GPS LESS PERSONAL NAVIGATION
Shambuling R.Doddamani, Maya Krishnan, Lakshmi Deepak Ch N
CS & E(PG), MVJCE, Bangalore
maya_krishnanr@yahoo.co.in
Abstract — Navigation is primarily depends on GPS. GPS
independent navigation has posed a significant challenge for
modern movement tracking systems, particularly when
engaged with operations in urban areas, where GPS
coverage is not available. The urban or indoor GPS problem
is that GPS technology performs poorly in urban and indoor
environments. The available GPS signals are highly
degraded in these environments. Aim of GPS LESS
PERSONAL NAVIGATION is to provide a new tracking
and tracing system that works in Both GPS and GPS denied
circumstances. This system makes use of either GPS signals
or a multi sensor system output for locating the position of a
moving target.
The proposed system makes use of the advantages
of both GPS and INS and results in a highly reliable and
available system for navigation in all circumstances. This
system can be used for personal navigation by attaching it to
person’s body. This also has an application in car navigation.
In this article we review the methodologies for
navigation of the target object with GPS, and limitations of
Navigation using GPS and we also review a method for
navigation with multi sensors and with DRM where GPS
signals are not available. We also review the details of in
market products that provide a solution for GPS problems.
Here the explanation of GPS navigation is based on NMEA
0183.
Keywords — GPS, INS, IMU, DRM, DOP
I. INTRODUCTION
Navigation is the process of reading, and controlling
the movement of a craft or vehicle or person from one
place to another.Current navigation systems depend on
GPS for getting the correct Information. GPS can show
you your exact position on Earth anytime, anywhere, in
any weather conditions. A number of GPS enabled
devices are available for navigation. But there are certain
situations where navigation is one of the critical
requirements and the GPS signals are unavailable or
weak. Accuracy of the GPS position measurements
depends on the satellite geometry which is usually
measured by the Dilution of Precision (DOP), as well as
other factors including satellites ephemeris uncertainties,
propagation errors, timing errors, multiple signal
propagation path, and receiver noises
In these circumstances a GPS less system is required
for navigation. To bridge GPS signal outages, an
integration with other positioning approaches is essential,
such as inertial navigation system (INS), inertial micro-
electro-mechanical System (MEMS) unit, cell phone,
wireless local area network(WLAN), pseudolites and
ultra-wideband (UWB) [4][5]. The selection of different
technologies is decided by particular Applications. The
different error sources that makes GPS unavailable are
atmospheric conditions, multipath, selective availability
etc.
II. NAVIGATION WITH MULTI SENSOR
SYSTEMS
GPS receivers require an unobstructed view of the sky,
so they are used only outdoors and they often do not
perform well within forested areas or near tall buildings.
During the era before GPS a combination of sensors had
been used for locating the position information. This
method is known as Inertial Navigation System (INS). A
number of different sensors can be used for obtaining the
position data. The main sensors that are in use are gyro
scopes and accelerometers.
A gyroscope is a device that measures the angular rate
that is how much degree per second it is rotating.
Gyroscopes measure angular velocity as
However, gyroscopes suffer from drifting problem
resulting from changing operating temperatures. A long
period of warm up time is required before gyroscopes can
work properly. In addition, due to AID conversion and
quantization errors, gyroscopes have more difficulties in
measuring small angular velocities. The errors in the
gyroscope measurements produce drifting problem [1].
Accelerometer measures the acceleration.
Accelerometers are used to measure the linear
accelerations. For navigation purposes, usually only the
longitudinal accelerations are of interest. The acceleration
measurements need to be integrated to obtain the speeds
and travelling distances, and drifting problems in general
are experienced during the integration operations similar
to the gyroscopes, accelerometers have difficulties in
measuring small accelerations [1].

