Design and Prototype of Heading
Reference System
Piotr Kaniewski, Military University of Technology, Warsaw, Poland
Jakub Kazubek, Military University of Technology, Warsaw, Poland
BIOGRAPHY
Piotr Kaniewski had been studying Radiotechnical
Systems of Aircraft at The Military University of
Technology in Warsaw, Poland. He was graduated
and received his MSc degree in 1994. He has held
his PhD degree in radionavigation from The
Military University of Technology since 1998. Dr
Kaniewski has been employed at The Faculty of
Electronics of The Military University of
Technology as an Engineer, Assistant, and finally
Assistant Professor. His research interests include
Kalman filtering, non-linear filtering and integration
of positioning systems
Jakub Kazubek is a fifth year student of The
Warsaw Military University of Technology. He is
studying Radioelectronic Systems in the Institute of
Radioelectronics at the Faculty of Electronics. He
was an individual student with a specialty of
Integrated Navigation Systems. His research
interests include inertial navigation systems, their
integration with other navigation devices and
practical development of integrated systems.
ITRODUCTIO The main subsystem of the designed HRS is an
Common radio-technical navigation systems like
Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS),
LORAN, TACAN and others do not provide
navigation data on continuous basis. In harsh
environment or in case of intentional or
unintentional jamming, their data may be
unavailable even for long periods.
Whenever there is a need for continuous navigation,
radio-technical systems are usually integrated with
inertial navigation systems (INS) or dead-reckoning
systems (DR). Due to large dimensions and power
consumption, as well as high prices, INS systems
have been traditionally applied in high-end or
military applications. The last years have witnessed
an unprecedented decrease of all the above
mentioned factors, making inertial navigation
suitable for a wider set of applications. However,
the dead-reckoning method is still a preferred choice
in low-cost land navigation systems.
Dead reckoning allows to determine the current
position of a vehicle using heading and velocity
measurements. One of the data streams needed for
DR can be provided by a Heading Reference System
(HRS). HRS provides heading estimates, which
allow DR to calculate the direction of a vehicle
displacement and, along with velocity information,
to predict the current position of the vehicle.
The paper presents a project and a prototype of HRS
system, utilizing an electronic compass with tilt
sensors and MEMS gyro. These additional sensors
are used to correct the compass measurements. The
main task of the developed system is to determine
the current heading on the almost continuous basis
and with as high accuracy as possible.
MAGETIC AZIMUTH CALCULATIOS
electronic compass module. This part of the system
allows heading estimation, based on the Earth’s
magnetic field measurements. Since the Earth’s
magnetic and geographic poles do not coincide, the
azimuth calculated on the basis of the magnetic field
measurements is the magnetic azimuth. To
determine geographical azimuth, the magnetic
declination has to be subtracted from the magnetic
azimuth.
To determine the magnetic heading, the components
of Earth’s magnetic field have to be measured in
two, parallel to the Earth’s surface, orthogonal
directions. The three dimensional Earth’s magnetic
field vector and its relationship to the magnetic
azimuth is shown in Fig. 1 [2, 5].
 techniques have to be used for measuring the offset
which results in additional circuitry.

Magnetoresistive sensors make use of the

magnetoresistive effect which causes a change in the
resistance of the sensor under the influence of an
external magnetic field. The internal structure and
the idea of operation of the MR sensor have been
shown in Fig. 2 [1].

Fig. 1 Earth’s magnetic field and magnetic azimuth

Earth’s magnetic field vector can be decomposed

into vertical component Hz and horizontal
component Hxy. The direction of the Hxy vector is
parallel to the magnetic North-South direction.
Next, the horizontal component vector Hxy can be
shown as a sum of two vector components: Hx,
which is parallel to the movement direction and Hy,
which is perpendicular to the movement direction. It
has been assumed that the positive values of these
components correspond with the forward sense of
the Hx vector and the right sense of Hy vector.
As can be seen from Fig. 1, the magnetic azimuth
can be calculated as follows [2, 5]:
 Ηy 
ψ M = 2π − atan  (1)
 Hx  connected in a bridge circuit. Linear characteristic
To calculate the azimuth with use of the above
equation, it is sufficient to measure only two
horizontal components of the Earth’s magnetic field
Hx and Hy. As it is crucial to measure the horizontal
components, the magnetic sensors in the compass
module should be gimballed mechanically or
electronically.
Fig. 2 Internal structure of MR sensor
MR sensors have got internal magnetization which
can be shown as Hint vector. Its direction is
perpendicular to the sensitivity axis of the sensor.
When external magnetic field Hext is applied along
the sensitivity axis, the direction of resultant vector
Hres rotates with an angle of β which causes
a change in the resistance of the sensor.
To achieve best performance, MR sensors are
and high sensitivity to weak magnetic fields is
gained by applying barber pole structure to the
sensing elements.
In the designed HRS system, Philips KMZ51 [9]
MR sensors have been applied. Their internal
structure is shown in Fig. 3.

