Basic Navigation systems

• AUTOMATIC DIRECTION FINDER(ADF)

• VHF omnidirectional range (VOR)
 AUTOMATIC DIRECTION FINDER(ADF)

WHAT IS ADF?
• It is an electronic navigation
system that identifies the
relative bearing (angle) of an
aircraft from a radio beacon
such as an 
Non-Directional Beacon
(NDB) or commercial radio
broadcast station
• operates in the MF or LF
bandwidth
 Features:

• Automatic Direction Finder is the radio signals in the low to

medium frequency band of 190 KHz to 1750 KHz
• It is widely used navigation system today
• It has the major advantage that the reception is not limited to line
of sight distance
• The ADF signals follow the curvature of the earth
• The maximum of distance is depend on the power of the beacon
• The ADF can receives on both AM radio station and NDB (Non-
Directional Beacon)
• Commercial AM radio stations broadcast on 540 to 1620 KHz
• Non-Directional Beacon operate in the frequency band of 190 to
535 KHz
 ADF COMPONENTS

• ADF Receiver:
• pilot can tune the desired station and select
the mode of operation
• The signal is received, amplified, and
converted to audible voice or Morse code
transmission and powers the bearing indicator
• Control Box (Digital Readout Type) :
• Most modern aircraft has this type of control in the
cockpit
• In this equipment, the frequency tuned is displayed as
digital readout
• ADF automatically determines bearing to selected station

• Antenna :
• The aircraft consist of two antennas. The two antennas are
called LOOP antenna and SENSE antenna
• The ADF receives signals on both loop and sense antennas
• The loop antenna sense the direction of the station by the
strength of the signal
• The sense antenna provides the bearing information
• Bearing Indicator :
• displays the bearing to station relative to the
nose of the aircraft
• Two types of bearing indicators are used:
Relative Bearing (BR)
Magnetic Bearing (MR)
• Magnetic Bearing = Magnetic Heading +
Relative Bearing
 TYPE OF ADF INDICATOR

• Fixed Compass Card

• Rotatable Compass Card
• Single-Needle Radio Magnetic Indicator
• Dual-Needle Radio Magnetic Indicator
• Fixed Compass Card :
• It is fixed to the face of instrument and
cannot rotate.
• 0 degree is always straight up as the nose of
aircraft
• The relationship of the aircraft to the station
is referred to as " bearing to the station " MB
or aircraft to magnetic north.
• In this type of indicator, pilot calculates the
bearing by formula: MB = RB + MH

• Rotatable Compass Card :

• The dial face of the instrument can be

rotated by a knob.
• By rotating the card, the Magnetic Heading
(MH) of the aircraft is adjusted to be under
the pointer at the top of the card
•Single-Needle Radio Magnetic Indicator :

•Radio Magnetic Indicator(RMI) is an instrument that

combines radio and magnetic information to provide
continuous heading , bearing , and radial information
•In the Single needle Radio Magnetic Indicator , the compass
card is a directional gyro and it rotates automatically as the
aircraft turns and provide continuous heading
•This indicator accurately indicates the magnetic heading and
the magnetic bearing to the beacon

•Dual-Needle Radio Magnetic Indicator :

•The dual needle RMI is similar to single needle RMI except

that it has a second needle
•The first needle indicates the Magnetic Bearing to the NDB
station
•The second needle indicates the magnetic heading and point
to VOR station. This help pilot to check the location of the
aircraft at that time
 VHF omnidirectional range (VOR)

• What is VOR?
• VOR (VHF Omni-Range) is the basic Electronic
navigation used today
• This navigation method relies on the ground based
transmitters which emits signals to VOR receiver
• The VOR system operates in the VHF frequency band
from 108.0 to 117.95 MHz
• The reception of VHF signals is a line of sight situation
at a minimum altitude of 1000 feet (AGL) above
ground level
 VOR Range
• VOR Class= Low:
• Altitude:1,000-18,000 feet, Range: 40 nautical miles
• VOR Class=High:
• Altitude:1,000-14,500 feet, Range: 40 nautical miles
• VOR Class=High:
• Altitude:14,500-60,000 feet, Range: 100 nautical miles
• VOR Class=High:
• Altitude:18,000-45,000 feet, Range: 130 nautical miles
VHF omnidirectional range (VOR)
Features:

