International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 25-28, 1999 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / In the past four years Congress has passed legislation mandating the reallocation of 255 MHz of radio frequency bands from Federal to non-Federal or “MIXED USE.” Several of the frequency bands supporting telemetering functions were affected, and more legislation of this nature is forecasted.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 25-28, 1999 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / Radio frequency power margins in well planned line-of-sight (LOS) air-to-ground digital data transmission systems usually produce signal to noise ratios (SNR) that can deliver error free service. Sometimes field performance falls short of design and customer expectations. Recent flight tests conducted by the tri-service Advanced Range Telemetry (ARTM) project confirm that the dominant source of bit errors and short term link failures are “clusters” of severe error burst activity produced by flat fading, dispersive fading and poor antenna patterns on airborne vehicles. This paper introduces the techniques used by ARTM to measure bit error performance of aeronautical telemetry links.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 20-23, 2003 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / Space-time coding (STC) for QPSK where the transmitted signals are received with the same delay is well known. This paper examines the case where the transmitted signals are received with a nonnegligible delay differential when the Alamouti 2x1 STC is used. Such a differential can be caused by a large spacing of the transmit antennas. In this paper, an expression for the received signal with a delay differential is derived and a decoding algorithm for that signal is developed. In addition, the performance of this new algorithm is compared to the standard Alamouti decoding algorithm for various delay differentials.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 21, 2002 / Town & Country Hotel and Conference Center, San Diego, California / Recent changes in spectrum availability as well as higher demands for spectrum have motivated the development of telemetry transmit systems capable of fully operating over both L and S telemetry bands. However, enabling operation within these two bands poses new problems in system design. This paper presents a prototype system capable of operating between 1.4 and 2.4 GHz, which supports continuous phase modulation (CPM) waveforms such as pulse code modulation (PCM), frequency modulation (FM), and shaped offset quadrature phase shift keying (SOQPSK). The system architecture is detailed, and the prototype performance is discussed.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 22-25, 2001 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / This paper will present measured data in an adjacent channel interference (ACI) environment for both filtered continuous phase frequency shift keying (CPFSK) and Feher’s patented quadrature phase shift keying (FQPSK-B) [1]. The quantity measured was bit error probability (BEP) versus signal energy per bit to noise power spectral density ratio (E(b)/N(o)). The interferers were either CPFSK or FQPSK-B signals. The results presented in this paper will be for bit rates of 5 Mb/s, one interferer 20 dB larger than desired signal, various channel spacings, and two different telemetry receivers. The ACI test effort will collect data sets at several bit rates and with one and two interferers. The results will be useful to system designers and range operators as they attempt to maximize the number of Mb/s that can be simultaneously transmitted in the telemetry bands.

ITC/USA 2011 Conference Proceedings / The Forty-Seventh Annual International Telemetering Conference and Technical Exhibition / October 24-27, 2011 / Bally's Las Vegas, Las Vegas, Nevada / The introduction of network elements into telemetry systems brings a level of complexity that makes performance analysis difficult, if not impossible. Packet simulation is a well understood tool that enables performance prediction for network designs or for operational forecasting. Packet simulators must however be customized to incorporate aeronautical radio channels and other effects unique to the telemetry application. This paper presents a method for developing a Markov Model simulation for aeronautical channels for use in packet network simulators such as OPNET modeler. It shows how the Hidden Markov Model (HMM) and the Markov Model (MM) can be used together to first extract the channel behavior of an OFDM transmission for an aeronautical channel, and then effortlessly replicate the statistical behavior during simulations in OPENT Modeler. Results demonstrate how a simple Markov Model can capture the behavior of very complex combinations of channel and modulation conditions.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 17-20, 1994 / Town & Country Hotel and Conference Center, San Diego, California / This paper analyzes the probability of bit error for PCM-FM over a standard IRIG channel subject to multipath interference modeled by the aeronautical fading channel. The aeronautical channel model assumes a mobile transmitter and a stationary receiver and specifies the correlation of the fading component. This model describes fading which is typical of that encountered at military test ranges. An expression for the bit error rate on the fading channel with a delay line demodulator is derived and compared with the error rate for the Gaussian channel. The increase in bit error rate over that of the Gaussian channel is determined along with the power penalty caused by the fading. In addition, the effects of several channel parameters on the probability of bit error are determined.

Multipath is one of the dominant causes for link loss in aeronautical telemetry. Equalizers have been studied to combat multipath interference in aeronautical telemetry. Blind equalizers are currently being used with SOQPSK-TG. The Preamble Assisted Equalization (PAQ) project studied data-aided equalizers with SOQPSK-TG. PAQ compares, side-by-side, no equalization, blind equalization, and five data-aided equalization algorithms: ZF, MMSE, MMSE-initialized CMA, and frequency domain equalization. This thesis describes the GPU implementation of data-aided equalizer algorithms. Static lab tests, performed with channel and noise emulators, showed that the MMSE, ZF, and FDE1 show the best and most consistent performance.

Results from Cal Poly's recent wind tunnel test, during the Winter of 2011-2012, in the 40- by 80-foot test section at the National Full-Scale Aerodynamics Complex (NFAC) at NASA Ames Research Center are presented. AMELIA, the Advanced Model for Extreme Lift and Improved Aeroacoustics, is the first full-span, cruise efficient, short take-off and landing (CESTOL) model incorporating leading- and trailing-edge blowing wing circulation control and over-the-wing mounted turbine propulsion simulators (TPS) to date. Testing of the 10 foot span model proved successful and was the result of a 5 year NASA Fundamental Aeronautics Program Research Announcement. The test generated extensive low-speed experimental aerodynamic and acoustic measurements. All of the results associated with Cal Poly's effort will be available in an open-source validation database with the goal of advancing the state-of-the-art in prediction capabilities for modeling aircraft with next generation technologies, focusing on NASA's N+2 generation goals. The model's modular design allowed for testing of 4 major configurations. Results from all configurations are presented. Out of a total of 292 data runs, 14 repeat run configurations were obtained. Overall repeatability of test data are good. Factors contributing to non-repeatability in the test data were assessed and showed high pressure air line temperature to be a primary factor. Test data shows drastic improvements in performance are obtained when incorporating leading edge blowing: wing stall can be delayed to more than 25 degrees angle-of-attack at lift coefficients exceeding six. Without the introduction of leading edge blowing to increase boundary layer momentum and maintain flow attachment around the leading edge, STOL performance suffers. Similar runs for isolated trailing edge blowing show a reduction in maximum lift coefficient to three with stall occurring at zero angle-of-attack. Testing at two engine pylon heights allowed for the highly coupled propulsion and flow control system to be characterized.

The aim of this thesis is to evaluate fatigue management systems (FMSs) within the Australian transportation industry, and provide directions for future improvement. In doing so, it draws on some preliminary data from the rail industry, and a larger study that evaluates several components of a FMS that was implemented by the Australian Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) for the general aviation sector in 2000.