Integrated Educational Guidance, Navigation, Control and Signal Processing Laboratory

The growth and added importance for the field of navigation, guidance and control, from day to day since the second world war in the forties, necessitates a jump in the educational facilities concerning this field. In addition, there are many challenges facing the guidance engineer such as information availability, system design complexity, the ever-increasing requirements with the possibility of unstable or tolerable environments and the limited or restricted literature. These limitations did not allow the guidance engineer to grasp a sound understanding and knowledge of the fundamental principles involved in missile test, design and evaluation which known as the know-how of missile design. The guidance engineer should have a broader view and hence a better appreciation of the various design aspects in order to achieve a more efficient design. That is; the today's guidance engineer needs to understand the details of guidance as well as the details of interfacing with different disciplines in an automated environment. To address these needs, a guidance, navigation, control and signal processing laboratory has to be implemented. Therefore, this paper is devoted to give a systematic and concise explanation on this type of laboratories. It could be appropriate for undergraduate and graduate students as well as those practicing and searching and/or manufacturing in the field. Due to the nature of the guidance and control, a highly mathematical background is needed for their synthesis and analysis. The paper offers a structure for the laboratory including different devices and subsystems such as homing heads or seekers or tracking kits and control fin drives. The devices used within this laboratory include the popular measuring instruments (multimeter, spectrum analyzer, oscilloscope and function generator) and the inertial instruments such as the gyroscopes and accelerometers. The paper addresses the test procedure and performance parameters for the inertial instruments. This strategy allows more flexible and better learning experiences with deep understanding for the students and/or researchers.