• VOR signals provide considerably greater accuracy and

reliability than NDBs
• VOR provides a bearing from the station to the aircraft which
does not vary with wind or orientation of the aircraft
• VHF radio is less vulnerable to diffraction around terrain
features and coastlines
• VOR signals offer a predictable accuracy of 90 m (300 ft), 2
sigma at 2 NM from a pair of VOR beacons as compared to
the accuracy of  Global Positioning System (GPS) 
• VOR stations rely on "line of sight" because they operate in
the VHF. This limits VOR range to the horizon
 VOR operation

Constant in phase Phase variable signal

 OPERATION
• The VOR at ground base transmits two signals at the same time. One
signal is constant in all directions as a reference phase. Another signal, it
is variable-phase signal and it rotates through 360 degrees, like the beam
from the lighthouse
• Both signals are in phase when the variable signal passes 360 degrees
(reference to magnetic north) and they are 180 degrees out of phase
when the rotating signal passes 180 degrees
• The aircraft equipment receives both signals. The receiver will calculate
the difference between the two signals, and interprets the result as a
radial from the station to pilots on the aircraft

RADIALS: The two signals from VOR transmitter generate 360 lines like
spokes in a wheel . Each line is called a Radial . VOR navigation
equipment on the airplane will determine which of those 360 radials the
airplane is on
VOR INDICATOR
• A : Rotating Course Card is calibrated from 0 to 360 degrees,
which indicates the VOR bearing chosen as the reference to fly
by pilot

• B : Omni Bearing Selector or OBS knob , used to manually

rotate the course card to where the point to fly
• C : TO-FROM indicator, The triangle arrow will point UP when
flying to the VOR station. The arrow will point DOWN when
flying away from the VOR station

• D : Course Deviation Indicator (CDI). This needle moves left or

right indicating the direction to turn the aircraft to return to
course
DOT : The horizontal dots at center represents the aircraft away
from the course. Each dot represent 2 degrees deviate from
desired course
 How It Works

• The followings are just the typical, some aircraft may

be vary in details . The pilot can set VOR receiver to
selected ground station or another word is to select
a radial to define a magnetic course toward or away
from VOR station on receiver. The Radial of the VOR
receiver is divided into 360 degrees, at the point 360
is representing Magnetic North . When we called
out , we called in three digits such as 090 that
means on the East and 270 means on the West .

The proper time to tune navigation receivers is while

the aircraft is on the ground because the pilot has to
do the flight planned and known where to go. After
takeoff, usually start from altutude of 1000 feet
minimum above ground level, the VOR receiver will
get signals from transmitter and the flag will show
arrow FROM (left picture).
• When the aircraft has gone half way or
close to next VOR station and VOR
receiver got that signals from next station
. The arrow flag will change
from FROM to TO arrow (from right
picture) . At this time, pilot should select
OBS to Radial of next VOR station.

CDI on the indicator shown off center by

four dots and that means eight degrees
off the course, the pilot must correct the
heading of aircraft
If the aircraft out of transmitter range or
VOR station not operates, the VOR receiver
will show red flag or indication to tell pilot
that don't misunderstand because CDI
needle will stay at center all the time.
Accuracy and Reliability:
The predicted accuracy of the VOR system is
±1.4°
However, test data indicates that 99.94% of the
time a VOR system has less than ±0.35° of error
 Internal monitoring of a VOR station will shut
down or change over to a standby system if the
station error exceeds some limit
A Doppler VOR beacon will typically change
over or shut down when the bearing error
exceeds 1.0°
 UNIT-V

• ADVANCED NAVIGATIONAL SYSTEM

Hyperbolic system of Navigation
LORAN (Long Range Navigation)
Decca navigation system
DME (Distance Measurement Equipment)
TACAN (Tactical Air Navigation)
Omega Navigation system
Navistar Global positioning system
 Hyperbolic system of Navigation

