Determination of a residual gravity model and its effect on inertial navigator performance

In connection with the design and the mechanization of modern inertial navigation and guidance systems, it becomes necessary that uncertainties in the gravitational force field are accurately analyzed and compensated. The considered investigation demonstrates the feasibility of using a gravimeter for compensation of a marine Inertial Navigation System (INS) by real time estimation of vertical deflections. Gravity anomaly data collected by the gravimeter also can be stored and postprocessed by conventional methods to derive vertical deflection maps. A flexible and efficient methodology, based on state space modeling of the complete system configuration, is developed for the evaluation of different parameters.