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  • Author Author: ralphjy
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Alpha Rover - GPS Unit

ralphjy

While I'm pondering my choice of a control processor, I thought I'd try out the GPS unit that I bought to use with the Rover.  This is an inexpensive GPS board that I found on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07P8YMVNT/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1.  It uses a GT-U7 module which has a UBLOX 7th generation chip that is software compatible with the NEO-6M that I've used before.

 

This board has a micro USB connector in addition to the normal UART connector which makes it easy to hook up to a PC.  One really neat thing I discovered through one of the product links was the free UBLOX U-Center software.

U-Center is GNSS evaluation software for Windows and among other things it allows you to get a visual view of what satellites are available and being used (the map continually updates).  https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/u-center#tab-documentation-resources.

 

Contents of kit - includes a ceramic antenna with a U.FL connector.

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Here is the Sky View map of satellites in U-Center.

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About 10 minutes after I first plugged it in, the module had a pretty good fix on my location.  The coordinates it determined actually are in my backyard.  My computer room is an interior room on the second floor and this module is definitely better than the NEO-6Ms that I've used before.  They had some difficulty acquiring satellites from within this room and usually could only acquire 2-3.  I'll have to see how noisy the data is and how accurate it is when I'm outdoors.

 

The GPS unit outputs a text message stream.  The Text Console in U-Center shows messages as the unit is attempting to acquire a fix.

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The message of interest is the $GPRMC which contains the position (latitude, longitude), speed and direction information.  The program needs to parse this comma separated message to extract that information which is described below:

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Now have to think about where and how to mount this to the Rover.

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