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 Avionics
Satellite Navigation
Global positioning System

2
Basic Principle of Satellite Navigation

• Increasingly, procedures are being implemented for aircraft to

approach and land using GNSS as well as navigate enroute.
• In the near future it is likely that most flights can be conducted under
IMC conditions using only satellite navigation, however redundancy
requires all other navigation system will be maintained.
• A Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) system employs a
constellation of satellites orbiting the Earth so that a vehicle always
has line of sight with several of them.
• Each satellite has an atomic clock on board that is synchronized to the
clocks on the other satellites and to the atomic clocks on the ground
that define “GPS time,” which is also synchronized to coordinated
universal time (UTC).
• Each satellite continuously broadcasts its current orbital position
(ephemeris) with each broadcast starting at a precise time referenced
to GPS time.
• A single satellite would define the position of the vehicle as
somewhere on the surface of a sphere.
• three satellites would place the vehicle at one of two
points, one near the surface of the Earth and the
other out in space, which can be discarded.
• The inaccurate distances obtained without
synchronizing the aircraft clock to GPS time are
termed pseudo-ranges.
• The time offset between the aircraft and satellite
clocks is the same for all satellites.
• Receiving a fourth satellite enables the aircraft clock
to be synchronized to the satellite clock and convert
the pseudo-ranges to absolute distances.
• A by-product of the process is that the GNSS receiver is
synchronized to GPS time and thus to UTC with atomic
clock accuracy.
• The x,y,z coordinates determined by GNSS define a point in
space but to relate this to a geometrical position on the
Earth’s surface in terms of latitude and longitude requires an
accurate knowledge of the shape of the Earth such as the
WGS84 model.
• Raw GNSS signals cannot be used for precision landing
approaches and augmentation is required.
GPS comprises three distinct segments:

7
• A GNSS system is comprised of three segments, that is:
– the space segment, which is the constellation of satellites in
orbit;
– the control segment, which is the ground infrastructure of
control stations, monitoring stations,etc.;
– the user segment, which are the GNSS receivers in vehicles
Space segments

• The group of satellites that are at the heart of a satellite

navigation system are described as a constellation and they
transmit in the UHF band.
• Here we focus more on the global positioning system (GPS).
• The basic GPS system uses 24 satellites that are placed in
an orbit such that each satellite makes exactly two rotations
about the Earth for one rotation of the Earth about its axis.
• The GPS satellite orbital period is half a sidereal day, which
is 11 hours, 58 minutes, and 2 seconds (43 082 seconds).
• The orbital radius can be calculated as:
1
𝜏𝜏 2 𝐺𝐺𝐺𝐺 3
𝑟𝑟 =
4𝜋𝜋 2
M is the mass of earth, G is gravitational constant (= 6.67408
×10−11 m3 kg−1 s−2), 𝜏𝜏 is the period 𝜏𝜏 = 2𝜋𝜋𝜋𝜋/𝑣𝑣 .
• Thus, to achieve an orbital period of 43 082 seconds
requires an orbital radius of 26 559 km, which is above
ground is 20 192 km (earth radius 6367km).
• From any point on the Earth, the maximum amount of time
that a satellite is visible each day is about 4.6hours ~
4hours.
• the perimeter of the cap and Earth radii define a cone with a spherical cap, which
subtends a solid angle at the center of the Earth, Ω. 2θ is the linear angle of the cone
apex, RO is the radius of the satellite orbit and R ⊕ is the radius of the Earth.
• the proportion, P, of the hemisphere illuminated by a satellite is Ω/2π=> P=1-cosθ
• There are six orbital planes spaced 60o apart
and each orbital plane, containing four
satellites, is oriented at 55o with respect to the
equator.
• The average number of satellites visible at any
time from a point on the surface will be
approximately 6-12 satellites.
The maintenance of a GNSS system requires
the commitment to keep launching satellites
indefinitely as they have a finite lifetime.
This is estimated to be about 7–8 years, due to
various possible fail conditions and the
exhaustion of the fuel required to adjust the
satellite orbit.
Transmission by GPS

