Procurement of Precision Lightweight GPS Receive [Please distribute this message to any employees in your office who do not receive electronic mail and might be interested in the subject] To: All USGS Employees From: Marti Ikehara, USGS GPS-PPS Coordinator Water Resources Division, Sacramento, CA Subject: Procurement of Precision Lightweight GPS Receiver (PLGR) INTRODUCTION: The USDA, Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), National Cartography & Geospatial Center, will again coordinate the procurement of PLGR's for Federal agencies authorized by Department of Defense (DOD) to purchase GPS receivers. These receivers are capable (through encryption) of accessing the Precise Positioning Service (PPS) of the NAVSTAR Global Positioning System (GPS). The accuracies guaranteed by access to PPS are 16m horizontal and 29m vertical, in real-time, without differential corrections. Employees of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) have been authorized to purchase the PLGR GPS receiver (which is PPS-capable) through USDA. This memo informs USGS employees about the opportunity to purchase GPS-PPS receivers, and includes information specifically about procuring the PLGR and associated hardware and software. Be advised that the Memorandum of Understanding with DOD allows only full-time, permanent Federal civilian employees to purchase AND USE GPS-PPS receivers. Although agency coordinators are trying to effect a change in DOD's position to include other categories of USGS employees, modification of this policy is not expected any time soon. The PLGR, manufactured by Rockwell, can be purchased only during this window. USDA is the Federal civilian agency currently authorized to procure the PLGR and associated equipment for USGS employees; Rockwell is not set up to allow other bureaus or individuals to make direct purchases. No other window of opportunity is planned for the procurement of the PLGR receiver or accessories during FY1996. Another GPS-PPS receiver, the Centurion manufactured by Trimble, is also available and does not have a specific window for ordering. Procurement would also be done through the the USGS GPS-PPS Coordinator, but currently USDA-NRCS is the agency designated to key the units, so keying is dependent on their schedule. Additionally, a request to purchase these units must be processed through DOD's Joint Program Office to obtain permission to procure them. The cost of the Trimble PPS receiver is $3500. This receiver has two primary capabilities that the PLGR does not have. One is the ability to operate in either PPS- tracking mode, or in SPS-mode and, with another Trimble GPS unit such as the Pathfinder, produce differentially-corrected data. The other capability is that features and attributes can be coded and stored in the Centurion as part of the fieldwork. BACKGROUND: Last year, 35 PLGRs were purchased by people in all three USGS Divisions through USDA-NRCS. Informal results reported by these users show accuracies, relative to positions determined by geodetic measurements, on the order of 2-4m (horizontal). The primary uses of the PLGR in USGS have been for mapping and navigation, both on land and on water. Up to 999 coordinates can be recorded in the PLGR by using the waypoint menu, and can be downloaded as an ASCII file. Some experiences have been reported in the netnews group called usgs.surveying. This is a bulletin board available to all USGS employees. The cryptographic key needed to access the PPS may be valid for as long as 1 year, but its expiration date is variable. There are three ways to lose the key: operator error, scheduled expiration, and emergency deactivation. The latter could occur if DOD has determined that the key (and/or GPS unit) has been obtained by forces unfriendly to the U.S. or its allies. In any of the cases, rekeying must be done to access PPS, and the current charge is $25 per servicing by USDA-NRCS. PROCESS: As the USGS GPS-PPS Coordinator, I will be accepting orders for PLGRs until COB Tuesday, November 7, 1995 (Election Day). Procurement requests must be submitted to the Coordinator on DI-1's. Specific instructions will be provided to those persons expressing definite intent to order. Please notify me via email if you are interested in procuring PLGRs; be sure to include your email address and phone number in the body of the message. All questions should be directed to: Marti Ikehara USGS GPS-PPS Coordinator Email: mikehara@usgs.gov Phone: (916) 979-2615 x384 FAX: (916) 979-2668 Payment will be due by COB December 1, 1995. All purchasers should be prepared to transfer funds one week prior to this date. NO MONEY - NO ORDER - NO EXCEPTIONS NRCS will award this contract to Rockwell on January 8, 1996. NRCS expects to take delivery of the equipment 60 days (mid-March, 1996) after the contract is signed. Encryption service will start immediately and units will be shipped as they are keyed. Depending on the quantity ordered, encryption service could take as long as two months. EQUIPMENT AVAILABLE: At this time, the following is a current listing of available equipment, associated hardware and software, and pricing. NRCS is actively working on some additional functional capability about which they will be providing additional information. PLGR KIT $1591.00 The PLGR KIT includes: PLGR PPS Low Power/Enhanced PLGR Software Upgrade Personnel Case Operator and Maintenance Manual Warranty Field Checklist Memory Battery Power Adapter-AC/DC Primary Battery-AA Battery Holder Power Adapter-Cigarette lighter with Screw Lock Connector PLGR-PC Interface Cable Magnetic Mount Antenna Antenna Cable-3 meter Additional items can be ordered at the following prices: ADDITIONAL ACCESSORIES: NiCad Primary Battery $57.00 NiCad Battery Recharging Station $172.00 Vehicle Installation Mount $11.00 PLGR-PLGR Interface Cable $14.00 SPARE ACCESSORIES: PLGR-PC Interface Cable $27.00 Magnetic Mount Antenna $82.00 Antenna Cable - 3 meter $30.00 Power Adapter-Cigarette Lighter $27.00 SOFTWARE OPTIONS: DOS Mission Planning Software for E-PLGR $100.00 Keyboard Menu Definition Editor (KMDE) $100.00 E-PLGR Software Upgrade $100.00 Geolink Mapping Companion for PLGR+ $1,695.00 There is a possibility that there will be a software option for the PLGR that will provide the capability to determine accurate azimuths and distances between two points. As further information becomes available, I can provide it to people who have contacted me expressing their interest in procuring a PPS receiver.