Operational Aspects of an Innovative, DVB-S based, Satellite Ranging Tool

Orbit determination using distance measurements

“…The RF ranging techniques can be classified according to their operation methods into two main items [10], [13]: a) Two-way Distance Ranging: It is customary to use a transponder on the desired target. This device receives the interrogator RF pulse and replies to it with a much stronger pulse, usually on a different frequency, as shown in figure (2).…”

“…One of the goals of the system design is to depress the multipath signal to the maximum possible extent to improve the measurement precession. Using spread spectrum technique [13] -as shown in the next section -is an effective way to combat the effects of multipath signals.…”

“…Introducing spread spectrum [13] as a ranging method for orbit determination. It is transmitted through the Satellite payload channels, which is achievable as the transmitted signal is spread in such away that it become noise like and thus would not interfere with the payload traffic and then reproduce the signal again at the receiver level, and from the detection of the time or phase delay between the transmitted and received signal, the operator could compute the distance.…”

“…Direct Sequence spread spectrum system Compared to classical Pseudo-range systems, the use of payload signals has various advantages for the satellite operator [13]. The payload based ranging signal is always present, and have no impact on the satellite control activities, while classical Pseudorange actually has to be activated by satellite commanding.…”

“…Generating a Matlab program as shown in figure (15), to check the autocorrelation property for different codes. From the three types of sequences [13], the PN sequences are considered best suited for synchronization because the autocorrelation takes on just two values. However, the Gold and Kasami sequences provide a larger number of sequences with good cross-correlation properties than do the PN sequences.…”