Coupling a position finding system to a marine automatic pilot without the use of an intermediate computer

The coupling together of the Decca Navigator and an automatic pilot has been achieved by the Decca Navigator Company using an Omnitrac computer. The method used is highly complicated and expensive to manufacture. This paper is a feasibility study of the possibility of solving the problem in a more economical fashion for marine applications. The proposals outlined employ a line following technique and could be adapted to suit any positional finding system using an x, y, t plotter as a sensing device to derive a path error signal.