Modified ambiguity function approach for GPS carrier phase positioning

Abstract

This paper presents a new strategy for GPS carrier phase data processing. The classic approach generally consists of three steps: a float solution, a search for integer ambiguities, and a fixed solution. The new approach is based on certain properties of ambiguity function method and ensures the condition of integer ambiguities without the necessity of the additional step of the integer search. The ambiguities are not computed explicitly, although the condition of “integerness” of the ambiguities is ensured in the results through the least squares adjustment with condition equations in the functional model. An appropriate function for the condition equations is proposed and presented. The presented methodology, modified ambiguity function approach, currently uses a cascade adjustment with successive linear combinations of L1 and L2 carrier phase observations to ensure a correct solution. This paper presents the new methodology and compares it to the three-stage classic approach which includes ambiguity search. A numerical example is provided for 25 km baseline surveyed with dual-frequency receivers. All tests were performed using an in-house developed GINPOS software and it has been shown that the positioning results from both approaches are equivalent. It has also been proved that the new approach is robust to adverse effects of cycle slips. In our opinion, the proposed approach may be successfully used for carrier phase GPS data processing in geodetic applications.