Low cost heading sensing system for an autonomous aquatic surface vehicle

This work describes the development of a heading reference system composed of low cost inertial sensors with MicroElectroMechanical Systems (MEMS) technology, which present high noise levels. Thus, filtering and sensor´s measurements fusion is done in order to achieve a reliable estimation, trough an extended Kalman filter. The system is used for navigation and control of an autonomous aquatic surface vehicle. In this work, the principles of inertial navigation, orientation representation as well as the coordinate frames involved are investigated, presenting the quaternion method, and the update procedure according to the heading changes. The developed system was tested in the lab and on a trimaran shaped vessel navigating on a dam.