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Narrator: To help calibrate the pitot-static system on a test bed aircraft that is part
of NASA’s Aviation Safety Program, engineers at Langley Research Center have developed
a new in-flight GPS-based approach.
John Foster: We’ve merged the existing GPS technology with modern system identification
methods. And, that approach allows you to do the calibration much faster and in some
ways, more accurately than you can with some of the existing methods out there. The method
worked very well in that environment. We were able to complete the calibration in a matter
of minutes and demonstrate its accuracy to within less than half a knot airspeed.”
Narrator: The Langley method doesn’t require unique hardware commonly used for conventional
calibration methods. It uses inputs from onboard GPS signals and measurements of the pitot-static
system pressures. These in turn are used to compute an optimized model of the system errors
over the desired range of airspeed.
John Foster: Calibration methods using GPS have been around for awhile, but what’s
unique about ours is the way we use that data and the way we merge that with the measured
pressure data.”
Narrator: The research team, who has tested the method successfully on a light twin aircraft,
is continuing to develop it for large full-scale aircraft and helicopters. If you’re interested
in a novel pitot-static calibration method, Langley may have just the right innovation.