• A Hyperbolic Navigation System is a system that

produces hyperbolic lines (or surfaces) of position of the
target by:
– measuring the difference in times of reception (or)
– difference in phase between radio signals from two or more
synchronized transmitters

• In this radio navigation system, a navigation instrument is

employed on a ship or aircraft, which determines location based
on the difference in timing or phase from radio navigation
transmitters
• Measuring the difference in timing (phase) of
radio signals received from two beacons gives
the difference in distance of the receiver from
the beacons
• Plotting all of the potential locations of the
receiver for the measured delay, it looks like a 
hyperbolic line on a chart
• In this way, the difference in time from two
pairs of beacons are measured and it gives two
such hyperbolic lines, and
• the intersection of these two lines indicates the
position of the receiver
• Now a days, for a number of reasons, this
practice is no longer used, and the hyperbolic
nature of the navigation solution become
obsolete
• The first of these hyperbolic navigation
 systems was the UK's Gee and Decca,
followed by the US LORAN and LORAN-C
 systems
• LORAN-C offered accurate navigation at
distances over 1,000 kilometres (620 mi)
• Gee
• The first operational hyperbolic navigation was UK's Gee, first
used experimentally by RAF Bomber Command in 1941
• Gee was used both for bombing over Germany as well as
navigation in the area of the UK, especially for landing at night
• Several Gee chains were built in the UK, and after the war this
expanded for four chains in the UK, two in France, and one in
northern Germany
• For a period following the formation of the 
International Civil Aviation Organization in 1946, Gee was
considered as the basis for a worldwide standard for
navigation, but the VHF omnidirectional range (VOR) system
was selected instead, and the last Gee chain was eventually
shut down in 1970
• LORAN
• The US had also considered hyperbolic navigation
as early as 1940, and started a development
effort known as Project 3 that was similar to Gee.
• The new concept relied on the use of sky waves
 to allow the pulses to be received over very long
ranges
• in mid-1942, Robert J. Dippy, inventor of Gee,
introduced another system emerged as LORAN,
for Long Range Navigation
•  LORAN became LORAN-A, LORAN-B and LORAN-
C are the different versions of this kind
 Basic Concepts:
• Hyperbolic navigation systems can be divided into two main classes,
those that calculate the time difference between two radio pulses, and
those that compare the phase difference between two continuous
signals
• Consider two radio transmitters located at a distance of 300 kilometres
(190 mi) from each other, which means the radio signal from one will
take 1 millisecond to reach the other
• One of these stations is equipped with an electronic clock that
periodically sends out a trigger signal. When the signal is sent, this
station, the "master", sends out its transmission
• 1 ms later that signal arrives at the second station, the "slave"
• This station is equipped with a receiver, and when it sees the signal from
the master arrive, it triggers its own transmitter.
• This ensures that the master and slave send out signals precisely 1 ms
apart, without the slave needing to have an accurate timer of its own. In
practice, a fixed time is added to account for delays in the electronics
• A receiver listening for these signals and
displaying them on an oscilloscope will see a
series of blips on the display. By measuring the
distance between them, the delay between
the two signals can be calculated
• For instance, a receiver might measure the
distance between the two blips to represent a
delay of 0.5 ms. This implies that
the difference in the distance to the two
stations is 150 km.
• When plotted on a chart, the collection of possible
locations for any given time difference forms a
hyperbolic curve. The collection of curves for all
possible measured delays forms a set of curved
radiating lines, centred on the line between the two
stations, known as the "baseline“
• In order to take a fix, the receiver takes two
measurements based on two different stations. The
intersections of the two sets of curves normally
results in two possible locations. Using some other
form of navigation, dead reckoning for instance, one
of these possible positions can be eliminated, thus
providing an exact fix
 LORAN (Long Range Navigation)
• LORAN, short for long range navigation, is a hyperbolic 
radio navigation system developed in the United States
 during World War II
• It was similar to the UK's Gee system but operated at lower
frequencies in order to provide an improved range up to
1,500 miles (2,400 km) with an accuracy of tens of miles
• This system has lower accuracies, in the order of 10's of
miles, but this is acceptable as could be used for short
range navigation
• LORAN was first used by ships and aircraft in the Atlantic
theatre but eventually found more extensive use in the
Pacific
• LORAN, in its original form, is an expensive system
to implement, requiring a cathode ray tube (CRT)
display
• This limits its use to the military and large
commercial users
• The U.S. Navy began development of Loran-B,
which offered accuracy on the order of a few tens of
feet, but ran into significant technical problems
• The U.S. Air Force worked on a different concept,
Cyclan, which the Navy took over as Loran-C. 
Loran-C offered longer range than LORAN and
accuracy of hundreds of feet. The U.S. Coast Guard
 took over operations of both systems in 1958
• LORAN used multi-lateration principles of
difference in time of signal arrival from different
stations to determine position
• In the post-war years, this methodology was
combined with technologies that measures the
phase shift of those signals which vastly improved
the fix accuracy
• This improved system was designated Loran-C and
the original LORAN system redesignated Loran-A
• As the Loran-C system expanded, the original
system declined but some chains remained in
service until as late as 1980
 DME (Distance Measurement Equipment)

