Port Said University

Faculty of Engineering
Civil Engineering Department

Surveying (2)
CIV219

2nd Year – Civil Engineering Department

Second term – Academic Year 2019-2020

Research Title
GNSS applications in monitoring of deformation of buildings

Student Name:
‫محمد غريب السويفي متولي‬
Student Number:
27062
_____________________________________________________________
Submitted to:
The Faculty of Engineering, Port Said University
Dr. Ahmed El Sharkawy
Dr. Marwa Azzam

Port Said - June 2020

Abstract:
The Deformation of various engineering structures is regularly assessed from time to time
to make sure that these structure exhibit a safe deformation behavior, GNSS ‘Global
Navigation Satellite System’ is active in the measurement of static and dynamic
displacement which takes place in large civil engineering structures such as long bridges,
towers, and tall buildings under winds and other effects. For example of these methods the
deformation occurs in these massive structures can be measured ‘monitored’ by using
different geodetic methods such as Global Positioning System ‘GPS’ , There are some
primitive techniques compared to GNSS method to measure Structural Vibration (these
include accelerometer vibration measurement, laser interferometer vibration measurement,
and vibration measurement with an electronic distance measurement instrument) but these
techniques are not sufficient as the geodetic ones. By the way they have their advantages
too such as saving money and they don’t need the same amount of experience to deal with
like the geodetic methods but they also have disadvantages represent in imprecision in
readings compared to the modern GNSS methods . Nevertheless, low sampling
frequencies and multipath effects affect the accuracy of these methods in displacement
measurement On the other hand, accelerometers can not accurately calculate static and
low-frequency Structural responses, but can reliably calculate structural responses at high
frequencies.

Therefore, in this research, the reliability and practicability of using different global navigation
satellite systems in measuring the deformation that take place in different engineering
structures (static plus dynamic) will be shown besides discussing the different types of
GNSS and difference between them.

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Introduction:
The dynamic deformation occurs in engineering structures has been a subject of
longstanding concern to engineers. With the growing complexity and cost of large-scale
Engineering Structures and the enormous projects that take place by the different
contracting companies around the world such as (bridges, dams, skyscrapers, etc...)
operation and maintenance have become extremely important. That means structural
displacement is an essential parameter for evaluating the Integrity and protection of a large
civil engineering structure, especially massive buildings or a long cable-supported structure
Bridge, with winds beneath. Wind-inducing responses of such a large structure is controlled
entirely And then you displacement responses are obtained. These movements happen in
mentioned Structures are due to different reasons and factors such as Changes in
temperature or operating forces in machinery; and immediate acceleration of movements
causing failures geotechnical structures.

In these –massive- structures, the harmonic frequencies typically range from 0.1 Hz to 10
Hz, and amplitudes from 10 mm to 200 mm. The interest in vibrations in these civil
engineering structures stemmed from the fact that there are many longer or larger structures
than in the past. And now these structures are built to be a lot more flexible. Also there is an
understanding that the structural integrity should be monitored from time to time, in particular
after Events like fires, earthquakes etc.

The move towards potential-deformation-sensitivity engineering and construction projects

and rising geoscientific interest in the study of crustal movement have all combined to raise
awareness of the need for a systematic integrated to designing and analyzing these
surveys. Deformation refers to modifications in a deformable body (objects created by man
or by nature) submits in form, dimension, and position. It is therefore important to measure
these movements for safety assessment purposes and also to prevent any future disaster.

Techniques for calculating deformations can usually be divided into geotechnical, structural,
and geodetic methods (Teskey and Poster, 1988). The geodesic methods that can be used
(highly understood by land surveyors) are Global Positioning System ( GPS), near range
photogrammetry, complete station (terrestrial survey), very long baseline interferometry, and
laser range of satellites

And going through this research we will discuss all of these methods , their applications and
difference between them briefly.

