Subject: [IGSMAIL-4324]: Test Set of Absolute Antenna PCVs
From: Markus Rothacher <[email-masked]>
To: IGSMAIL <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2003 10:16:06 +0100

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IGS Electronic Mail      28 Mar 01:09:58 PST 2003      Message Number 4324
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Author: Markus Rothacher

Dear Colleagues,

it took much longer than initially thought to put together
a new consistent set of GPS antenna phase center 
offsets and phase center variations (PCVs), but here it is. 
The following remarks concerning this new set should be 
considered:

- The set of PCVs contains now absolute antenna patterns and 
  no longer patterns relative to the AOAD/M_T antenna.
- Values for satellite and receiver antennas are given in
  the new ANTEX format.
- Not only elevation- but also azimuth-dependent PCVs are 
  available for some (not all) of the receiver antenna types. 
  PCVs with elevation-dependence only are also given (see 
  keyword NOAZI in ANTEX).
- GPS satellite antenna PCVs are included and have to be used
  together with the absolute receiver antenna PCVs to avoid
  a wrong scaling of the GPS results by about 15 ppb.
- Offsets and PCVs have to be used consistently, for the 
  receiver as well as for the satellite antennas.
- The set of PCV corrections given here is a test set that 
  should only be used to perform tests at present. After 
  thorough testing it will be decided, whether the new set
  will become the new official IGS set.  
- We would like to thank the company Geo++ and the Institut
  für Erdmessung for making their absolute robot calibration
  measurements available to us.
- The satellite antenna PCVs were computed from global GPS
  data, which means that only the ionosphere-free PCVs
  are presently available. The L1 and L2 PCVs were set to
  the ionosphere-free PCVs. 

The ANTEX format description (antex10.txt) and the 
test set of PCVs (pcv_abs_proposed.tst) may be downloaded from the 
IGS CB information system at 

  ftp://igscb.jpl.nasa.gov/pub/station/general/pcv_proposed

Much success with your tests !

If there are any questions, comments, results etc., please
let us know.

With best regards,
                     Markus Rothacher ([email-masked])
                     Ralf Schmid ([email-masked])

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Prof. Dr. Markus Rothacher                   Phone : ++49-89-289-23191
Forschungseinrichtung Satellitengeodaesie    Fax   : ++49-89-289-23178
Technische Universitaet Muenchen             E-mail:
[email-masked]
Arcisstrasse 21
D-80290 Muenchen / Germany