Investigation of Signal Jitter in COTS Optical Tracking Devices for Use with Synthetic Vision Systems

The integration of Optical Tracking with Synthetic Vision Systems (SVS), offers a solution that could improve precision, control and safety for pilots during low visibility flights. However, this assimilation cannot be achieved without addressing the issue of jitter presence, which is the primary cause of performance reduction in many tracking devices. It is therefore necessary to investigate the effect of jitter on a viable Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) optical tracking device that could be incorporated with an SVS enabled display. Aspects of this investigation include the characterization, measurement and reduction of jitter. In this paper, the measurement and characterization processes are discussed.