• In all cases the modulation of the carrier is by BPSK but the

information is contained in a complex hierarchy.
• The atomic clocks on the satellites are referenced to UTC but are
offset from it by an integer number of seconds.
• GPS time is maintained by the control segment and is continuous
while UTC is monitored by the US Naval Observatory.
• From time to time add a leap second to UTC to compensate for small
changes on the rate of rotation of the Earth.
• GPS time has remained unchanged since it was synchronized to UTC
at the midnight changeover from 5 January to 6 January in 1980, but
since then 18 leap seconds have been added to UTC.
• The units used for operational reasons are the week number (WN) and
units 1.5s long, whose count since the start of the current week is
called the time of week (TOW).
• The timing on a satellite is provided by four exceptionally accurate
atomic clocks, two using cesium as the standard and two using
rubidium.
• The international standard for the definition of one second is
9,192,631,770 cycles of the photons in the microwave region emitted
by the transition of an electron.
• The frequency of an atomic transition such as this provides an
extremely stable time reference as it is not influenced by
environmental factors such as pressure and temperature.
• The clocks on all the satellites in a constellation are
synchronized to each other and to atomic clocks on the
surface via the ground stations in the control segment.
• The entire system is thus keeping GPS time with atomic
clock precision and is referenced to UTC with the same
accuracy.
• The clocks are used to produce a fundamental frequency,
f0= 10.23 MHz (exceptionally high stability). This
fundamental is used to generate the carrier frequencies of
the navigation channels.
• L1 channel: 1.57542 GHz = 154 f0.
• L2 channel: 1.22760 GHz = 120 f0.
• L5 channel (since 2010): 1.17645 GHz = 115 f0.
• The L1 and L2 channels are modulated by two so-called
pseudo-random noise (PRN) binary codes labeled as the
coarse acquisition (C/A) and precision (P) codes mixed with
a navigation message.
• The C/A code is transmitted at a rate of 1.023 Mbps and is
a repeating binary sequence of 1023 bits, which is different
for each satellite, transmitted every millisecond.
• This code is mixed with a navigation message transmitted at
50 bps by modulo-2 addition and then modulated onto the
L1 carrier by BPSK.
• Modulo-2 addition can be achieved by an exclusive-OR (EX-
OR) gate.
• The precision code is transmitted at a rate of 10.23 Mbps
and is a much longer binary sequence taking a week to
transmit.
• navigation message mixed by modulo-2 addition and the
result modulated onto both the L1 and L2 channels.
Modulo-2

1227.6 MHz
Generation of C/A code

• In the case of the GPS C/A code, the generation is by a two-

step process.
• At the start of a 1023-chip sequence taking exactly 1 ms, a
10-bit shift register is first loaded with “1”s and then at each
clock cycle (1/1.023 × 106 = 0.977517 μs), the EX-OR result
(modulo-2 addition) of chips 3 and 10 is placed into position
1 and all other bits move one place to the right.
• The chip that is then in position 10 is fed into the second
stage of the C/A code generator.
• Each stage is often described as a polynomial and within
this notation the polynomial for stage 1 is defined as 1 + x3 +
x10 though the mathematical manipulation is not a
polynomial in the normal sense but rather the exponent
defines which bit is summed.
• the chip stream output to polynomial 2 is 11111111000 at a
rate of 1.023 Mbps
The result of the first
12 iterations of the
stage 1
• The second-stage polynomial is dependent on the satellite
number. For example, the C/A code generation by satellite 1
is in polynomial defined as 1 + x2 + x3 + x6 + x8 + x9 + x10,
that is bits, 2, 3, 6, 8, 9, and 10 are summed by modulo-2
addition.
• The bit or chip that results from this is fed into the first
position of a 10-bit shift register with all other chips moving
one place to the right.
• all chips are set to “1” at the start of a 1023-chip cycle and
then on each iteration the EX-OR result from positions 2 and
6 of the shift register is EX-ORed with the output from
polynomial one at the same iteration to produce an output
chip to the PRN that is broadcast.
• The result for the first 10 iterations is shown and the first 10
chips for the 1023-chip PRN code from satellite 1 is
11001000002 = 14408.
• After exactly 1 ms when 1023 chips of the PRN code have
been transmitted, the two shift registers are reset to all “1”
and the process repeats.
• The PRN codes, although appearing similar to a random
stream of chips are deterministic sequences, unique to each
satellite.
• It can be regarded as a precisely ticking clock with a 1 ms
beat in which there is a means of identifying which satellite
is broadcasting the time sequence.
Satellite-dependent EX-OR combinations of
bits in register 2 to produce unique PRN code
for each satellite and the first 10 chips of the
code.
Decoding of the Navigation Message

