Calbration and evaluation of water speed indicator and compass for the small autonomous underwater vehicle navigation filter

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Calbration and evaluation of water speed indicator and compass for the small autonomous underwater vehicle navigation filter

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Knapp, Randall G

There are three major thrusts to this thesis. The first was to design and build a device to measure ground speed for testing the position estimating capabilities of the Small Autonomous Navigation System (SANS) filter. The ground tests consisted by placing the SANS unit on a golf cart and maneuvering it along a known track. The speed sensing device uses a bicycle wheel attached to the golf cart along with an appropriate time to speed software conversion. The next problem was to determine if the existing paddle wheel in use would be accurate enough for the SANS to conduct underway tests. To perform this, a mechanism had to be built to channel water and measure its speed while allowing the paddle wheel to be in the flow. Finally, the electronic compass was found to have heading dependent errors, thus a test was designed to determine its deviation. This was performed by swinging the compass using a transit aligned with its axis. This established a deviation table that was inserted into the SANS code, further refining its directional capabilities. As a final test for determining the effectiveness of the calibrated inputs, tests were conducted that showed that the SANS filter is capable of obtaining 3 meter accuracy with no Global Positioning Update for an excess of two minutes. This is well beyond the initial goals set for the system ; http://archive.org/details/calbrationndeval109458043 ; Lieutenant, United States Navy ; Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.