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Main Body:
Prior to going through the GNSS technology with its uses navigation must be identified
beforehand for the sake of gaining a whole access to GNSS. To "navigate" is to determine
the exact position of an object movable or immovable in addition to its course through
exploiting geometry, astronomy and radio signals. For a system to navigate it requires what's
called "pilotage" which is a term based on two main pillars; first locating the position and
velocity of the moving object, second is keeping track of its route regardless of any obstacles
in the way until reaching the chosen destination. Navigation is either automatic or manual
and it branches off to two methods only, either inertial navigation systems"INS" or a GNSS
standing for Global Navigating Satellite System. Basically the two systems differ in the
methods by which they locate the position, as for INS it depends mainly on rotation and
acceleration information received from an Inertial Measurement Unit which in turn depends
on the deploying six different sensor arrays located in three orthogonal axes. However the
GNSS depends for locating position on the satellite signals to determine acceleration,
velocity and time.

Before delving into the topic of the research let’s first discuss some of the sides of the inertial
navigation system and what are the propulsions that make the world search for better
,alternative system such as the GNSS.

As we mentioned before INS considered as a primitive way of navigation which is used in

limited uses. It depends on knowing some information about the body which we are
monitoring, by knowing the position, the orientation and the velocity of this body by handling
these information using a computer besides group of accelerometers and gyroscopes we
can get the full data about this body this system is used in some vehicles like ships, planes,
guided missiles and submarines. This system isn’t as good as GNSS because it has some
errors in the readings acceleration, angular velocity and these errors are integrated into
larger errors in velocity, which is exacerbated into even greater positional errors.

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After talking briefly about the Inertial Navigating System we will head through the main
subject of our research -GNSS-.

What is GNSS?

In idiom GNSS is short for Global Navigation Satellite System it refers to a series of satellites
which provide spatial signals sending positioning and timing data to GNSS receivers. Such
data are then used by the receivers to determine location. This system allow small electronic
receivers to specify the exact location (longitude, latitude and elevation ‘altitude’) with high
accuracy even higher than the INS devices.

The satellites used in GNSS produces the same form of carrier waves L1 and L2 they are
two waves only and their main role is to carry and transmit information for the receiver body.
Talking about the variation between the satellites we should mention two main sides all
these satellites don’t have the same age or design as it depends on the authority that
launches them.. to collect signals any system should have at least about 3 satellites that
collect the mentioned information and then transmit them into useful data for the users each
of these satellites make a full rotation around the earth in 11h58m and 2s.

The efficiency of the GSP is measured on the basis of four criteria:

 Accuracy: the difference between the measured and the actual position, speed or
time of the receiver.
 Integrity: the capacity of a system to provide a trust level and an warning in case of
an anomaly in the positioning data.
 Continuity: The ability of a system to work without interruption.
 Availability: The percentage of time a signal meets the standards of precision,
honesty and consistency set out above.

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GNSS Classification:

Most of people know only about the GPS System and consider it as the one and only system
of Satellite navigation but in fact there are several systems of GNSS. There are four main
global systems: GPS which is used in USA, GLONASS which is used in Russia, Galileo
which is used in European Union and BeiDou which is used in China. Furthermore; there
are two regional system: QZSS which is used in Japan and finally IRNSS ‘NavIC’ which is
used in India. And in this paragraph we will talk about all of these systems in detail.

1. GPS

Our first global system which we will have is The United States Global positioning System.
It is the oldest System of them all. Its operations started in 1978 and it was available for
global use from 1994. As all the systems of GNSS the GPS main use lie in providing
geolocation and time information to a GPS receiver anywhere on or near the Earth where
the sight of four or more GPS satellites is unimpeded.

The United States Military first realized that there is a great need to have an independent
military navigation capability. And thus the Transit program was deployed to that end in
1964. Transit, also known as NAVSAT, operated on the Doppler Effect and was used to
provide U.S. Army with positioning information and navigation for nuclear submarines,
surface ships, as well as hydrographic surveys and geodetic surveys. With time, public use
of GPS has been opened up. At the moment GPS has a constellation of 33 satellites of
which 31 are in operational orbit. It is maintained by the U.S. Air Force, which is committed
to having at least 24 active GPS satellites available. Till date, 72 satellites have been
launched on GPS.

2. GLONASS

Global Navigation Satellite System of Russia –the formerly Soviet- also known as Global
Orbiting Navigation Satellite System; Russia. GLONASS was first used in 1993 using 12
satellites in 12 orbits, they spin at height of 11,886.83 miles. And nowadays; there are about
27 satellites in orbit and all are in operation. GLONASS is run by the Russian Aerospace
Defense Forces and is in use as the second alternative navigation system.

