Milestone-Proposal:Honda Electro Gyrocator: The World's First Map-based Automotive Navigation System, 1981

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Docket #:

This Proposal has been approved, and is now a Milestone


To the proposer’s knowledge, is this achievement subject to litigation?


Is the achievement you are proposing more than 25 years old? Yes

Is the achievement you are proposing within IEEE’s designated fields as defined by IEEE Bylaw I-104.11, namely: Engineering, Computer Sciences and Information Technology, Physical Sciences, Biological and Medical Sciences, Mathematics, Technical Communications, Education, Management, and Law and Policy. Yes

Did the achievement provide a meaningful benefit for humanity? Yes

Was it of at least regional importance? Yes

Has an IEEE Organizational Unit agreed to pay for the milestone plaque(s)? Yes

Has an IEEE Organizational Unit agreed to arrange the dedication ceremony? Yes

Has the IEEE Section in which the milestone is located agreed to take responsibility for the plaque after it is dedicated? Yes

Has the owner of the site agreed to have it designated as an IEEE Milestone? Yes


Year or range of years in which the achievement occurred:

1981, The year 1981 is the one in which the world’s first automotive navigation system ‘Honda Electro Gyrocator’ was released. 

Title of the proposed milestone:

Honda Electro Gyrocator: The World’s First Map-Based Automotive Navigation System, 1981

Plaque citation summarizing the achievement and its significance:

The world’s first map-based automotive navigation system "Honda Electro Gyrocator" was released in 1981, which was developed on the basis of the inertial navigation technology, adopting a helium gas rate gyro sensor. This system pioneered in the displaying of a car’s location, direction, and traveling locus with the use of overlay road maps, contributing to the advancement of information, environment, and safety technologies for automobiles.

200-250 word abstract describing the significance of the technical achievement being proposed, the person(s) involved, historical context, humanitarian and social impact, as well as any possible controversies the advocate might need to review.


IEEE technical societies and technical councils within whose fields of interest the Milestone proposal resides.


In what IEEE section(s) does it reside?

IEEE Tokyo Section

IEEE Organizational Unit(s) which have agreed to sponsor the Milestone:

IEEE Organizational Unit(s) paying for milestone plaque(s):

Unit: IEEE Tokyo Section
Senior Officer Name: Seishi Takamura

IEEE Organizational Unit(s) arranging the dedication ceremony:

Unit: IEEE Tokyo Section
Senior Officer Name: Isamu Chiba

IEEE section(s) monitoring the plaque(s):

IEEE Section: IEEE Tokyo Section
IEEE Section Chair name: Toshitaka Tsuda

Milestone proposer(s):

Proposer name: Masayuki Arai
Proposer email: Proposer's email masked to public

Please note: your email address and contact information will be masked on the website for privacy reasons. Only IEEE History Center Staff will be able to view the email address.

Street address(es) and GPS coordinates in decimal form of the intended milestone plaque site(s):

Honda Collection Hall

Address: 120-1 Hiyama, Motegi-cho, Haga-gun, Tochigi, 321-3597 Japan GPS Coordinates: Latitude : 36.526825, Longitude : 140.226713,

Describe briefly the intended site(s) of the milestone plaque(s). The intended site(s) must have a direct connection with the achievement (e.g. where developed, invented, tested, demonstrated, installed, or operated, etc.). A museum where a device or example of the technology is displayed, or the university where the inventor studied, are not, in themselves, sufficient connection for a milestone plaque.

Please give the address(es) of the plaque site(s) (GPS coordinates if you have them). Also please give the details of the mounting, i.e. on the outside of the building, in the ground floor entrance hall, on a plinth on the grounds, etc. If visitors to the plaque site will need to go through security, or make an appointment, please give the contact information visitors will need. Honda Collection Hall, which is exhibiting all of Honda’s historical products and award certificates/plaques, including the world’s first map-based automotive navigation system of Honda’s ‘Electro Gyrocator’.

Are the original buildings extant?

The original building is extant, belonging to Honda Motor, Co., Ltd.

Details of the plaque mounting:

The plaque is to be displayed in the exhibition room of Honda Collection Hall.

How is the site protected/secured, and in what ways is it accessible to the public?

