemion’s
product
qt = @(dq)*qO
The attitude of vehicle in navigation frame in
the time instant t = to +At would be found on the
basis of the quaternion’s division,
qo = Ps *qt
These operations correspond to integration of
the kinematic equations of attitude.
Next integration of the general navigation
equations is as follows. Vector of acceleration,
defined by the accelerometer’s outputs, is
transformed from the body frame to the inertial
frame using the following
................................................................
Q ”os.,*,
D r.111.110
11.1
n .I
...............................
Figure 1. Structure of GPSlINS Fusion System
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a0 = AT(qt)*a(t, +At) (19)
Then gravity acceleration vector go = g(r0)
has to be computed. After this, integration of
accelerations is performed on the basis of the
numerical procedure. It is useful to remark, that the
value of the g(r) is determined as predicted value,
using quadratic approximation and spherical model
(16) of the earth gravity.
Then the vehicle’s position and velocity
vectors in the next time instant to + A t are
calculated, using formulas (9) and (10). These
(17) calculated values are accepted as initial values for
the next step of calculations and all cycle is
repeated until the end of the navigation mode. It is
necessaty to mention that the outputs of
accelerometers and vector of gravity acceleration at
the previous step has to be transformed to the new
(18)
position of navigation frame.
GPWNS Correction Algorithm
In integration of corrected SINS equation from
step to step, the estimation error will be described
the following difference equation [9] (see Figure 1).
P*.111.“ (&,*I
“.l*CltY ,“.*,I
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r][ *:
SI,
&P,
= A,V,
A,V*
A,
A,
0
A.A,
~S,I . . AXA&u.,,-,
6Pk.n
] + [ * +* 2,l ~ - ~ ]
A -A,Alu.,k.i
[:1
(20)
where 68 = se,,@), A is integration interval,
A, = A@), subscript k accordance to f,. Let's
consider the technique of determination of the
estimation error by Kalman filtering in the case that
we used GPS information about vehicle position
andvelocity[10][11].
x
Let and Vk are vehicle position and where K, is the Kalman gain matrix,
velocity defined GPS data in moment t = t , and -
U,* =-
-
C p ; 9 - - -.,SF;
USL - -c,Sp; (23)
= Gk +U, x i . In this moment, the solution of
The values of corrected vectors in (22) and
navigation equation are given by Fk and 3,. . (23) are given by
-
By setting the vectors Fk - and 3, - as F, u,(f,) = A(%(t,))ii-* u.(t,) 5 A(x(t,))C,;, (24) .
the measurement update of plant defined difference
equation (20), the problem of the state estimate
determioation may be solution by the method of Hardware Configurations
Kalman filtering. So the state estimate extrapolation Sensors to comprise GPS/INS system were
error vector is formed by difference equation consisted of three 1-axis vibration gyroscopes, one
3-axis accelerometer, one GPS receiver with
multiple antennas and DSP processor with U 0 and
memory like Figure 2. Table 2, Table 3 and Table 4
are the specification of each sensor.

Figure 2. Hardware Structure GPSANS System

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 axes of vehicle and around 0" through 90"to roll
Items Specifcations axes. GPS data were measured during 367 sec.
Angular Rate 0 to flOO dedsec Figures 3 through 5 show the result of HDOP and
Scale Factor(sensitivity) 2OmV/(deg/s) positioning comparison. In the case of three
SF Vibration with Temp. f3% antennas, the number of the observed satellite was 7
Bias(output zero point) 2.5VDC and HDOP was 1.1 and the navigation precision
was 1.1l m (2dRMS) in latitude, 4.44m (2dRMS) in
Bias Vibration with Temp f60mV longitude and 2.2m (2dRMS) in height.
Bandwidth IOHz(JdB)
Non-linearity <OS%FS typ. 2.5 -, I

Items Specifcations
hput Rang&) fl
Zero g Drifi(mv) f30 0.5
Sensitivity0 2
Non-linearity (%FS) *3 0 , , , , , , , , , , . , ,

1 45 8 9 1 3 3 1 7 7 2 2 1 2 6 5 3 0 9 3 5 3
Alignment Error(deg) f2
Noise(mg rms) 0.5 time (sec)
Bandwidth(Hz) 50 J

I 4 I
Signal L1 ,CfAcode
Channels 12

Accuracy
Position 15 meters 2D RMS
timing 50-
Reacquisition Time lOOmS
start(cold'war"ot) 4513818 sec
NMEA at 4800 baud
Data Protocol
SiRF Binary at 38400 baud
mh
Application Test
Amlication test for GPSANS sensor fusion Figure 4. Positioning Result for a GPS Antenna
system-& conducted on the road in KARI. At fust
the performance for multiple antennas was verified
by analyzing the received data on the February 1ZR1282
2003. Next the navigation performance of GPSKNS ,TR1181
fusion system was tested by running on the road on
the June 2003.
12721218
12~12n
Multiple Antennas Test 127212?8
mmz m6
1pB JBllBUa H2zbuy mmca JBILa12
A GPS receiver, a combiner and three antennas Mm
were used for multiple antenna test. GPS antennas
was located on three points, the upper, the left and Figure 5. Positioning Result for 3 GPS Antennas
right side of test bed. The test bed was disposed a

