Predicting the Success Rate of Long-baseline GPS+Galileo (Partial) Ambiguity Resolution

Abstract

This contribution covers precise (cm-level) relative Global Navigation Satellite System(GNSS) positioning for which the baseline length can reach up to a few hundred km. Carrier-phase ambiguity resolution is required to obtain this high positioning accuracy within manageable observation time spans. However, for such long baselines, the differential ionospheric delays hamper fast ambiguity resolution as based on current dual-frequency Global Positioning System (GPS). It is expected that the modernization of GPS towards a triple-frequency system, as well as the development of Galileo towards a full constellation will be beneficial in speeding up long-baseline ambiguity resolution. In this article we will predict ambiguity resolution success rates for GPS+Galileo for a 250 km baseline based on the ambiguity variance matrix, where the Galileo constellation is simulated by means of Yuma almanac data. From our studies it can be concluded that ambiguity resolution will likely become faster (less than ten minutes) in the case of GPS+Galileo when based on triple frequency data of both systems, however much shorter times to fix the ambiguities (one-two minutes) can be expected when only a subset of ambiguities is fixed instead of the complete vector (partial ambiguity resolution).