• Distance Measuring Equipment (DME) is a system that

is used in aviation for navigation purposes
• Distance Measuring Equipment (DME) is defined as a
navigation beacon, used to measure the air craft
position relative to that beacon at the ground
• Aircraft send out a signal which is sent back by the
DME ground equipment after a fixed delay
• An aircraft can compute its distance to the beacon
from the delay of the signal perceived by the aircraft's
DME equipment using the speed of light
• Distance Measuring Equipment (DME) is
defined as a combination of ground and
airborne equipment which gives a continuous
slant range distance-from-station readout by
measuring time-lapse of a signal transmitted by
the aircraft to the station and responded back
• DMEs can also provide groundspeed and time-
to-station readouts by differentiation
• Distance measuring equipment (DME) provides
pilots with distance information between the
aircraft and the ground station, and is used in all
phases of flight
DISTANCE MEASURING EQUIPMENT
 • Features:
• DME operates in the 960 - 1215 MHz band
• The aircraft transmits on a center frequency of 1025 up
to 1150 MHz with 1 MHz spacing
• The DME station replies on a frequency that is either
63 MHz lower or 63 MHz higher
• The aircraft uses unique pairs of pulses and the same
pulses are used for the reply. This is to differentiate the
signals from other signals send by the DME station
• Modern DME stations can serve up to 200 aircrafts at
the same time
•  
• A traditional DME displays the distance from
the DME transmitter antenna to the aircraft
This is called the slant distance.
• It is very accurate. However, since the aircraft
is at altitude, the distance to the DME ground
antenna from a point directly beneath the
aircraft is shorter
• Some modern DMEs are equipped to calculate
this ground distance and display it
 Omega Navigation system