The plaque will be displayed in an acrylic showcase in the exhibition room of Honda Collection Hall, which can be accessible to the public.

Who is the present owner of the site(s)?

Honda Motor Co., Ltd.

2-1-1 Minami-Aoyama, Minato-ku, Tokyo, 107-8556, Japan

What is the historical significance of the work (its technological, scientific, or social importance)? If personal names are included in citation, include justification here. (see section 6 of Milestone Guidelines)

The major historical significance of “Honda Electro Gyrocator” is summarized briefly as follows:

1)Background of “Electro Gyrocator” development

In the 1970s, motorization in Japan had so far advanced dramatically with complementing rapid progress in automotive technology and remarkably-rapid and widespread development of roadways. Those days, however, it was also reality that with the increasing motor traffic and expanding sphere of action, the automobile was unable, depending on the road and traffic conditions, to fully demonstrate its proper convenience.

In 1973, a government-led project that was Comprehensive Automobile Traffic Control System had started in Japan. The target of the project was realization of route guide and dynamic induction by showing the arrows on the on-board display. The project included the development of the system that transferred the information of vehicle ID and destination from the on-board antenna to the center computer via loop antennas embedded in major intersections for communication. However large-scale equipment or facilities was necessary for these systems and it seemed to take a long time to obtain social consensus and realize practical use.

Honda started to address the development of completely self-contained navigation systems that enable vehicles themselves to obtain the information of self-position instead of depending on the outside facilities such as radio facilities. For the development of self-contained navigation system, Honda believed that the most important information for drivers and moving cars was the self-position information.

Technologies of route guide in those days could provide only information of destination direction by using magnetic compass that shows facing direction. In the 1970s, Honda developed the technology to obtain electric data of vehicle position during driving at the time that nobody could obtain vehicle position information by GPS. This technology realized the inertial navigation to provide the data by detecting “direction” and “distance” of moving cars with precise gyro sensor and mileage sensor. And Honda also developed “Honda Electric Gyrocator” system that could show the electric data on road map of on-board display.

This map-based automotive navigation system was welcomed in automotive societies as an epoch-making technology and commercialized in 1981 for the first time in the world.

2)Social meanings from the historical viewpoint

When traced back the origin of the technology to show vehicle position on road map of on-board display with vehicle-position detection technology, it is said that we can reach the Honda Electro Gyrocator released in 1981.

The vehicle-position detection technology has been advanced more and can provide fuel-saving route based on the fuel consumption data and route information in coordination with the system to offer environmental-friendly driving route. Now sharing congestion information that is opened to the public widely as WEB information on the Internet helps avoid the congestion and realize the efficient movement on road. In addition, this technology is also adopted the communication technology of vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-road and also contributes to the development of ITS (Intelligent Transport System) technology as the advanced transportation systems to achieve safe driving.

As mentioned above, the basic technologies of “Honda Electro Gyrocator” (detecting the vehicle position and showing the position and traveling locus on road map of on-board display) were considered as the influential technology to contribute to the societies from the viewpoint of active safety and environmental friendliness. Furthermore, they had evolved to the technologies that enabled to show more detailed and accurate vehicle positions by using not only Gyro Sensor but also GPS information and also helped to realize the future autonomous driving technology.

What obstacles (technical, political, geographic) needed to be overcome?

We had three technical challenges as below to be addressed for precise route guide.

1. Display of a vehicle position on road map 2. Detection of a precise vehicle position 3. Capability of adjustment even if an error of vehicle position occurs

Challenging tasks and their countermeasures are mentioned as below:

1.Display of a vehicle position on road map

It is essential to indicate the positional relationship between roads and a vehicle due to limitation of vehicle activity range that can be allowed only on roads. Our aim as a first step was set to show vehicle position on road map of on-board display.

It was difficult to mount device to cars with map information by using digital technology in those days because the device needs a large amount of digital medium. We therefore realized to indicate a vehicle position on road map by displaying traveling locus, current vehicle position mark, and direction mark on CRT and setting a transparent map sheet on the front face of CRT.

