Optimized Multi-Position Calibration Method with Nonlinear Scale Factor for Inertial Measurement Units

Navigation grade inertial measurement units (IMUs) should be calibrated after Inertial Navigation Systems (INSs) are assembled and be re-calibrated after certain periods of time. The multi-position calibration methods with advantage of not requiring high-precision equipment are widely discussed. However, the existing multi-position calibration methods for IMU are based on the model of linear scale factors. To improve the precision of INS, the nonlinear scale factors should be calibrated accurately. This paper proposes an optimized multi-position calibration method with nonlinear scale factor for IMU, and the optimal calibration motion of IMU has been designed based on the analysis of sensitivity of the cost function to the calibration parameters. Besides, in order to improve the accuracy and robustness of the optimization, an estimation method on initial values is presented to solve the problem of setting initial values for iterative methods. Simulations and experiments show that the proposed method outperforms the calibration method without nonlinear scale factors. The navigation accuracy of INS can be improved by up to 17% in lab conditions and 12% in the moving vehicle experiment, respectively.