Integrated Navigation

Abstract

Each navigational aid has its advantages and disadvantages and for that reason the optimum aid will be a combination of several aids. The best way of combining the aids seems to be by means of an automatic dead reckoning computer which continuously computes position from true air-speed and wind-speed and other data which can be fed into the existing navigational aids by means of a data transformer. Data from the integrated system can be transmitted by data link to air traffic control to correct the flight programme, &c. This paper, which was presented at Dusseldorf at the German Navigation Society's meeting (5–7 June 1962), surveys the field of integrated navigation systems and describes a number of possibilities. Formulae are derived for the accuracy of Vortac and D.R. and Vortac and doppler. It is published with the kind permission of the German Navigation Society.If we look critically at the navigational aids which are available today we find that all have advantages and disadvantages, and that no one aid can be claimed to be suitable for all purposes. This situation will still exist for many years. Therefore it seems very advantageous to combine the available navigational aids to form an integrated navigation system in such a way that the possibilities may be fully utilized.

I—An Elementary Compound System

“…There is, of course, nothing new in a proposition of this kind. 1 ' 2 ' 3 It is suggested that a combination such as that of Decca and a self-contained dead-reckoning device can usefully be described as a 'compound' system since the whole is formed, to quote the relevant entry in Webster's dictionary, 'by the aggregation of otherwise independent elements'.…”