There was little demand for strictly-precise paper maps in those days because people just used maps for checking by their own eyes. However a large discrepancy was found when we compared traveling locus to commercially-available paper maps. This meant that using map of low-precision would impair indication of precise vehicle position even if detection technology of vehicle position was improved. We, therefore, made the original map based on precisely-measured maps issued by Geospatial Information Authority of Japan and developed a new map sheet for exclusive use.

The map sheet was co-developed with Shobunsha Publications, Inc., the map manufacturer. It was a special transparent map sheet for exclusive use that performed transparent color printing in high ware resistance on 0.1 mm polyester film. 1/250,000 scale maps were applied to display whole Japan. The arrangement of colors for the map was decided in consideration of green CRT light from the back side of the map. Rivers and seas in the map were printed in red to enable drivers to recognize vehicle inaccessible area intuitively (See the reference 16_Fig. 1).

“HONDA Marking Pen” was also co-developed with Mitsubishi Pencil Co., Ltd. (See the reference 16_Fig. 2). This purplish-red-colored pen was used for marking destinations or scheduled driving routes on the map sheet. The markings also could be deleted without damages of map sheet printings. Although it was primitive way, we realized our original purpose, that is, “route guidance” by marking scheduled driving routes beforehand with this Marking Pen.

New technologies and deep consideration as above helped realize route guidance followed road network by display of vehicle position on road map.

2. Detection of a precise vehicle position

As a detection method of vehicle positions, a completely self-contained inertial navigation by gyroscope and wheel revolution was adopted. Radio navigation methods such as LOng-RAnge Navigation (LORAN), Omega System, or GPS were not adopted because they didn’t work at high-rise buildings, underground passage, or in tunnels. A geomagnetic sensor was not also adopted due to errors by disturbance.

For highly-precise inertial navigation, a mileage sensor that detected wheel revolution in high precision and a direction sensor “Gyroscope” that detected direction of vehicle movement accurately were necessary.

The mileage sensor was developed for exclusive use by adopting the pulse generation method which inserted sensor between speed meter cable and transmission. This sensor using Hall device could detect revolution of speed meter cable even at ultra-slow speed.

In consideration of on-vehicle environment with frequent vibration, a gas rate sensor filled with helium gas having no moving part was developed exclusively for the gyroscope system. This gyroscope was compactly constructed by integrally assembling a main body incorporating helium gas, circulation pump, injection nozzle and flow sensor in a package, a constant temperature chamber unit for keeping the main body at a constant temperature, and a control circuit unit. (See the reference 11).

For stabilization of gyroscope output, two flow sensors were mounted electrically and mechanically with high precision and the gyroscope was composed with the double thermostat construction. Precise direction detection was realized stably by controlling temperature environment of the gyroscope electrically (See the reference 3 and the reference 16_Fig.3). It was necessary to suppress zero point drift to stabilize output with high accuracy. Therefore the zero point correcting method at the stop of the vehicle was also developed (See the reference 10).

By using information of distance and direction in high precision from the mileage sensor and the direction sensor, the navigating computer was advanced to calculate and detect precise vehicle positions that change every moment.

3.Capability of adjustment even if an error of vehicle position occurs

The system that enabled drivers to recognize error of vehicle positions by checking traveling locus and road shape of map and to adjust them was advanced (See the reference 9).

The transparent map sheet was mounted on CRT which displayed traveling locus, current vehicle position mark, and direction mark. It made drivers to identify vehicle positions easily. Moreover, when error of vehicle positions occurred, drivers could recognize it easily by displaying derail of traveling locus or vehicle position from the road on the map.

It was necessary to adjust the traveling locus or the current vehicle position mark to fit roads on the map for correcting errors. To realize it, two systems were developed. The one is a function to enable drivers to move traveling locus, current vehicle position mark, and direction mark laterally and rotationally in accordance with the driver’s operation. The other was a mechanism to fine adjust the position between traveling locus and road of map by sliding or rotating the map sheet on CRT by hand and enable fix or release the sheet by a lever.

The navigating computer in those days was required to display traveling locus on CRT laterally or rotationally in accordance with the driver’s arbitrary operation while it calculated vehicle positions that changed every moment in real time and stored the information as traveling locus data. In addition to them, data image had to be magnified or reduced by changing of map scales. Its calculation burdened microprocessor in those days with considerable load. Honda, therefore, decided to introduce the 16-bit microprocessor (TMS9901 of Texas Instruments Incorporated), which was just released, as the information processing device for the automobile navigation system.