• If we generate within the receiver a template PRN code that

matches one of the satellite PRN codes we can lock onto
the signal by time shifting the template.
• The code designed to achieve minimum correlation between
different PRN codes so there is very little probability that a
given PRN template will find correlation with the wrong
satellite.
• The time offset between the template and the incoming
signal to achieve a match is the basis of time measurement
in the GPS system
• Having locked onto each satellite, the receiver is constantly
scanning each template offset by a small amount back and
forth to stay locked-on and measure the changing offset due
to the motion of the vehicle and the satellite.
• If the internal clock in the receiver was synchronized to GPS
time with atomic clock accuracy, the time offset would
simply be the travel time of the signal from the satellite.
• When the PRN code is modulated by the 50 bit s−1 navigation
message, while the navigation code is at “0” the PRN code is
unaffected but while the navigation code is at “1” the PRN code is
inverted.
• When this signal is received and synchronized to the internally
generated PRN code template in the receiver, during a “0” of the
navigation message there is correlation and a “0” is output from the
EX-OR sum of the signal and template.
• Similarly, while the navigation message has value “1,” there is
anticorrelation and a “1” is output, in other words at synchronization
the navigation message appears at the output, otherwise the output
remains at “0.”
Format of navigation message

• The entire navigation message has a total length of 37 500

bits and is transmitted at a rate of 50 bits s−1.
• There are 25 frames, each containing 1500 bits, taking 30
seconds to transmit and the frames are further subdivided
into five subframes, each containing 300 bits, taking six
seconds to transmit.
• The first three subframes of each frame contain satellite-
specific timing and orbital position information while the final
two subframes contain almanac parameters for the whole
constellation.
• The data for the almanac is spread through the entire
navigation message and thus is refreshed only every 12.5
minutes but generally these parameters do not change
except at much longer timescales.
Subframe structure of 10 30-bit
words, each taking 0.6 s to
transmit. Every subframe starts
with a telemetry (TLM) word
and a handover (HOW) word.
(b) The bit structure of a general
data word consisting of 24 bits
of data and a 6-bit parity block.
(c) Bit structure of the TLM
word.
(d) Bit structure of the handover
word.
• This information combined with the timing of the received
signal provided by the PRN code enables the receiver to
determine a pseudo-range from a specific SV.
• The parameters semi major axis, A, ellipticity, e, right
ascencion, Ω0, inclination, i0, and direction between
semimajor axis and vector of earth and ascending node, ω
completely specify the shape and orientation of the orbit.
• These values provides the reference time for the
transmission. This information combined with the timing of
the received signal provided by the PRN code enables the
receiver to determine a pseudo-range from a specific SV.
Ephemeris
parameters, A,
e, Ω , i , ω, and ν
0 0

that specify the

position of a
satellite in an
Earth-centered
Earth-fixed
(ECEF) reference
frame.
The aircraft co-ordinates are determined as follows:

