Aiding the L3Harris Iver3 INS using USBL

In brief

L3Harris AUV Systems’ customer chose Mini-Ranger 2 Ultra-Short BaseLine (USBL) aided navigation system and AvTrak 6 Nano, both manufactured by our technology partner Sonardyne, for its Iver3 AUV.

The challenge

To conduct successful autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) and unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV) missions, navies need to know they can rely on accurate positioning. To that end, they’ve found that using USBL position aiding to support underwater vehicle inertial navigation is an effective way to underpin accurate vehicle operations while reducing error margins.

This is just what a customer of L3Harris was looking for when they chose the Mini-Ranger 2 USBL positioning system to aid the INS on the L3Harris Iver3 AUV.

The solution

Mini-Ranger 2 is a highly effective USBL for littoral operations, delivering accurate data without cost and complexity. Deployed from the surface, it can be used to track and communicate any of the transceivers in the AvTrak 6 family. L3Harris chose the AvTrak 6 OEM Nano, the smallest variant of the AvTrak 6 family, for its AUV. The AvTrak 6 OEM Nano was programmed to send a PSIMSSB telegram every time the AUV received a position update from the surface. This update is used to aid the INS.

The results

Through a series of trials and with support from our technology partner Sonardyne application engineering team, L3Harris was able to validate the performance of the Mini-Ranger 2 and AvTrak 6 OEM Nano. USBL is now used to limit the dead-reckoning position drift typical of AUV operations over time. In addition, L3Harris is considering how to best implement the diagnosis capability of the AvTrak 6 family – enabling in-situ observations of the acoustic environment can be used to automatically adjust the power and gain settings to improve performance on the fly.

Get in touch if you would like to know how will can support your AUV and UUV operations.