MEMS-Based IMU Development, Calibration and Testing for Autonomous MAV Navigation

S. Winkler, M. Buschmann, T. Kordes, H.-W. Schulz, P. Vörsmann

Abstract:	Micro Air Vehicles are a major field of research at the Institute of Aerospace Systems of the Technical University of Braunschweig, Germany. The current research activities are focused on the fully autonomous fight of the 40 cm wing span and 360 g MAV Carolo. For achieving fully autonomous flight control and navigation aircraft state determination is essential. For that purpose a MEMS-based Inertial Measurement Unit was developed. In addition to the six inertial sensors, a temperature sensor embedded into one inertial sensor provides temperature information. After a description of the developed miniaturized Inertial Measurement Unit, the mathematical calibration model providing scale factor, bias and misalignment angles is introduced. The temperature influence on the inertial sensor measurements is presented and the reproducibility of the calibration results confirmed. Output of the calibration is one calibration table for each inertial sensor containing scale factor, bias and misalignment angles as a function of the temperature measurement. Furthermore, a flight test with the university's research aircraft, a Dornier Do 128-6, equipped with the high-precision Inertial Navigation System Honeywell Lasernav and a Novatel OEM3 GPS receiver as reference was carried out. The results show that the calibration results can be confirmed by the reference sensors. It turns out that already if a temperature change of about 0.4C within 1 min is not taken into account, the errors in attitude, velocity and position results increase drastically. The errors can be significantly decreased if the calibration tables obtained are applied.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 59th Annual Meeting of The Institute of Navigation and CIGTF 22nd Guidance Test Symposium (2003) June 23 - 25, 2003 Hyatt Regency Hotel Albuquerque, NM
Pages:	128 - 134
Cite this article:	Winkler, S., Buschmann, M., Kordes, T., Schulz, H.-W., Vörsmann, P., "MEMS-Based IMU Development, Calibration and Testing for Autonomous MAV Navigation," Proceedings of the 59th Annual Meeting of The Institute of Navigation and CIGTF 22nd Guidance Test Symposium (2003), Albuquerque, NM, June 2003, pp. 128-134.
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