Comparison of the Performance of a Microwave Landing System Elevation Station with the Instrument Landing System End-Fire Glide Slope at Yeager Airport, Charleston, West Virginia

Abstract

In support of Project No. 5 of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Microwave Landing System (MLS) Demonstration and Evaluation Program, Comparison of MLS and Instrument Landing System (ILS) Performance, the FAA technical Center installed an MLS elevation station collocated with the ILS basic end-fire glide slope (EFGS) serving runway 23 at Yeager Airport, Charleston, West Virginia. The EFGS is the only type of ILS glide slope antenna that will provide operationally usable performance at the site because of limited flat terrain in front of the antenna and a valley with rising hills in the approach to the runway. The FAA Technical Center's MLS test bed, consisting of a 1.5 deg beamwidth elevation station and a 2 deg beamwidth azimuth station, was transported to, and temporarily installed at Yeager Airport on runway 23. Only the MLS elevation was collocated with the commissioned ILS EFGS. The azimuth station was not collocated with the localizer for siting reasons. The MLS installation did not affect the performance of the ILS as verified by a flight check by the Atlantic City Flight Inspection Field Office (FIFO). During ground tracked partial orbits and inbound level runs and approaches, both ILS and MLS data were simultaneously recorded in the FAA Technical Center instrumented aircraft, a Convair-580, N-49. End-Fire Glide Slope (EFGS), Instrument Landing System (ILS), Microwave Landing System (MLS), Yeager Airport, Charleston, WV.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Mar 01, 1992
Accession Number
ADA250854

Entities

People

  • Clifford Mackin
  • Edmund Zyzys

Organizations

  • Federal Aviation Administration

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Accuracy
  • Airports
  • Altitude
  • Computers
  • Digital Data
  • Distance Measuring Equipment
  • Elevation
  • Glide Slope
  • Guidance
  • Instrument Landings
  • Low Altitude
  • Microwave Landing Systems
  • Navigation
  • Stations
  • Test Beds
  • United States
  • West Virginia

Readers

  • Aviation Safety and Air Traffic Management
  • Electromagnetic Wave Scattering and Antenna Radiation Engineering
  • Environmental Remediation and Restoration.

Technology Areas

  • Space