High dynamic, low volume GPS receiver

Abstract

A new GPS receiver concept and design are presented to meet the high dynamic and low volume requirements for range applications in missiles and drones. The receiver has the potential to satisfy all range requirements with one basic receiver, which has significant potential economic benefit over the alternate approach of using a family of receivers, each tailored for specific applications. The main new concept is to use approximate maximum likelihood estimates of pseudo range and range-rate, rather than tracking with carrier phase locked loops and code delay locked loops. Preliminary analysis indicates that receivers accelerating at 50 g or more can track with position errors due to acceleration of approximately 0.2 m/g, or 10 m at 50 g. Implementation is almost entirely digital to meet the low volume requirements.