MAGETIC FIELD SESORS

Among many different types of magnetic field

sensors available nowadays magnetoresistive (MR)
sensors are an interesting choice for using in low-
cost electronic compasses. Their main advantages,
besides their cost are high sensitivity and a large
scale of integration, which allows reduction of their
dimensions in comparison to formerly widely used Fig. 3 Internal structure of KMZ51 sensor
fluxgate sensors.
KMZ51 sensors have got differential output and
The main disadvantage of MR sensors is their offset integrated flip and compensation coils. The
voltage which adds to measurements. Special compensation coil generates magnetic field of
direction parallel to the sensitivity axis, allowing
using compensation techniques. This coil is not used
in the project. The flip coil allows changing internal
magnetization sense thus it can be used to change
the characteristic of the sensor. The flip coil is used
to measure the offset voltage of the sensor. Typical
characteristics of sensors are shown in Fig. 4 [9].
Fig. 4 Typical characteristics of KMZ51 sensor
As it is shown in the above figure, KMZ51 sensors
have got two characteristics: positive (a) and
negative (b). The flip coil allows to switch between
them by applying to this coil bidirectional current
pulses of an amplitude c.a. ±1 A.
The offset voltage is also shown in Fig. 4. Assuming
typical values of the supply voltage, temperature
and Earth’s magnetic field, the offset voltage can be
even seven times bigger than the voltage change due
to the sensor rotation in the Earth’s magnetic field.
The offset voltage is independent on the type of the
characteristic (a) or (b), which allows its calculation
with a special measurement procedure called
flipping [1, 2, 3]. The idea of measuring the offset
voltage is shown in Fig. 5 [2].
Fig. 5 Offset voltage measurement
The flip coil of the sensor is constantly pulsed with
bidirectional current IF which causes permanent
changes to the sense of the internal magnetization of
the sensor and thus switches the characteristics
between positive and negative one. By measuring
output voltages on the both characteristics (Vp and
Vn) the offset voltage can be calculated using the
following formulae [2]:
Voffset =
1
(V p + Vn ) (2)
2
The offset voltage has to be subtracted from each
measurement.
TILT COMPESATIO
When the compass module is tilted, the measured
components do not equal horizontal components of
the Earth’s magnetic field [5, 6]. Because of that,
the angle determined with the use of the equation
(1) is sensitive to the tilt of the compass.
The relationship between the tilt and the azimuth
error is shown in Fig. 6 [2].
Fig. 6 Relationship between tilt and azimuth error
In the above figure, two cases have been shown. In
the case (a), there is no tilt, thus there is no azimuth
error ε. The angle δ is the magnetic inclination
angle. In the case (b), it is assumed that the tilt τ
exists around the Y axis, which is parallel to the
magnetic North-South direction. The azimuth error ε
can be calculated using the following equation [2]:
ε = atan (tan δ ⋅ sinτ ) (3)
The influence of the tilt angle and the inclination X E = X C cos θ − YC sin θ sin φ − Z C sin θ cos φ (4)
angle on the azimuth are shown in Fig. 7.

YE = YC cos φ + Z C sin φ (5)

80
δ = 80°
70

60 The values of magnetic field horizontal components

Azimuth error ε [°]

50
in OXEYE plane can be calculated using the
δ = 60° following equations:
40

30
H x′ = H x cosθ − H y sinθ sinφ − H z sinθ cosφ (6)
20
δ = 30°
10
δ = 10°
0 H ′y = H y cos φ + H z sin φ (7)
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Tilt τ [°]

