Navigation System Stabilization

You must conduct two to three sets of figure eights, either manually or using waypoint mode. The goal is to stabilize the navigation system and obtain an INS status of SolutionGood in SpatialExplorer during a scan before you are acquiring the data relevant to your mission. This allows the software to process the current IMU drift and noise. We recommend flying a figure eight pattern because it helps lower the covariances (Uncertainty Position and Uncertainty Attitude), which are estimated errors of position and attitude.

Figure-Eight Pattern

Always keep the vehicle direction of flight pointing forward, much like an airplane. As you're flying, the Uncertainty Position (UncertP) and Uncertainty Attitude (UncertA) are both visible in the progress bars in System Monitor in Spatial Explorer. The lower the values the better; minimizing the covariance values produces more accurate sensor trajectories and thus more accurate measurements. Faster motion will be more effective than slower motion.

When not supplying RTK (differential corrections) to the navigational system, the GNSS position will be SinglePoint throughout the mission. However, when using differential corrections, the GNSS position Type steps through several states: SinglePoint, PseudorangeDifferential, FloatingNarrowLane, IntegerNarrowLane, and IntegerNarrowLane (Verified). Upon entering IntegerNarrowLane, the GNSS position acquires a stable RTK fix. During this stage, the RTK algorithm is restarted in the background. If the same fix can be resolved again, this means the state is verified, leading to IntegerNarrowLane (Verified).

Typical status of the navigation system during initialization

Position Status	Description
SinglePoint	Single point position. Rover only knows its position with reference to itself and no external reference point.
PseudorangeDifferential	Pseudorange differential solution.
FloatingNarrowLane	Floating narrow-lane ambiguity solution.
IntergerNarrowLane	Integer narrow-lane ambiguity solution. Upon entering IntegerNarrowLane, the GNSS position acquires a stable RTK fix. During this stage, the RTK algorithm is restarted in the background.
IntegerNarrowLane (verified)	Integer narrow-lane ambiguity solution indicating solution fix has been verified against an external reference point. If the same fix can be resolved again, this means the state is verified, leading to IntegerNarrowLane (Verified).
IntegerWideLane	IntegerWideLane refers to an Integer wide-lane ambiguity position solution. This typically occurs when using Real-Time Kinematics and refers to an ambiguity in the positional fix of the GNSS solution.