𝑥𝑥 − 𝑥𝑥1 2+ 𝑦𝑦 − 𝑦𝑦1 2+ 𝑧𝑧 − 𝑧𝑧1 2 + 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶 = 𝑅𝑅1

𝑥𝑥 − 𝑥𝑥2 2+ 𝑦𝑦 − 𝑦𝑦2 2+ 𝑧𝑧 − 𝑧𝑧2 2 + 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶 = 𝑅𝑅
2
𝑥𝑥 − 𝑥𝑥3 2+ 𝑦𝑦 − 𝑦𝑦3 2+ 𝑧𝑧 − 𝑧𝑧3 2 + 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶 = 𝑅𝑅
3
𝑥𝑥 − 𝑥𝑥4 2+ 𝑦𝑦 − 𝑦𝑦4 2+ 𝑧𝑧 − 𝑧𝑧4 2 + 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶 = 𝑅𝑅
4

where (x, y, z) = aircraft position

t = unknown aircraft clock bias
C = speed of light
(xi , yi, zi) = position of the i'th satellite
Ri = pseudo range measurement
44
Note:

• Ri is derived from the phase delay of the code

correlation

• (xi, yi, zi) is extrapolated from knowledge of

recent satellite ephemeris and time, taken from
raw data

• t is eliminated - assumes the aircraft clock bias

is unchanged for all measurements - this is
realistic, although the clock may drift, it is likely
to have good short term stability

• The co-ordinate system is geodetic

45
Precision P(Y) code

• The precision code is also a Gold code, which is streamed

at a chip rate of 10.23 MHz on both the L1 and L2 channels
and is modulated by the navigation. The sequence,
however, is much longer, consisting of 6.1871 × 1012 chips,
which at 10.23 MHz would take just over a week to transmit
but it is re-initialized after exactly one GPS week.
• It is possible to send an encrypted version of the precision
code known as the Y-code. This is notified by setting bit 19
in the HOW of each subframe to “1,” which then alerts the
receiver to use the decryption key provided to authorized
users.
Additional GPS Signal: L2C

• L2C Signal (Civilian) : Transmitting a user code available to all users

modulated by a navigation message on the L2 channel.
• The L2C code is not a single PRN stream like the C/A code but
consists of two separate sequences, each transmitted at 511 500
chips s−1 but multiplexed together into a single stream at a chip rate of
1023.0 kHz like the C/A code.
• The two PRN ranging codes are referred to as the civil-moderate (CM)
code, which is 10 230 chips long repeating every 20 ms and the civil-
long (CL) code, which is 767 250 chips long and repeats every 1500
ms.
• The CL code is not modulated by a navigation message but is
transmitted to provide strong correlation with the internally generated
template by the receiver.
• The CM code is modulated by an upgraded navigation
message referred to as CNAV, which has a much more
flexible design than the legacy navigation message, now
referred to as LNAV.
• It is organized into packets 300 bits long, each taking 12
seconds to transmit and each packet contains a message ID
number that informs the system what data is contained in
the message.
Additional GPS Signal: L5

• From block II F satellites (from 2010) onwards, a signal

transmitted at a new frequency of 1176.45 MHz (=115f0)
has been available with a ranging code and a navigation
message.
• The new frequency is in the protected aviation UHF band in
the range 960–1215 MHz.
• Improving accuracy to the level where GPS can be used for
precision approaches without augmentation
• This is a similar system to that used in transmissions by the
European Galileo GNSS
• The advantages of the L5 signal include a factor of 2
increase in transmitted power, better autocorrelation of the
PRN codes providing more accurate timing, the flexible
CNAV message structure, and a transmission frequency in a
protected aeronautical band.
Additional GPS Signal: L1C

• L1C is a new signal broadcast on the L1 1575.42 MHz

frequency and is downward compatible with the legacy C/A
signal. It will be implemented on the block III GPS satellites
with the first one launched in May 2018.
• In a similar manner to the L5 signal, L1C will use overlay
codes to improve correlation and sharper timing. It will also
be broadcast at greater power and will have improved
interoperability with the Galileo GNSS.
Additional GPS Signal: L3 and L4 Signal