• OMEGA was the first global-range radio navigation

 system operated by the United States
• It is a hyperbolic navigation system, enabling ships
and aircraft to determine their position by
receiving very low frequency (VLF) radio signals in
the range 10 to 14 kHz, transmitted by a network
of fixed radio beacons, using a navigation receiver
unit
• It became operational around 1971 and was shut
down in 1997 in favour of the 
Global Positioning System
The Communications Control Link building of the Naval Radio Station at 
Haiku, part of the Kaneohe Omega Transmitter, 1987
• Omega was approved for development in 1968 with eight
transmitters and the ability to achieve a 4-mile (6.4 km) accuracy
when fixing a position.
• Each Omega station transmitted a sequence of three very low
frequency (VLF) signals (10.2 kHz, 13.6 kHz, 11.333... kHz in that
order) plus a fourth frequency which was unique to each of the
eight stations.
• The duration of each pulse (ranging from 0.9 to 1.2 seconds,
with 0.2 second blank intervals between each pulse) differed in a
fixed pattern, and repeated every ten seconds; the 10-second
pattern was common to all 8 stations and synchronized with the
carrier phase angle, which itself was synchronized with the local
master atomic clock
• The pulses within each 10-second group were identified by the
first 8 letters of the alphabet within Omega publications of the
time
• The envelope of the individual pulses could be used to establish a
receiver's internal timing within the 10-second pattern. However,
it was the phase of the received signals within each pulse that was
used to determine the transit time from transmitter to receiver.
• Using hyperbolic geometry and radio navigation principles, a
position fix with an accuracy on the order of 5–10 kilometres (3.1–
6.2 mi) was realizable over the entire globe at any time of the day.
• Omega employed hyperbolic radio navigation techniques and the
chain operated in the VLF portion of the spectrum between 10
and 14 kHz.
• Near the end of its service life of 26 years, Omega evolved into a
system used primarily by the civil community.
• By receiving signals from three stations, an Omega receiver could
locate a position to within 4 nautical miles (7.4 km) using the
principle of phase comparison of signals
• Omega stations used very extensive antennas to
transmit at their very low frequencies (VLF). This is
because wavelength is inversely proportional to
frequency (wavelength in metres = 299,792,458 /
frequency in Hz), and transmitter efficiency is
severely degraded if the length of the antenna is
shorter than 1/4 wavelength.
• They used grounded or insulated guyed masts with
umbrella antennas, or wire-spans across both
valleys and fjords.
• Some Omega antennas were the tallest
constructions on the continent where they stood
or still stand.
 OMEGA stations

• There were nine Omega stations in total:

• Bratland Omega Transmitter
• Trinidad Omega Transmitter
• Paynesville Omega Transmitter
• Kaneohe Omega Transmitter
• La Moure Omega Transmitter
• Chabrier Omega Transmitter etc...
•  
• TACAN is a polar-coordinate type radio air navigation system
that provides distance information and bearing (azimuth)
information
• This information,, is usually provided by two meters. One
meter indicates, in nautical miles, the distance of the aircraft
from the surface beacon
• The other meter indicates the direction of flight, in degrees-
of-bearing, to the geographic location of the surface beacon
• By using the TACAN equipment installed in the aircraft and
TACAN ground equipment installed aboard a particular
surface ship or shore station, a pilot can obtain bearing to
and distance from that location
• This information helps the crew members to:
• fly directly to a particular location
or
• use the bearing and distance information from
a specific beacon to fix geographic location
• TACAN PRINCIPLES:
• TACAN equipment is based on radar-ranging
techniques which determines distance by
measuring the round-trip travel time of RF
pulse
• The airborne equipment generates timed
pulse pairs that the surface TACAN system
receives and decodes
• After a 50-μsec delay, the transponder
responds with a reply
• The airborne DME then converts the roundtrip
time to distance from the TACAN facility
• The frequency and identification code provide
the geographic location of the transmitting
beacon
 TACAN EQUIPMENT
• Many different types of TACAN equipment have
been used for air navigation
• Today, the AN/URN-25 is taking over the task of
tactical air navigation from the older AN/URN-
20 on new construction ships
• Two types of antennas are used with the
AN/URN-25, such as OE- 273(V)/URN, used
primarily in shipboard installations, and the OE-
258/URN
 CAPABILITIES AND LIMITATIONS
• In the X mode of operation, the TACAN set transmits
on one of 126 discrete channel frequencies (which are
1-MHz apart) from 962 to 1024 MHz and from 1151 to
1213 MHz
• In the Y mode of operation, the set transmits on one
of 126 discrete channel frequencies (which are 1-MHz
apart) within the range of 1025 to 1150 MHz
• The navigation set receiver, operating in the 1025- to
1150-MHz range for both the X and Y modes, is always
displaced 63 MHz from the transmitter frequency
• The TACAN set can simultaneously provide
individual distance measuring service for up to
100 interrogating aircraft
• Of the 3,600 pulse pairs-per-second transmitted
by the TACAN, 900pulse pairs (MAIN and
AUXILIARY bursts) contain the bearing
information; the remaining 2,700 pulse pairs are
either random noise pulses, identity pulses, or
replies to interrogating aircraft.
• The navigation set has a receiver sensitivity of -92
dBm or better and a nominal peak power output
of 3 kilowatts at the transponder output