In addition, the navigating computer had to meet driver’s operational demands while calculating vehicle position in real time. Therefore it could not control switching of tasks properly by interruption processing only. Then the necessity of Real Time Operation System (OS) was fully realized. At that time, however, we had to develop all systems internal Honda from application programs to kernel in OS because ready-made Real Time OS to suite our purpose was not commercialized at that time. Development of OS by automotive manufacturer was exceptional and epoch-making in development method of auto electronics system (See the reference 3).

A display unit and an operational unit, together with hardware of navigating computer, were co-developed with ALPS ELECTRIC CO., LTD. The operational unit was supported firmly with cantilevered die-cast materials from the back end of CRT to the front end and map sheets could be inserted between the surface of CRT and the operational unit. The map sheet on CRT could be fixed or released by moving the lever vertically (See the reference 16_Fig. 4). Drivers could slide or rotate the map sheet easily to fit traveling locus on CRT display by using this mechanism. The move key that moved locus display vertically and horizontally, the rotation switch to make rotate, the scale-change key, and others were arranged on the operational unit (See the reference 16_Fig. 5).

By the new technologies and the detailed measures as above, drivers could recognize and adjust positional errors easily. As a result of that, the navigation system could keep navigating for even long driving with adjustment of errors.

What features set this work apart from similar achievements?

As of 1981, the navigation system that displayed a direction and a distance to destinations existed. The system enabled to calculate direction with geomagnetic sensors and distance with wheel revolution after input of destination position from vehicle position such as “XX km to the east and XX km to the north” (See the reference 16_Fig. 6).

However this system could not guide a route as map-using navigation and had three disadvantages as below:

(1) It stopped navigation when drivers faced obstacles such as river because it could only display directions to destination.

(2) Large errors could occur when drivers faced big magnetic substances such as iron bridges or passed railroad crossings which caused magnetization of the vehicle body because the system used geomagnetism for direction detection.

(3) Drivers could not recognize or adjust error manually because information of vehicle position existed in the internal system only.

Compared with the systems as above, the Gyrocator had advantages as below in all aspects:

[1] It could keep navigating even when the obstacle existed on the road because of map-based navigation. (Map-Based navigation system)

[2] It could detect vehicle positions in high precision without being affected by disturbance or magnetization of vehicle bodies because gyroscope was used for direction detection. (Inertial navigation system)

[3] It could make drivers recognize and adjust errors by comparison of locus and maps even when errors occurred (See the reference 16_Fig. 7) (Locus check: manual map matching)

These three technologies as above are used as basic technologies for present navigation systems using GPS and are considered as the global standards.

Supporting texts and citations to establish the dates, location, and importance of the achievement: Minimum of five (5), but as many as needed to support the milestone, such as patents, contemporary newspaper articles, journal articles, or chapters in scholarly books. 'Scholarly' is defined as peer-reviewed, with references, and published. You must supply the texts or excerpts themselves, not just the references. At least one of the references must be from a scholarly book or journal article. All supporting materials must be in English, or accompanied by an English translation.

(1) http://www.jsae.or.jp/autotech/data_e/14-2e.html. See Appendix 1.

(2) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOqig8rixOU (in Japanese). See Appendix 2.

(3) Katsutoshi Tagami, Tsuneo Takahashi, and Fumitaka Takamashi : “Electro Gyrocator”: New Inertial Navigation System for Use in Automobiles, SAE Techincal Paper, 830659, Feb.-Mar. , Detroit, MI, 1983. See Appendix 3.

