Omega Navigation Research Articles

Flight Test Performance of an Airborne Omega Equipment Set*

Omega is a radio navigation system with the potential of providing world-wide coverage. Several of the system's characteristics, however, complicate its use in an airborne situation. This paper describes the preliminary results from flight testing equipment assembled to verify the feasibility of real time airborne OMEGA navigation. In particular, the effects of diurnal variations in phase velocity and the low data rate will be discussed.

An Economic Evaluation of the Use of Omega Navigation System by Merchant Ships

The omega navigation system is a long-range, all-weather, electronic system using very low frequency radio signals. The Secretary of Defense announced on December 29, 1967 that “Four stations for the Navy developed OMEGA system have been approved for operational use to facilitate operational evaluation.” These four stations now provide coverage to over one-quarter of the globe; four additional transmitters are needed to provide world-wide coverage. The Navy has tested shipboard Omega receivers, found them to be ideal for installation in a wide variety of naval ships, and approved the system for service use. It is timely for commercial ship operators to investigate the economic advantages that may be available to them if they install Omega receivers in their ships. The investigation should consider both the present coverage with usable Omega signals only in the area north of the equator between Norway and Hawaii, as well as world coverage when the additional transmitters are operational.

The Contribution of the Omega Navigation System to Safe and Economical Ship Operations

The Contribution of the Omega Navigation System to Safe and Economical Ship Operations

Group-velocity variations of v.l.f. signals

Some experimental transmissions for the Omega navigation system were monitored over an 8500km path to determine the phase variations of the difference frequency between 10.2kc/s and 13.6kc/s. These results are interpreted in terms of the group velocity at the mean frequency of 11.9kc/s and are compared with calculations of group velocity based on first-waveguide-mode phase velocities due to Wait. The significance of these results in the design of a ground-based radionavigation aid is discussed.

The Omega Navigation System

omega is a very long-range VLF navigation system generating hyperbolic lines-of-position by phase difference measurements of 10.2 kc/s time-shared transmissions. A new multi-frequency signal format is described which will increase the system utility. The background, theory, and results of a six-year developmental effort on the omega navigation system are presented. A worldwide system employing eight stations is feasible. Such a system would be straightforward in use and have an accuracy of one-half to one mile. Operational results of twenty-five shipboard installations are presented.