• The GPS satellites also broadcast on two additional

frequencies not used for navigation known as the L3 signal
and the L4 signal at frequencies 1381.05 MHz (135f0) and
1379.913 MHz (1214/9f0), respectively.
• The satellites are platforms for optical, X-ray, and
electromagnetic pulse (EMP) sensors designed to detect
nuclear explosions to check for noncompliance with test-ban
treaties and any observations are reported on the L3
channel.
• The L4 channel is used to study the benefit of ionospheric
corrections using an additional frequency.
Control Segment

• Control segment consists of a master control station (MCS)

in Colorado, an alternate control station in California, ground
antennas, monitoring stations, and tracking stations.
• The MCS provides command and control of the GPS
constellation, uploads navigation messages, and ensures
the health and accuracy of the SV constellation.
• It receives navigation information from the monitor stations,
utilizes this information to compute the precise locations of
the SVs in space, and then uploads this data to the SVs,
which they pass on to users in the transmitted navigational
message.
• In the event of a satellite failure, the MCS can reposition
satellites to maintain an optimal GPS constellation.
• To change the orbit of a satellite, the satellite must be
marked unhealthy, which, in the legacy system, is done by
setting the appropriate value (“111100”) in word 3, subframe
1 of the navigation message.
• This is passed on in the transmitted message to users so
receivers will not use the SV for their position calculation.
Then the maneuver can be carried out, and the resulting
orbit tracked from the ground.
• The new ephemeris is uploaded into subframes 3 and 4 of
the navigation message and the satellite marked healthy
again.
• In addition, the updates from the MCS synchronize the
atomic clocks on board the SVs to each other, and adjust
the ephemeris of each SVs’ internal orbital model.
Augmentation System

• The ICAO specification for the overall system accuracy of

the Standard Positioning Service (SPS), that is, GNSS
without further corrections.
• Horizontal ±13m
• Vertical ±22m
• Time ±40 ns
• The corrections provided to aircraft can either be
implemented in a wide area augmentation system (WAAS)
where a map of deviations is broadcast by satellite or as a
local area augmentation system (LAAS) where a single
station provides local information to aircraft in the area.
Wide Area Augmentation Systems (WAAS)

• There are several WAAS in operation, the original being established in

the United States, which uses a series of 38 receiver sites. Each site
receives signals from all GPS satellites in view and transmits this
information to a WAAS master site, where the major sources of GPS
errors are analyzed.
• The master site then develops a correction message, which is
transmitted to two geosynchronous satellites. These retransmit the
correction message to WAAS-enabled aircraft receivers that apply the
corrections.
• These are in the form of a map showing the required adjustment in
each area and it typically improves GPS accuracy to around the 5m
level, which is sufficiently good for Category 1 approaches, that is, a
decision height of 200 ft. and a runway visibility of >=550m
• Other WAAS systems include the European geostationary
navigation overlay service (EGNOS), the multifunctional
satellite augmentation system (MSAS) in Japan, and the
GPS aided geo-augmented navigation (GAGAN) system in
India.
Local Area Augmentation Systems (LAAS)

• For Cat II/Cat III approaches, higher precision is required

and this is achieved with ground-based LAAS installations.
On the site is a precisely surveyed GNSS receiver, which
determines its position from all satellites in view position and
compares it with the known position of the site.
• The error is formatted, and a correction is transmitted to an
aircraft via a VHF link in the VOR band (108–118 MHz).
• The aircraft picks this up as an SV (pseudolite) on the site.
Ionospheric and tropospheric errors are eliminated and the
system allows precision CAT III approaches.
GPS Cockpit Instrumentation