To evaluate the above equations the vertical

Fig. 7 Influence of tilt and inclination on azimuth component of the Earth’s magnetic field as well as
pitch and roll angles of the module have to be
As can be seen in Fig. 7, the azimuth error can measured. The vertical component is measured with
achieve large values, up to 40°, even for relatively a third MR sensor and tilt angles are measured with
small tilt angles, such as 10°. The ε error grows fast the use of a 3-axis accelerometer. The method of
for small tilt angles and its maximum value depends calculating these angles will be discussed in the next
on the inclination angle δ. section of this paper.
Such high error values are not allowable and have to ′ ′
Having calculated Hx and Hy magnetic field
be compensated. In the designed HRS, electronic tilt
components, tilt compensated azimuth can be
compensation has been applied to reduce this error.
determined as follows:
Fig. 8 shows pitch and roll angles of the electronic
compass module [2, 4].
 Η ′y 
ψ M = 2π − atan  (8)
 Η x′ 

TILT AGLES CALCULATIOS

In the designed HRS, tilt angles are calculated with

use of measurements of Earth’s gravity acceleration.
The idea is shown in Fig. 9 [2, 4]:

Fig. 8 Compass module orientation

Coordinate frame defined by the XC, YC and ZC axes

is aligned with the compass module. The other
coordinate frame defined by the axes XE, YE and ZE
has its OXEYE plane perpendicular to the local
gravity vector. Tilt angle measured between XC axis
and the plane E is the pitch angle θ and the angle Fig. 9 Gravity components in tilted compass frame
measured between YC axis and E plane is the roll
angle φ. Tilt angles can be calculated using the following
equations [2, 4]:
To compensate tilt effects, the measurements of
magnetic field components in XCYCZC frame should
 
θ = atan 
be converted to the XEYEZE frame. The general ax
(9)
transformation equations from XCYCZC to XEYEZE  a 2y + a z2 
are as follows [4-7]:  
  ay 
φ = atan   (10)
 a2 + a2 
 x z 
Accelerations ax, ay and az are measured with
a 3-axis Freescale MMA7260 MEMS accelerometer
[10]. The accelerometer has integrated temperature
compensation and circuitry providing three
analogue voltage outputs.
The measurement range used in the designed system
is ±1.5 g. The output voltage for 0 g equals half of
the supply voltage. Offset voltages and sensitivities
for each output are measured during the process of
HRS calibration implemented in the prototype.
GYROSCOPE CORRECTIO not possible when the HRS user accelerates,
The designed Heading Reference System has got
a one axis gyroscope sensor. The sensor provides
information about angular rate and the change of the
total angle. Its sensitivity axis is aligned with the ZC
axis of the compass module.
In the design, Analog Devices ADIS16251
integrated digital MEMS gyroscope has been used
[11]. It has a digital serial peripheral interface (SPI)
which is used for communication with the chip. The
main advantage of this sensor is its high short term
accuracy.
To determine the gyroscope heading ψg, angular rate
measurements ωg from gyro have to be integrated.
Unfortunately, the integration leads to accumulation
of errors with the rate depending on the drift of the
sensor.
Moreover heading calculated on the basis of
gyroscope measurements has to be initialized. In the
prototype, the initialization is performed during the
start-up procedure of the device and ψg is set to the
initial compass azimuth ψc(0).
ITEGRATIO ALGORITHM
The designed Heading Reference System uses the
gyroscope data and the compass data to determine
current heading [6]. The designed prototype utilizes
a Kalman filter [7, 8] to integrate the measurement
data and estimate gyroscope errors. The results of
estimation are subsequently used to calculate the
estimated heading ψ̂ .
A block diagram of the implemented integration
algorithm is shown in Fig. 10.
Fig. 10 Integration algorithm
The compass heading ψc is used by the Kalman
filter only if it has been previously properly
compensated for tilt effects. As this compensation is
a manoeuvre detector has been applied. If the total
acceleration differs from 1 by more than a threshold
λ, the Kalman filter switches to the prediction mode
and does not perform the measurement update.
The algorithm also checks if there exists the consent
between the change of the gyroscope heading ∆ψg
and the change of compass heading ∆ψc. If there is
a discrepancy between the two values, the algorithm
assumes that there is a magnetic field disturbance,
and switches the Kalman filter to the prediction
mode. This allows eliminating invalid compass data
from the filter input.
The measurement vector of the Kalman filter is
formed as a difference between the compass heading
and the gyro heading. As they both are composed of
true heading and respective errors, the difference
between gyro and compass headings consists of
a combination of errors. The Kalman filter estimates
residual gyroscope heading errors and provides
them to the input of the error updater. The error
updater accumulates them and calculates the total
estimated heading error δψ̂ g , which is subsequently
subtracted from the gyro heading ψg, providing
estimated heading ψ̂ .
HRS PROTOTYPE
In the frames of this project, a prototype of the
described Heading Reference System has been
developed. The main task of the system is to
determine the current heading on the almost
continuous basis and with possibly high accuracy. It
was assumed that the system should consist of low
cost elements, having possibly high accuracy, small
dimensions, and battery supply. The block diagram
of the prototype is shown in Fig. 11.