Accelerometers measure linear acceleration as
INS makes use of a number of gyro sensors and
accelerometers to determine position information .INS
consist of a Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) and a
Navigation equation module.IMU contains one or more
gyroscopes and accelerometers. Output measured from
IMU is processed by the navigation module to provide the
Latitude, Longitude, Altitude information. The output
from the navigation module can be used to identify the
location of a moving object. A
Sample calculation is given below
Where the input values like , etc is derived
from the output values of IMU.
Fig 1: system which takes acceleration and rotation rates from the IMU
and produces position, velocity, and attitude of the system.
INS is based on measurements of linear accelerations
and angular velocities. INS measures the linear
acceleration and angular rates of moving person through
its accelerometers and gyroscopes sensors. The main
interest is the position determination, which is possible
after a double integration of the accelerations to obtain
linear displacements and a single integration of the
angular velocities to obtain the angles of rotation. The
INS error bound grows with time, due to the unbounded
positioning errors caused by the uncompensated gyro and
accelerometer errors affecting the INS Measurements.
III. GPS NAVIGATION
The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a constellation
of 27 Earth-orbiting satellites, in which 24 are in
operation and three extra satellites exist as a fault
tolerance means. Global Positioning System satellites
transmit signals to equipment on the ground. GPS
receivers passively receive satellite signals. A GPS
receiver has to locate satellites, determine the distance to
each, and use this information to deduce its own location.
This operation is based on a mathematical principle called
Trilateration. A GPS receiver must be locked on to the
signal of at least three satellites to calculate a 2D position
(latitude and longitude) and track movement.GPS through
the use of satellites as the reference positions, provides
absolute positions information without the error
accumulation. However, its accuracy and availability are
affected by the satellite geometry, Selective Availability
(SA) and environmental effects.
For GPS receivers based on NMEA 0183 standard the
received GSA sentences can be analyzed to find out the
strength of GPS signal. GSA - GPS DOP and active
satellites. This sentence provides details on the nature of
the fix. It includes the numbers of the satellites being used
in the current solution and the DOP. DOP (dilution of
precision) is an indication of the effect of satellite
geometry on the accuracy of the fix. It is a unit less
number where smaller is better. For 3D fixes using 4
satellites a 1.0 would be considered to be a perfect
number, however for over determined solutions it is
possible to see numbers below 1.0.
An example of GSA sentence that gives position data is as
follows:
$GPGSA,A,3,04,05,,09,12,,,24,,,,,2.5,1.3,2.1*39
Where:
GSA Satellite status
A Auto selection of 2D or 3D
3 3D fix - values include: 1 = no fix, 2 =
2D fix and 3 = 3D fix
04,05... PRNs of satellites used for fix
2.5 PDOP (dilution of precision)
1.3 Horizontal dilution of precision
2.1 Vertical dilution of precision (VDOP)
*39 The checksum data
 The following diagram shows a bad Geometric degree
of Precision. In this situation the data from the GPS
cannot be used.

Horizon

Horizon

Receiver

Fig 2: Good Geometric Degree of Precision

The GPS signals that has strength adequate for our

application the position information can be extracted from
the NMEA data. The latitude, Longitude, Altitude
information is used to identify the unique location on Receiver
earth. Latitude, Longitude data can be extracted from
RMC sentence.
Fig 3: Bad Geometric Degree of Precision