• The GPS cockpit instrumentation generally needs no setting

up simply to report position, which is normally on a moving
map display. As soon as the receiver is switched on, it
automatically locates and locks on to satellite signals and
starts the process of shifting the PRN code templates to
match the movement of the satellites and the internal
software streams navigational data in response to the
incoming navigation message
Summary: Principle of Operation

Each satellite transmits the L1 and L2 signals to provide two modes of operation

L1 contains:

• C/A code - Coarse Acquisition code available to all users

• P-code - Precise Code, for military users (originally, Nowadays

all user can access P-code and the Military uses M-code )
L2 contains:

• P - code - which is used in conjunction with the P-code signal in

L1

84
 Principle of Operation

Each satellite broadcasts a carrier on L1 and L2 bands

The satellite generates a unique random number sequence

and modulates this code on the:

L1 at 1.023 MHz (1023 bit code) repeating every 1 ms

L2 at 10.23 MHz (38 week code)

These two codes are modulated by a navigation message at

50 bits per second

The aircraft receiver tracks the random code and

demodulates the navigation message
85
The navigation message contains 25 'pages' of data, where each page contains
1500 bits in the form of 5 sub-frames of 300 bits

• 1 page takes 30 sec. to transmit

• 25 pages takes 12½min

These pages contain all the essential information to track the satellites and to
compute the navigation equation.

Each page contains brief summary information (to avoid 12½ minute 'start-up)
and the data is normally valid for 4 hours
87
The nav. message contains:
• GPS system time
• a hand-over word (to access the P-codes)
• Ephemeris data for the satellite (orbit information)
• almanac data for all the satellites
• satellite status information
• correction data for delays in the ionosphere
• UTC coefficients to compute time corrections
The aircraft receiver attempts to 'lock' on to the random sequence.

88
 Satellite signal generation

The sequence starts at specific times (every ms for the C/A code)
The delay between the offset in the user codes to match the incoming code is
directly proportional to the distance between the satellite and the aircraft
The L1 and L2 carrier is modulated by the digital codes for C/A codes and P-codes
respectively using Bi-Phase Shift Keying (BPSK): -a change in the data causes a
1800 phase reversal

89
 Pseudo-range Measurement

The relative phase (delay) of the code acquisition gives the measure of the
transit time between transmission of the code by the satellite and its reception at
the aircraft
The measurement contains errors:
• Clock errors of the satellite and the aircraft
• Satellite perturbations
• Ephemeris data which is out of date or a poor approximation
• Refractive paths through the ionosphere - they can be modeled
(and are corrected for P - code users as the L1 and L2 signals are at
different frequencies)
• Tropospheric delay - readily modeled
• Receiver noise and resolution
• Multi-path reflections

100
These errors fall into two categories:

• Errors that can be compensated (modeled)

• Errors that cannot be avoided e.g. multi-path

Clock bias in the aircraft is the main source of error and applies equally to
pseudo range measurements of all satellites.

101
A GPS receiver keeps estimates of the uncertainty of position i.e. a covariance
matrix with diagonal elements ( σx2 , σy2, σz2, σt2 )
In simple terms, the dilution of precision is the area of the shaded parts of the
intersections above i.e. the smaller the better
several forms of dilution of precision are defined for GPS:
• VDOP vertical DOP (σZ2)½
• HDOP horizontal DOP (σX2 + σy2)½
• PDOP position DOP ( σX2 + σy2 + σZ2)½
• TDOP time DOP (σt2)½
• GDOP geometric DOP (σX2 + σy2 + σZ2 + σt2)½

103
 References

1. Tooley, M., & Wyatt, D. (2017). Aircraft communications and

navigation systems. Routledge.
2. Wyatt, D. (2014). Aircraft Flight Instruments and Guidance
Systems: Principles, Operations and Maintenance. Routledge.
3. Tooley, M. H., & Wyatt, D. (2009). Aircraft electrical and electronic
systems: principles, operation and maintenance. Routledge.
4. Collinson, R. P. (2023). Introduction to avionics systems. Springer
Nature.