Covariant derivatives for Ehresmann connections

Abstract

We deal with the construction of covariant derivatives for some quite general Ehresmann connections on fibre bundles. We show how the introduction of a vertical endomorphism allows construction of covariant derivatives separately on both the vertical and horizontal distributions of the connection which can then be glued together on the total space. We give applications across an important class of tangent bundle cases, frame bundles and the Hopf bundle.