Attitude determination with UD implementation of decoupled bias estimation

The application of the UD implementation decoupled bias estimation to attitude determination is analyzed here. The advantage of decoupled bias estimation in general is the reduction in the dimensions of the filter and the subsequent reduction in the amount of processing. The purpose of the UD implementation is to mitigate the effects of round-off errors. A unique advantage of the application of decoupled bias estimation to attitude determination is that the bias processing can easily be turned off whenever a reconfiguration to a bias-free estimator mode is necessary. A comparison of the attitude error of the UD decoupled Kalman filter attitude uncertainty is given with respect to the coupled Kalman filter attitude uncertainty during the time periods when the bias processing is turned off. A detailed discussion of the UD implementation is given.