Challenge
    Fast moving vehicles such as boats, planes, etc, require a precise spatial orientation (heading, pitch, roll). Present technologies are either bulky, power hungry, expensive or imprecise. They use Earth’s gravitational and magnetic fields in accelerometers and magnetic field sensors and/or Earth’s rotation in gyroscopes. Currently there are two
approaches differing in complexity and provided information:
    • 2-axis systems with mechanical gimballing → heading (azimuth) only,
    • 3-axis systems with numerical gimballing → complete spatial orientation – attitude –consisting of heading, pitch, roll angles.

    The challenge is to overcome the limitations of existing technologies which are:
    • Magnetoresistors (AMR) and MEMS accelerometers → limited resolution, not suitable for precise applications,
    • Three wire-wound fluxgate sensors and MEMS accelerometers → expensive, power consuming and bulky,
    • MEMS gyroscopes & accelerometers → signal drift, not suitable for precise applications and longer lasting missions,
    • Optical gyroscopes → highly expensive and bulky.

    Solution
    Tyndall has developed a 3D Compass with proprietary fluxgate magnetic field sensors, integrating a supersoft amorphous magnetic material into the PCB, to deliver reduced power consumption of the sensor, high sensitivity and low noise. The Tyndall technology has been embedded into system prototypes with dedicated PC and PDA software with unique features delivering a substantial added value:
    • Bluetooth and USB interfaces allowing wireless/wired communication to PDA or PC
    • GPS data integration (if present on PDA or PC)
    • Data acquisition and recording capability (datalogging)
    • Attitude graphical interpretation.

    Benefits Summary:
    Resolution
    • Heading: better than 0.1°
    • Pitch and roll: better than 0.08°

    No moving parts
    → robust and resistant to mechanical wear and friction.
    Mathematical algorithm implemented to correct for sensor and mechanical setup imperfections:
    → individual sensor sensitivities, non-linearities and offsets,
    → mutual non-orthogonality of the accelerometer and magnetic field sensor triplets.

    Interfaces
    • Wireless Bluetooth Class 2
    • USB 2.0

    Software
    Graphical user interface software for PC (Microsoft Windows) and for PDA (Windows Mobile 5,6) has been developed in LabVIEW allowing easy modification to match customer needs.
    Case with IP 65 rating → environmental resistance.

    Applications:
    • High precision marine navigation (sailing boats, power boats, yachts)
    • Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV)
    • Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUV)
    • Animal and human tracking