PTTI SYSTEMS ON THE EASTERN TEST RANGE

Christopher S. Duffy, James L. Wright

Abstract:	The Eastern Test Range (ETR) is a missile and rocket testing facility available to military and commercial users for the launching and testing of space vehicles. The ETR provides over 4,000 nautical miles of tracking coverage of these vehicles from four major land-based tracking stations and one shipboard tracking station. At each station there are a myriad of Precise Time and Time Interval (PTTI) requirements that must be met. The most demanding requirements are: synchronization accuracy to the United States Naval Observatory (USNO) Master Clock to 100 nanoseconds, frequency accuracy of 1x101* (Tau =1 day), no single point of failure and continuous (24 hours per day, 365 days per year) PTTI operation. This paper will update a similar paper delivered at the Eighteenth Annual PTTI Applications and Planning Meeting and will describe the techniques employed to meet all of the ETR'PTTI requirements. Philosophical notions such as range PTTI service is much like a highly reliable utility service, synchronization from GPS should not be overemphasized, and gradual corrections are preferred to step corrections will be presented
Published in:	Proceedings of the 21th Annual Precise Time and Time Interval Systems and Applications Meeting November 28 - 30, 1989 Sheraton Hotel Redondo Beach, California
Pages:	467 - 478
Cite this article:	Duffy, Christopher S., Wright, James L., "PTTI SYSTEMS ON THE EASTERN TEST RANGE," Proceedings of the 21th Annual Precise Time and Time Interval Systems and Applications Meeting, Redondo Beach, California, November 1989, pp. 467-478. https://doi.org/10.33012/1989.14541
Full Paper:	ION Members/Non-Members: 1 Download Credit Sign In