Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS Receiver

There is a common practice to calculate orbital trajectories of space objects like satellites and space debris using Two-Line Element Sets (TLEs). However, TLEs provide rather coarse parameters for fine orbit computation and their precision varies with age of their issue and position of the satellit...

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Main Authors: Pavel Kovář, Pavel Puričer, Kateřina Kovářová
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2022-04-01
Series:Sensors
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/22/8/2902
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author Pavel Kovář
Pavel Puričer
Kateřina Kovářová
author_facet Pavel Kovář
Pavel Puričer
Kateřina Kovářová
author_sort Pavel Kovář
collection DOAJ
description There is a common practice to calculate orbital trajectories of space objects like satellites and space debris using Two-Line Element Sets (TLEs). However, TLEs provide rather coarse parameters for fine orbit computation and their precision varies with age of their issue and position of the satellite. The paper evaluates such induced position determination error using the comparison of a position calculated from TLE data for a small CubeSat class satellite and a position obtained from the on-board custom GPS receiver that is a part of such satellite payload. The analyses of the impact of satellite position at the orbit, i.e., a dependency of position error on satellite geographical latitude, and impact of the ageing of TLE data in frame of position and velocity vector were made. There was shown that use of TLE data can bring some significant errors in calculation of predicted satellite position which can affect performance and efficiency of some related tasks like steering the ground station antenna for communication with the satellite or planning the satellites operations namely for the classes of small and amateur satellites.
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spelling doaj.art-fa6034aa85ec4071bc883191eef8dcc72023-12-01T21:22:50ZengMDPI AGSensors1424-82202022-04-01228290210.3390/s22082902Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS ReceiverPavel Kovář0Pavel Puričer1Kateřina Kovářová2Department of Radioelectronics, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, The Czech Technical University in Prague, 166 27 Prague, Czech RepublicDepartment of Radioelectronics, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, The Czech Technical University in Prague, 166 27 Prague, Czech RepublicDepartment of Economics and Management, Jan Evangelista Purkyne University in Usti nad Labem, 400 96 Usti nad Labem, Czech RepublicThere is a common practice to calculate orbital trajectories of space objects like satellites and space debris using Two-Line Element Sets (TLEs). However, TLEs provide rather coarse parameters for fine orbit computation and their precision varies with age of their issue and position of the satellite. The paper evaluates such induced position determination error using the comparison of a position calculated from TLE data for a small CubeSat class satellite and a position obtained from the on-board custom GPS receiver that is a part of such satellite payload. The analyses of the impact of satellite position at the orbit, i.e., a dependency of position error on satellite geographical latitude, and impact of the ageing of TLE data in frame of position and velocity vector were made. There was shown that use of TLE data can bring some significant errors in calculation of predicted satellite position which can affect performance and efficiency of some related tasks like steering the ground station antenna for communication with the satellite or planning the satellites operations namely for the classes of small and amateur satellites.https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/22/8/2902LEO satellite orbittwo-line element setsimplified perturbations model
spellingShingle Pavel Kovář
Pavel Puričer
Kateřina Kovářová
Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS Receiver
Sensors
LEO satellite orbit
two-line element set
simplified perturbations model
title Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS Receiver
title_full Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS Receiver
title_fullStr Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS Receiver
title_full_unstemmed Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS Receiver
title_short Study of the Two-Line Element Accuracy by 1U CubeSat with a GPS Receiver
title_sort study of the two line element accuracy by 1u cubesat with a gps receiver
topic LEO satellite orbit
two-line element set
simplified perturbations model
url https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/22/8/2902
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