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3. Galileo

Galileo is European Union’s GNSS constellation. In March 2002 the European Space
Agency voted yes to launch its own alternative to GPS under the name of Galileo Positioning
System. This system came out 15 December 2016 under the cost of 10 billion euros. Galileo
is considered as civilian and commercially available global navigation system. The fully
deployed Galileo system includes 30 operational satellites and 6 spares in orbit. Galileo
started providing early operating capabilities in 2016 and is expected to be fully operational
by the end of this year.

4. BeiDou

BeiDou is Chinese satellite navigation system. It has a total of 22 operational satellites in

orbit and is scheduled to comprise 35 satellites in the entire constellation. BeiDou has two
distinct constellations. They are BeiDou 1 and BeiDou 2. BeiDou-1 which is known as the
first generation had a three-satellite constellation. It came out to use in 2000 and provided
restricted coverage and navigation services, mainly for Chinese and neighbouring users. At
the end of 2012 Beidou-1 had been decommissioned.

BeiDou-2 which known as COMPASS, is the system's second generation. It became ready
to use in 2011 with a partial constellation of 10 orbiting satellites. The next generations of it
is BeiDou-3. March 2015 marked the launch of the first BDS-3 satellite. Nine BDS-3 satellites
have been launched as from January 2018. BeiDou-3 should be fully functional by the end
of 2020

Regional navigation satellite systems

1. QZSS

The Quasi-Zenith Satellite System is Japanese regional satellite navigation system. Is a

four-satellite regional time transfer and improving system for GPS covering Japan and the
Asia-Oceania regions. As of January 12, 2018, QZSS services were available on a limited
basis, and were released in November 2018. The first satellite was launched in September
2010. 2023 is expected to provide an independent satellite navigation system (from GPS)
with 7 satellites.

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 2. IRNSS - NAVIC

IRNSS is short for Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System. And then it was given the
operation name of NaviC. It is the regional satellite navigation system for India. It was
Launched and operated by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), on 28 April
2016. This system consists of a constellation of 7 navigational satellites which cover India
and nearby regions extending up to 1,500 km. All the seven satellites are in orbit. 3 of them
are placed in the Geostationary orbit (GEO) and the others in the Geosynchronous orbit
(GSO)

As of 2018, the constellation was in orbit, and after a system check, the system was
operational from early 2018. NavIC provides two service levels, the "standard positioning
service," which will be open to civilian use, and the "restricted service" (encoded service) for
authorized users (including military service). NavIC systems are to be expanded by
increasing constellation size from 7 to 11.

GNSS Applications:

GNSS Applications is the applications the depends on GNSS receivers to complete its job
such as collecting velocity, position and time information and translate the coordinates into
useful data that the simple user can understand.

Military goals was the first goal that make Governments head to using Satellite navigation
systems but nowadays there are several uses in all the life fields, The GNSS currently break
into all the daily uses and people jobs, it played big role in Navigation, Surveying and
mapping ‘mainly’, Roads, Aviation, Civil Engineering(Specifically), Energy, Fisheries,
Agriculture, etc…

Roads

Route guidance: Almost All automobiles have inner GPS system that suggest the best
route to get to your meaned place with the best and fastest way, some people use hard
ways to get to their jobs or to reach a specific place as they already knew this way before
but with the suggested route in the vehicle you ride you can get to your target easier

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Fleet Management: It is a mechanism that enables companies that rely on business
transportation to eliminate or mitigate the risks associated with investment in vehicles,
increase performance, profitability and reduce their overall transportation and personnel
costs, while maintaining 100 % compliance with government legislation and this function
depends on Satellite Navigations Systems significantly and that increase confidence in
tracking of goods.

Traffic management: Using Satellites a vehicle driver can get a full view on the application
that is installed on his phone or in the vehicle itself by this view the driver can avoid traffic
congestion and reach the place he wanted with alternative suggested routes.

Advanced Driving Assistance Systems: They are electronic systems that make the
driving easier it helps the driver while he is driving and even during parking it gives a full
picture about the vehicles surrounding the driver and that makes him avoid making
accidents and improve the skills of the driving using these ADAS.