(4) http://world.honda.com/history/challenge/1981navigationsystem/index.html

(5) http://www.hondanews.info/news/ja/corporate/c810824: Aug. 24, 1981 (Japanese). See Appendix 4 (in English)

(6) http://www.hondanews.info/news/ja/corporate/c811217: Dec. 17, 1981 (Japanese). See Appendix 5 (in English)

(7) http://www.ieee.org/about/awards/bios/envsaf_recipients.html. See Appendix 6

(8) http://sites.ieee.org/itss/itss-awards/other/. See Appendix 7

(9) United States Patent; 4402050: Apparatus for visually indicating continuous travel route of a vehicle,patented on Aug. 30, 1983. See Appendix 8

(10) United States Patent; 4470124: Method of adjusting the zero-point of rate type sensor, patented on Sep. 4, 1984. See Appendix 9

(11) United States Patent; 4484284: Apparatus for visually indicating current travel route of a vehicle, patented on Nov. 20, 1984. See Appendix 10

(12) Japan patent; 62-15920: Apparatus for visually indicating traveled route of a vehicle, submitted on Nov. 24, 1981, patented on Apr. 9, 1987 (in Japanese)

Apparatus for visually indicating traveled route of a vehicle is composed of device to storage continuous positions of a vehicle, device for displaying driving locus on road map screen and operating device that enables to change settings of display form.

(13) Japan Patent; 58-24794: Apparatus for visually indicating traveled route of a vehicle, submitted on Nov. 28, 1979, patented on May. 23, 1987 (in Japanese)

Apparatus for visually indicating traveled route of a vehicle that enables to hold road map of sheet.

(14) Japan Patent; 2-36952: Apparatus for visually indicating traveled route of a vehicle, submitted on Feb. 5, 1980, patented on Aug. 21, 1990 (in Japanese)

Apparatus for visually indicating traveled route of a vehicle that has the function of displaying traveled course and mark display of current position that indicates the direction of travel, and control device that is enable to move the marks of current position and traveled route and the function that is capable of manual map matching between map and travel information.

(15) Japan Patent; 3-21846: Apparatus for visually indicating traveled route of a vehicle, submitted on Sep. 28, 1980, patented on March. 25, 1991 (in Japanese)

Apparatus for visually indicating traveled for a vehicle has the gas-rate sensor as direction sensor that is installed in thermostatic chamber.

(16)Photos and Figures for Honda Electro Gyrocator. See Appendix 11

Supporting materials (supported formats: GIF, JPEG, PNG, PDF, DOC): All supporting materials must be in English, or if not in English, accompanied by an English translation. You must supply the texts or excerpts themselves, not just the references. For documents that are copyright-encumbered, or which you do not have rights to post, email the documents themselves to ieee-history@ieee.org. Please see the Milestone Program Guidelines for more information.

A number of materials contained in the references cited above, which may make this achievement be more understandable, are shown as appendices in what follows.

Appendix 1: Copy of Reference (1)

Appendix 2: Copy of Reference (2), which shows YouTube indicating how to use Honda Gyrocator (in Japanese).

Appendix 3: Figure presented in Reference (3), System configuration diagram and basic composition of “Electro Gyrocator”.

Appendix 4: Copy of Reference (5), which shows Honda news released in Japan and translated in English.

Appendix 5: Copy of Reference (6), which shows Honda news released in Japan and translated in English.

Appendix 6: Copy of Reference (7), which shows IEEE Awards, IEEE medals website.

Appendix 7: Copy of Reference (8), which shows IEEE Awards, IEEE medals website.

Appendix 8: Copy of Reference (9), which sows USA patent.

Appendix 9: Copy of Reference (10), which sows USA patent.

Appendix 10: Copy of Reference (11), which sows USA patent.

Appendix 11: Copy of Reference (16), which shows Photos and figures of Honda Electro Gyrocator.

Please email a jpeg or PDF a letter in English, or with English translation, from the site owner(s) giving permission to place IEEE milestone plaque on the property, and a letter (or forwarded email) from the appropriate Section Chair supporting the Milestone application to ieee-history@ieee.org with the subject line "Attention: Milestone Administrator." Note that there are multiple texts of the letter depending on whether an IEEE organizational unit other than the section will be paying for the plaque(s).

Please recommend reviewers by emailing their names and email addresses to ieee-history@ieee.org. Please include the docket number and brief title of your proposal in the subject line of all emails.


Appendix 4 HONDANEWS Technology introduction Aug24 1981(English).pdf
Appendix 5 HONDANEWS HGC on sale 17Dec 1981(English).pdf