Measuring Code-Phase Differences due to Inter-Satellite Hardware Differences

Abstract

This paper focuses on the hardware demonstration of pseudorange domain errors from nominal signal deformation, as seen at the output of actual hardware receivers. To see these errors in the current singlefrequency configuration, the following procedural steps were necessary to highlight the error contributions: • Careful siting of antenna to reduce multipath — as it is the other correlator spacing-dependent error source • Multiple “receivers” with wide front-end bandwidths and with the flexibility of implementing both narrow and wide correlator discriminators for tracking • A known, zero-baseline differential receiver configuration with common clock to remove all other common mode errors With these steps, the effects of nominal signal deformation on pseudorange domain performance are clearly and directly seen for the first time, verifying past results. The proposed method avoids specialized hardware such as large dish antennas; instead, widely-available COTS hardware and a more easily-accessible dish antenna are used. This provides a practical and convenient means of monitoring signal deformations and for testing and verifying various mitigation strategies. Furthermore, this method is easily adapted to upcoming multi-constellation, multi-frequency systems.