Fig. 11 Block diagram of the designed prototype
The HRS is controlled by an Atmel AVR series
ATMega644P microcontroller with an internal
8 MHz oscillator. The microcontroller executes
a programme which conducts initialization routines,
measurement routines and errors estimation.
The electronic compass module consists of three
magnetic field KMZ51 sensors with their axes
oriented orthogonally. Z axis sensor is mounted on
a separate PCB. The outputs of the sensors are
connected to three differential input channels of the
analogue to digital converter.
The project uses an Analog Devices AD7799 24-bit
delta-sigma A/D converter [12]. It contains an
integrated amplifier with programmable gain and
a programmable filter. Reference voltage is
generated by a LM385-2.5 circuit. The A/D
converter is controlled by the microcontroller
through serial peripheral interface. The conversion
results are located in appropriate internal registers of
AD7799 converter and are read by the
microcontroller through the SPI interface.
The re-magnetizing circuit provides short pulses of
bi-directional current to the flip coils of the three
magnetic field sensors [3]. The circuit consists of
four MOSFET IRF7317 transistors. MOSFETs are
connected in a full H-bridge and drive three parallel
flip coils through a capacitor. The bridge is powered
through a low pass filter which separates the power
supply from high current pulses.
The design uses Freescale 3-axis MMA7260 MEMS
accelerometer for determining tilt angles [10]. The
accelerometer has got three analogue outputs which
drive three low pass filters. The filter outputs are
connected to three single ended inputs of the 10-bit
analogue to digital converter, being a part of the
microcontroller. The conversion results are available
in appropriate registers of the microcontroller.
The gyroscope used in the designed HRS prototype
is an Analog Devices ADIS16251 integrated angular
rate sensor [11]. The device is controlled by the SPI
interface using a set of internal registers. The sensor
has got an internal integration algorithm and its
measurement results are available in its internal
registers.
The estimated heading is displayed on a graphical
LCD module with additional information such as
pitch and roll angles, current mode of filter
operation (only prediction or normal work) and
information about detected magnetic field
disturbances and manoeuvres.
The circuit is powered by a 3.6 V / 600 mAh NiMH
accumulator. The microcontroller is powered
directly from the accumulator, just as the digital part
of the A/D converter. Since the gyroscope requires
5 V of power supply an Analog devices step-up
switching regulator ADP1111-5 has been used. The
output voltage from the step-up regulator is filtered
in low pass filters. Filtered 5 V power supply is
provided to the gyroscope, LCD, re-magnetizing
circuits, magnetic field sensors and analogue part of
the external A/D converter.
Figs. 12 and 13 show the prototype of the designed
Heading Reference System.
Fig. 12 GUI of designed HRS
 Table 1 Statistics of heading errors

Compass HRS
Standard
0.328 0.101
deviation [deg]
Angle error
1.830 0.460
range [deg]

As can be seen in Figs. 14-15, the gyro heading

tends to almost linearly increase because of gyro
errors. The compass heading has long term stability,
but is noisy. The integration algorithm enables
estimation of heading, holding the advantages of
short term gyro accuracy and long term compass
Fig. 13 Main part of HRS under LCD module stability. Due to use of gyro, fast response of the
system has been preserved and noises of the
MEASUREMET RESULTS compass heading have been significantly reduced.
During the evaluation of HRS performance, the gyro ACKOWLEDGEMETS
heading, compass heading and estimated heading
outputs have been observed. Measurement results This work was supported by the Polish Ministry of
were sent to a PC through a UART communication Science and Higher Education from sources for
port. In Fig. 14 measurement results for HRS, science in the years 2007-2010 under
constantly pointing 45° azimuth have been shown. Commissioned Research Project PBZ-MNiSW-
The results from Fig. 15 have been obtained for DBO-04/I/2007.
HRS pointing 290° through first 60 s and after that
time rotated to 320°. REFERECES
55
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