Hemisphere GNSS Announces Vector™ VR500

LAS VEGAS, NV, USA – March 7, 2017 – Today, at CONEXPO-CON/AGG 2017, Hemisphere GNSS, Inc. (booth G71925) announces the Vector VR500 Rugged All-in-One Smart Antenna. Designed specifically for harsh machine control environments, the multi-frequency, multi-GNSS smart antenna offers precise heading, RTK positioning, and easy installation. VR500 adds another system component and empowers heavy equipment manufacturers to deliver their own machine control and guidance solutions to their customers.

“The Vector VR500 is our all-in-one smart antenna OEM entry into the machine control market,” said Jennifer Keenan, product manager at Hemisphere. “The receiver is designed from the ground up, specifically for rugged machine control environments and offers a feature- and performance-rich combination of Athena™ RTK engine, Atlas® L-band corrections, heading accuracy up to 0.2 degrees, integrated UHF radio, updates up to 50Hz, and excellent connectivity.”

VR500 excels in the toughest machine control environments, meeting stringent IP ingress and MIL-STD202G shock and vibration requirements. A fully scalable solution, the VR500 tracks GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou, Galileo, QZSS, and IRNSS, and is also Atlas L-band and SBAS capable.

Designed for ease-of-installation, the all-in-one unit connects with just one cable supporting unprecedented integration of CANbus and UHF RTK radio with position and heading messages. The powerful and easy-to-use webUI allows the user to control, manage, and upgrade firmware and activations using Wi-Fi. VR500 offers a robust set of connectivity options allowing corrections to be received via radio, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and Serial.

Powered by Athena GNSS engine, VR500 provides best-in-class, centimeter-level RTK. Athena excels in virtually every environment where high-accuracy GNSS receivers can be used. Tested and proven, Athena’s performance with long baselines, in open-sky environments, under heavy canopy, and in geographic locations experiencing significant scintillation is nothing short of cutting edge.

Integrated L-band adds support for Atlas GNSS global corrections for meter to sub-decimeter level accuracy while new Tracer™ technology helps maintain position during correction signal outages. VR500 also uses Hemisphere’s aRTK™ technology, powered by Atlas. This feature allows the receiver to operate with RTK accuracies when RTK corrections fail. If the VR500 is Atlas-subscribed, it will continue to operate at the subscribed service level until RTK is restored.

Agility and Technology Meets Iron

Manufacturers are looking for flexibility and price performance in existing system offerings or in new systems. Hemisphere is providing the world’s first “full system OEM positioning solution toolkit” for building complete machine control and guidance systems with the announcement of the GradeMetrix™ application software and an array of compatible GNSS hardware components. These include IronOne Rugged Display & Computer, C321 RTK Base & Rover with SiteMetrix™ Site Management Software, A326 Rugged GNSS Smart Antenna, and Vector VR1000 Rugged GNSS Receiver.

Please visit our booth G71925 at CONEXPO-CON/AGG 2017 from March 7 to 11 in Las Vegas, NV to see our offerings in person.