High Precision Narrow-Band RF Ranging

Bradley D. Farnsworth and David W.A. Taylor

Abstract:	A round-trip, time-of-flight, high-precision, ranging radio operating in the 915 MHz ISM band is presented. A custom digital baseband processor is implemented on a Xilinx Virtex-4 FPGA and interfaced with COTS RF hardware. Processing gain enabled by direct-sequence spread-spectrum (DSSS) signaling directly improves the ranging accuracy. The system is designed with freerunning baseband clocks that do not require fine synchronization. Prototype brassboard system measurement accuracies of 7 cm (1-s) have been obtained during testing in an open field.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 2010 International Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation January 25 - 27, 2010 Catamaran Resort Hotel San Diego, CA
Pages:	161 - 166
Cite this article:	Farnsworth, Bradley D., Taylor, David W.A., "High Precision Narrow-Band RF Ranging," Proceedings of the 2010 International Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation, San Diego, CA, January 2010, pp. 161-166.
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