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 In the case of one antenna, the number of the
observed satellite was 4 through 7 and HDOP was
1.1 through 2.1 and the navigation precision was
4.44m (2dRMS) in latitude, 11.1Im (2dRMS) in
longitude and 2.6m (2dRMS) in height. Test result
showed that three antennas have better performance
in navigation than one antenna
Ground Moving Test
GPSmJS fusion system was located on the
vehicle and tested through movement of the vehicle
on the squared road in KARI. A vehicle speed was
-
0 40km/hrand the driving time is about 5 minutes
with two turns. Inertial data were measured with
1OOHz and those errors were corrected with GPS
data by 1Hz.Figures 6 and 7 show angle rate and
acceleration measured with GPSIINS. In the
procedure of ground moving test, the initial
alignment was conducted for 200 seconds before
the car started to run.
Figure 6. Angle Rate of GPSANS
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Figure 7. Acceleration of GPS/INS
But one problem was that the resolution of a
used gyroscope was not so accurate to measure the
earth rotation rate, which could not provide the
initial yaw angle of the vehicle. Therefore the user
needed either to input it artificially or to input it
from other information source such as
magnetometer to supply it. At the starting point,
after the car was aligned to the south direction
(y=180"),initial yaw angle was allocated
artificially as initial value. Measured angle rate
shows that the abrupt change of yaw rate in four
comers on squared road happens according to a 90"
tum. This also was shown in acceleration
measurements in x axis and y axis. Acceleration
changes in the x axis result ffomacceleration and
deceleration in the driving direction. Changes in y
axis result from centrifugal force due to a 90" tum.
Figure 8 shows the position trajectory of
GPS/INS. The position was compared through the
consistency of two trajectories by tuming twice on
the same squared road. In straight pa& the
trajectories of GPS/INS are nearly consistent
between first one and second one. But in comers,
the trajectories show mote clearly that INS errors
are bounded by GPS. In GPS case, the
inconsistency in trajectories between buildings
increases, while the one in open area decreases. But
in GPS/INS case, trajectories in all paths show to be
consistent while GPS signal is alive.
 3 - l

Figure 10. Comparison of Position Trajectories

with GPSfiNS and GPS
Figures 11 and 12 show its attitude and
trajectory obtained in a moving vehicle on the same
road of KARI. Comparing with Figures 7 and 8,
there are less biases in roll and pitch angle than the
developed GPS/INS. It provides more clear change
in yaw angle than the developed one of KARI. The
position trajectory with 1-4m discrepancy between
two trajectories is nearly like the developed one of
KARI.
- i
-
gI 0 . I .I ~ .i' ~ - , ~ ~ ~ ~ , ~ ~
~ ~ . , . . ~ . ~ . ~ ~ . ~ . ~~.~ ~,.,t.,,,, I
. ~ - ~ . - . ~ ~ . - . ~ ~ ~ ~ . ~ L - ~ - - . ; . l
1
= -10 I i
50 rm 19) 2 0 291

3 ,
~~.~.r.._l.~.r.._~_~.~~.~~~~..,.~~~
,
l.+--&&~ 4-4y-?,
-$,fi+;yr3i ~ -

Figure 11. Attitude of Honeywell H764G

Figure 9. Attitude of GPSmVS

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Figure 12. Position Trajectory of Honeywell
H764G
On the basis of current test result, the
specifications of the developed GPS/INS fusion
system are like Table S. As the constraints for
mounting on UAV, weight, size, power were
confirmed to be satisfied and the position
performance also was done. The attitude
performance was shown to follow up the target
requirement but was required to refine and improve
more.
system with DSP processor. INS algorithm and
GPS calibration algorithm were implemented into
G P S N S system. Test for the developed system
was conducted on ground in order to verify a
satisfaction of design requirements. Test result
showed that multiple antennas could provide better
performance than one antenna and that developed
low cost GPS/INS could provide enough the
position precision within Sm and not a little the
attitude precision within 10°-lS O of the vehicle
through the vehicle's moving test around the square
road. Through this test and evaluation, it was shown
that the requirements of initial constraints could be
satisfied and some parameters such as attitude
should be improved more. In the future, the
research will be focused on flight test and
improvement of attitude performance.
Acknowledgements
This paper was performed for the Smart UAV
Development program, one of the 2 1st Century
Frontier R&D Programs and for the National
Research Laboratory program funded by the
Ministry of Science and Technology of Korea.

Table 5. Specification Of GPSDNS

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