Research on target calibration of airborne photoelectric turret considering installation errors with roll angle

The photoelectric turret is one of the important mission payloads of manned or unmanned aerial vehicle system, and whether its optical axis is consistent will greatly affect the accuracy of target positioning and fire control guidance. This article provided a more in-depth exploration of the target/axes calibration problems encountered in engineering practice, including calibration methods based on nearby target board, calibration methods base on distant cooperative targets, and calibration methods based on auxiliary inertial measurement uint. In particular, a more in-depth analysis was conducted on situations such as roll angle installation errors and whether the aircraft in horizonal level. Issues such as alignment errors and the alignment between the axis of the airplane and intertial measurement uint (IMU) were discussed. Finally, the measured results of target location after calibration were provided for indirect verification. The calibration method proposed in this study extends traditional targets calibration techniques under non ideal conditions, which have certain guiding significance. The method has been successfully applied in several projects, yielding satisfactory results.