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Navigation

Aviation: Typically, air navigation systems have a moving map view, and are also
connected to the en-route navigation autopilot. For general aviation aircraft of all sizes,
cockpit-mounted GNSS receivers and glass cockpits appear using technologies such as
WAAS or LAAS to improve the precision. Some are qualified for navigation rules on
instrument flight, and some may also be used for final approach and landing operations as
in Joint approach to precision and landing method. Glider pilots use GNSS Flight Recorders
to record GNSS data to check their arrival at turning points in gliding competitions, as well
as information to help cross-country soaring decision-making on the road.

We can summarize the advantages of GNSS in aviation in these points:

 Improving navigational protection in all stages of the Flight

 Safer navigation of the rescue helicopters in any weather
 Enhancing efficiency in the control of flight operations, improving airspace
utilization

Maritime Navigation: GNSS can be used by

boats and ships to navigate all lakes, seas, and
oceans around the world. Maritime GNSS units
provide useful water functions, such as "man
overboard" (MOB) functions, which allow instant
marking of the place where a person has fallen
overboard, making rescue efforts simpler. Using
the NMEA 0183 interface, GNSS can be linked
to the ships' self-steering gear and chartplotters.
GNSS can also boost shipping traffic safety by activating AIS.
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Military

GNSS first use was for military purposes as we mentioned before and until now the precise
positioning is exclusively used for the military purposes and it is more advanced and
accurate than the normal one which the public use. This type of GNSS isn’t available to use
for people life needs as it is encrypted. Armies around the world –in advanced countries-
use these techniques to spy on their enemies and to know their exact location during wars.
And this technology is used also to locate guided missiles and avoid them, it’s also used in
sending missiles on enemies. There is advanced usages of this technology which represents
in unmanned aircraft, GNSS jammers on enemies devices and anti-jamming applications.

Agriculture

As we mentioned before the GNSS technology broke into all the life fields, regardless of the
size of its role, It is involved in facilitating the process for example in agriculture field it helped
in getting precise chemical spraying and in Crop yield monitoring.

Surveying and Mapping

The main uses of this type of application represents in Archaeology and Prospecting. The
archaeologists while digging into a site they are keen on creating a three-dimensional map
of the site, showing where each artifact is located. And also in prospecting the scientists
uses advanced satellite navigation systems to locate the exact position of oil, Precious
metals and other needed excavation

Most GNSS mapping grade receivers only use the carrier wave data from the L1 frequency,
but have a precise crystal oscillator that reduces the recipient clock jitter errors. This allows
for positioning errors in real-time on the order of one meter or less.

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Civil Engineering

There are several types of applications and uses gained from using GNSS in this big field
one of them is structure monitoring and detecting the expected deformation and we will
explain this use in detail in the next paragraph. Other uses are machinery guidance, Road
and Rail management (i.e. alignment, inclination control) and the advantages we get from
applied this modern technology are increasing safety, efficiency and improving logistics.

GNSS applications in monitoring of deformation of buildings

Several structural buildings like towers, bridges, dams, skyscrapers are subjected to have a
long term deformation which affects the capacity of this building and threatens its safety, this
deformation occurs due to many reasons such as crustal deformation, tectonic phenomena,
change in water lever, tidal phenomena.
Structural health monitoring (SHM) technologies have had wide-ranging applications to
assess the safety of engineering structures during their service life and in this technology
one or more of GNSS receivers are installed on the large structures which we mentioned to
observe any deformation that could happen and this trend is expected to continue widely
besides other trends that will also come out.
One of the most commonly used methods in this field is GNSS-RTK technology, using this
technology makes us achieve a higher accuracy in monitoring the deformation. In this
method the baselines between the installed monitoring receivers and the reference station
are made to be the shortest we can get. Besides this technology there are more soclutions
for the deformation that we will list it in the table.

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In conventional PPK and RTK modes, one or more local base stations must be installed at
a stable location close to the monitoring target for baseline solutions. The rover stations are
set at the measuring points of the target being monitored. Both GNSS receivers can transmit
more than four GNSS satellite signals synchronously on both rover and base stations. In
RTK mode, the RTK correction data will be continuously transmitted by the base stations,
the only difference is that the PPK results are computed in a post‐processing manner instead
of real time.

And now we will have some of the GNSS monitoring techniques such as, Single-base
GNSS-RTK, GNSS N-RTK, Mixed-mode GNSS.

Single-base GNSS-RTK

Our first mode and standard mode which we will have is the single-base GNSS-RTK.

