Absolute Time Error Calibration of GPS Receivers Using Advanced GPS Simulators

摘要

Precise time transfer experiments using GPS with time stability's under ten nanoseconds are commonly being reported within the time transfer community. Relative calibrations are done by measuring the time error of one GPS receiver versus a 'known master reference receiver.' This relative calibration can produce very stable results, but this begs the question of 'how does one calibrate the master reference GPS receiver.' In this paper we will discuss the use of advanced GPS simulators to measure the absolute time error of GPS receivers. This method has the advantage of calibrating a GPS receiver independent of any GPS system biases. The use of a GPS simulator also allows testing of special conditions of the GPS system, such as year 2000 rollover and the 1024 week epoch rollover.