An example of RMC sentence that gives position data is

as follows: IV. TIGHT GPS/INS INTEGRATION USING
NONLINEAR BLENDING FILTER
$GPRMC,040302.663,A,3939.7,N,10506.6,W,0.27,358.8
6,200804,,*1A In order to utilize the benefits of GPS and INS
navigation methods, we fuse the data gathered by each
Where: and use an integrated model. There are several integration
schemes using a blending filter such as unscented Kalman
RMC Recommended Minimum
filter (UKF), central difference Kalman filter (CDKF) or
040302.663 Satellite-Derived Time particle filter (PF) to combine the GPS and INS data [12].
A Satellite Fix Status In order to reduce the impact of accuracy decreasing when
3939.7, N Latitude Decimal Degrees and Latitude GPS becomes unavailable and reaching a high resolution
Hemisphere in compare with extended Kalman filter (EKF) as a
10506.6,W Longitude Decimal Degrees and classic approach, UKF, CDKF and PF has been used on a
Longitude Hemisphere simplified 2-dimentional navigation error model, built
0.27 Speed from stand-alone INS on one hand, and from the GPS on
358.86 Bearing the other hand [2]. This fact has been illustrated in Fig. 4
200804 UTC Date given below. For this purpose, the GPS pseudoranges are
*1A The checksum data excellent external measurements for updating the INS,
thus improving its long-term accuracy [14].
 Fig. 4 Tight GPS/INS integration using nonlinear Blending filter
Fig 5: Flow of the proposed integrated model
V. DEAD RECKONING
Dead (or deduced) reckoning method is an often used
positioning technique in GPS denied situations. In this
method, heading and distance sensors are used to measure
the displacement vectors, which are then used in a
recursive manner to determine the current position. While
full inertial sensing provides heading, velocity and
acceleration in three dimensions, dead reckoning uses
measures of heading and velocity to provide a two
dimensional positioning solution based on a known
starting point.
DRM is a two board sandwich about the size of a PC
card. One is an analog board and other is a digital board.
Analog board consist of a accelerometers, magnetometers,
temperature sensors, barometric altimeter. Digital board
has a micro processor, memory, serial interface chips,
power conditioners and other logic for addressing and
control [17]. Advantages of DRM over conventional
inertial navigators are in weight, power consumption and
accuracy.
Accuracy of the dead-reckoning method is constantly
degrading since errors in all measurements
accumulatively affect the current position estimation.
Given the constant availability of dead-reckoning sensor
signals, and the absolute position accuracy of the GPS, it
seems logical that these two systems can be combined to
achieve better performance.
Example: DRM®4000 MODULE
A number of DRM modules are available in market.
DRM 4000 is one among them, which is developed by
Honeywell. It is a miniature, electronic device for
personnel on foot. The DRM®4000 is a self-contained
navigation unit that provides independent position
information from a starting point based on the user's stride
and pace count, magnetic north and barometric altitude.
The module can accept external GPS data. Dead
Reckoning (DR) and GPS are blended by an internal
Kalman filter. The core sensing elements are commercial
grade MEMS components. The outputs from tri-axial
accelerometers, magnetometers, and gyros are used in the
navigation solution. The outputs are not integrated as they
might be in an inertial navigation system. The
magnetometers are used as a compass, the accelerometers
are used to determine a horizontal plane for the compass
and to count steps, and the gyros are used to stabilize the
platform. This DRM can be easily integrated with host
computer [13].
VI. APPLICATIONS
The two major applications of the above mentioned
system are tracking and navigation. The examples of
tracking applications include keeping track of prisoners,
watching elderly, and monitoring ambulatory patients. For
navigation applications, the system works in a jungle
canopy, indoors and also in urban canyons, where GPS
receivers tend to have problems. This system can be used
for vehicle navigations as well.
VII. CONCLUSION
The paper describes the theoretical basics of integrating
GPS, multi sensor system and Dead Reckoning for
navigation. Each of these systems used in isolation has lot
of cons, but while if they are blended efficiently; they
complement each other and provide a more reliable and
accurate navigation solution. It proposes a method for
highly reliable and available navigation system for GPS
denied environments. One big problem in using the dead-
reckoning system is the need for accurate initial location
before the system can function correctly. This
initialization procedure is not only tedious but may be
impossible at some situations. For example, the person
may start travelling from a location where it would be
difficult to pinpoint the starting location. With GPS
signal, this initialization procedure can be automated. In
the situation that GPS signal is unavailable when the
system starts up (e.g. the person may be in an
underground room), the last dead-reckoning position can
be used as initial position. However, as soon as they
signal become available, the GPS signals can be used
immediately to correct the location. When we come to the
direct implementation aspect, different hardware devices
must be compliant to each other for the best results.

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