Feasibility Study on Integration of SSR Correction into Network RTK to Provide More Robust Service

Abstract

Network RTK is a highly practical technology that can provide high positioning accuracy at levels between cm~dm regardless of user location in the network by extending the available range of RTK using reference station network. In particular, unlike other carrier-based positioning techniques such as PPP, users are able to acquire high-accuracy positions within a short initialization time of a few or tens of seconds, which increases its value as a future navigation system. However, corrections must be continuously received to maintain a high level of positioning accuracy, and when a time delay of more than 30 seconds occurs, the accuracy may be reduced to the code-based positioning level of meters. In case of SSR, which is currently in the process of standardization for PPP service, the corrections by each error source are transmitted in different transmission intervals, and the rate of change of each correction is transmitted together to compensate the time delay. Using these features of SSR correction is expected to reduce the performance degradation even if users do not receive the network RTK corrections for more than 30 seconds. In this paper, the simulation data were generated from 5 domestic reference stations in Gunwi, Yeongdoek, Daegu, Gimcheon, and Yecheon, and the network RTK and SSR corrections were generated for the corresponding data and applied to the simulation data from Cheongsong reference station, assumed as the user. As a result of the experiment assuming 30 seconds of missing data, the positioning performance compensating for time delay by SSR was analyzed to be horizontal RMS (about 5 cm) and vertical RMS (about 8 cm), and the 95% error was 8.7 cm horizontal and 1cm vertical. This is a significant amount when compared to the horizontal and vertical RMS of 0.3 cm and 0.6 cm, respectively, for Network RTK without time delay for the same data, but is considerably smaller compared to the 0.5 ~ 1 m accuracy level of DGPS or SBAS. Therefore, maintaining Network RTK mode using SSR rather than switching to code-based DGPS or SBAS mode due to failure to receive the network RTK corrections for 30 seconds is considered to be favorable in terms of maintaining position accuracy and recovering performance by quickly resolving the integer ambiguity when the communication channel is recovered.