Flight Testing of Advanced Receiver Autonomous Integrity Monitoring and Dual Polarized Antenna

Abstract

The United States Air Force Test Pilot School Test Management Project, “Have DRAGON”, conducted flight tests on two technologies aimed at improving the robustness of airborne GNSS navigation. The program was conducted in close partnership with the Stanford University GPS Lab which developed Advanced Receiver Autonomous Integrity Monitoring (ARAIM) and the Dual Polarized Antenna (DPA). ARAIM is a method of generating horizontal and vertical protection levels (H/VPLs) bounding the maximum error of a multi-constellation receiver. Have DRAGON also conducted the first-ever flight test of the novel DPA which was custom designed and manufactured by the Stanford GPS Lab. The DPA was designed to estimate signal direction of arrival by exploiting the difference between left and right circular polarization. The ARAIM receiver and DPA were installed on an Air Force C-12J aircraft and tested in a variety of flight test maneuvers. In addition, flight tests were conducted during the 2019 DT Navfest GPS jamming event hosted by Edwards Air Force Base. Results of the Have DRAGON flight test showed a significant improvement in ARAIM HPLs and VPLs when compared to conventional RAIM and proved the DPA was able to estimate the signal direction of arrival from multiple satellites in flight.