Development of a real-time DGPS system in the centimeter range

Abstract

Based on carrier phase observations of GPS a differential navigation system is developed delivering real-time accuracies in the centimeter range with an update rate of not smaller than one Hz. Central point in the development is the method of determining carrier phase ambiguities on-the-fly, since in this project primarily the DGPS system in a stand-alone operation is considered, i.e. without means of other sensors. Performance and limits of such a high-precision system are tested in field, in particular robustness, reliability and integrity of the carrier phase ambiguity resolution on-the-fly. Within a hydrographic experiment the capabilities of the OTF-algorithm are demonstrated using C/A code and L1 phase data only.