Removing Obsolescence in the 3A GPS Legacy Receiver Through the Application of Current Technologies: A Case Study

Charles Raab and James Parham

Abstract:	The GPS Receiver R-2332J/AR (RCVR3A) is a fivechannel airborne Precise Positioning Service (PPS) GPS Receiver that currently supports the navigation and timing requirements of nearly 70 military platforms. This 25- year old technology receiver is at a life-cycle phase in which its supportability is severely impacted by parts obsolescence. The Avionics Component Obsolescence Management (AVCOM), reports that currently 18% of the integrated circuits, hybrids, discretes and radio frequency devices are obsolete. Additionally, AVCOM projects that by the year 2015 obsolescence issues will be over 50%. Rockwell Collins, Cedar Rapids was tasked by Warner Robins Air Logistics Command (WRALC) to develop a design that mitigates the obsolescence issues of the RCVR3A while maintaining backward compatibility to Host Vehicles (HV) with respect to form, fit, and function. In order to keep this new receiver functionally viable for the next decade, the receiver is to incorporate current Selective Availability Anti Spoofing Module (SAASM) technologies and provide a platform to expand to future capabilities such as the Joint Precision Approach and Landing System (JPALS) and Global Air Traffic Management (GATM). Additionally, a clear roadmap to M-Code technology is required. A key issue in developing this new receiver is to maintain full backwards compatibility with the RCVR3A with respect to its interfaces of the HV. This interface compatibility will enable existing RCVR3A platforms to an upgraded R-2332M/AR (RCVR3A-S) replacement with minimal integration effort. This paper describes the key activities for Phase 1 of a three phase effort, which paid significant dividends for the engineering team’s efforts. A description of how Rockwell Collins has achieved the goal of maintaining backward compatibility to the RCVR3A while integrating Rockwell Collins’ GPS Embedded Module with All-In- View SAASM functionality is provided. The future phases of the modernized RCVR3A development will also be addressed. Finally, we address the RCVR3A relative to the future phases of the initial development and describe the plans going forward to develop the full suite of HV interfaces and the challenges that we will encounter going forward into the platform integration phase of the 3A Upgrade program.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 2007 National Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation January 22 - 24, 2007 The Catamaran Resort Hotel San Diego, CA
Pages:	1034 - 1040
Cite this article:	Raab, Charles, Parham, James, "Removing Obsolescence in the 3A GPS Legacy Receiver Through the Application of Current Technologies: A Case Study," Proceedings of the 2007 National Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation, San Diego, CA, January 2007, pp. 1034-1040.
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