Translated material
Know your place
Production of Russian global satellite navigation receivers begins
Receivers of the domestic global navigation satellite system (GLONASS) have finally appeared in Russia. They were demonstrated yesterday to First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov at the Russian Research Institute of Space Instrumentation (RNII KP). As is known, this scientific institution was designated by a decision of the Russian government as the parent organization responsible for the creation, development and targeted use of GLONASS .The RNII KP is creating hardware and software for positioning system satellites, and now scientists have made private domestic users happy. Such receivers have already been installed on experimental vehicles of Rostrans, Rosavtodor and Rosaeronavigatsiya. Their drivers can at any time determine their location and the position of any object equipped with a GLONASS receiver and beacon. But so far only in the capital region. However, these same receivers also work with the American GPS system , which expands their capabilities.
The first GLONASS receiver for private use will go on sale by the end of this year. Although the beacons of the system can be purchased today - for 29 thousand rubles. They promise to establish their production within one and a half to two years, and then the cost of the beacon will be reduced by half.
Consumers of information from the Russian global positioning system will be not only road and air carriers, railway transport, but also the armed forces . High-precision weapon guidance systems will be actively equipped with GLONASS receivers. Yesterday, the First Deputy Prime Minister was shown samples of the onboard navigation equipment of the Iskander operational-tactical missile, the Bulava, Sineva and Topol intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Sergei Ivanov was also told about the Transmaster automated vehicle monitoring and control system, which is being used experimentally in some regions of Russia, in particular in the Kaluga and Yaroslavl regions. In addition, the RNII KP has created a federal system for monitoring particularly dangerous objects and cargo. Using special equipment created at the Research Institute of Space Instrumentation, it will be possible to determine the vibrations of high-rise buildings relative to the vertical axis.
General Director and General Designer of the RNII KP, who is also the creator of the GLONASS system, Yuri Urlichich, reported to the First Deputy Prime Minister that it is planned to corporatize the successfully developing enterprise in the third quarter of this year. The institute’s employees boasted: they are already writing about us in the foreign press, that Russian systems well complement and replace GPS devices, and emergency rescue radio beacons are in high demand in many foreign countries. “Didn’t you place this advertisement yourself?” - asked former intelligence officer Ivanov, squinting. The scientists vigorously waved their hands in protest.
After visiting the institute, Sergei Ivanov chaired a visiting meeting of the Military-Industrial Commission under the Government of the Russian Federation. Naturally, it was dedicated to the development of GLONASS. The discussion was, in particular, about the state of the element base on which the global positioning system equipment is created - related companies, as Yuri Urlichich admitted, sometimes supply substandard and expired products. Sergei Ivanov demanded clearer coordination of all participants in the process, and these include dozens of ministries and departments, plus private firms. The lack of the necessary set of navigation maps also has an impact .