How it works?

One referral receiver to be located at a reference station with defined coordinates when the
other receiver's coordinates for this referral receiver are determined (One reference station
and one coordinate for the rover or user receiver to be calculated in a relative sense) that’s
why it’s called a single-base mode and this type is extremely common nowadays These
systems are also referred to as RTK systems and make the use of GPS / GNSS-RTK
feasible for many time-critical applications like Surveying Engineering.

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Although this technique is widely used it has many limitations like:

 The distance between reference receiver and the rover receiver due to distance-
dependent biases such as orbit error.
 Ionospheric and tropospheric signal refraction
 In case of short baselines the GNSS reference station could be located in the area
that is subjected to deformation
 The object itself can cause refraction of the signal and, in the worst case, reduced
signal availability affecting geometry

These errors led to keep the distance between the receiver and the instrument less than
10KM (depending on the latitude) –Example of ionospheric signal refraction effect- in low
latitude regions the ionospheric variability is so high and that make the use of single-base
GNSS-RTK technique nearly impossible over short baselines in the local afternoon period.
Many of those problems can be solved using methods where the GNSS reference station(s)
are located as far away as possible from the monitoring points without being too much
influenced by residual (double-differentiated) atmospheric bias.

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GNSS N-RTK

GNSS N-RTK is a technique that utilizes a network of permanently installed CORS

streaming their raw observations to a central computing facility in real-time. Because
residual spatially correlated biases are modelled more sophisticated. The distances between
CORS stations can be relaxed to several hundred kilometres. This mode has less errors
than the single-base GNSS-RTK.

Mixed-mode GNSS

In theory, a combination of single- and dual-

frequency instrumentation in a mixed-mode
network may ensure high-precision coordinated
results utilizing a large number of recipients
deployed in a area experiencing deformation;
Though keeping the cost of GNSS hardware as
low as possible.

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Conclusion:
Global Navigation Satellite Systems since its first appearance and until now has achieved a
great leap in all fields of life and working on it easier. Although its first use was for military
purposes it broke into all these fields and saved us from many catastrophes. All the countries
around the world now seek to have such systems to follow the footsteps of advanced
countries that already have these systems (USA – Russia – European Union – China –
Japan – India).

The GNSS technologies have great contributions in our life nowadays and any obstruction
that stand against these technologies will make the life harder.

In this research we focused on the monitoring of deformation using GNSS and we showed
the great role of this technology in making the structures safer by detecting and possible
deformation.

There are many techniques in detecting these deformation such as GNSS-RTK, GNSS N-
RTK and mixed method these techniques besides other techniques used around the world
and each one of them has its benefits and its limitations and disadvantages.

Working on more Navigation Satellite Systems in the future all over the world will nearly
solve most of the after-built structural problems but the modern countries that already have
these systems should lend a helping hand to the developing countries.

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References:

 Text Book ‘Principles of GNSS, Inertial, and Multi-Sensor Integrated Navigation Systems’
- Paul D. Groves – 2008
 ‘An integrated GPS–accelerometer data processing technique for structural deformation
monitoring’ - W. S. Chan · Y. L. Xu · X. L. Ding · W. J. Dai - 7 September 2006
 ‘DYNAMIC DEFORMATION MONITORING OF TALL STRUCTURE USING GPS
TECHNOLOGY’ - J. W. Lovse,· W. F. Teskey,2 G. Lachapelle,' - Member, ASCE, and M.
E. Cannon4 - 10 November 2014
 ‘Determination of periodic displacements of buildings and machines’- Mauer, W.,
Rossmeier, F., and Schnaedelbach, K
 ‘Advances in GNSS-RTK for Structural Deformation Monitoring in Regions of High
Ionospheric Activity’ - Chris RIZOS, Australia, Joël van CRANENBROECK, Belgium,
Vincent LUI, Hong Kong, PR China - 16 April 2010

Used Websites:

https://www.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/
https://www.wikipedia.com/
https://www.gssc.esa.int/navipedia/index.php

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Table of Contents:

Content Page
Number

Abstract 2

Introduction 3

Inertial Navigation System (INS) 4

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) 5

GNSS Classification 6

GNSS Applications 8

Monitoring deformation of structures with GNSS 12

Conclusion 16

Reference 17

Table of contents 18

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