An Autonomous Flight Control Strategy Based on Human-Skill Imitation for Flapping-Wing Aerial Vehicle

In this article, combined active flow control system and flight control system design for morphing unmanned aerial vehicles is applied for the first time for autonomous flight performance maximization. For this purpose, longitudinal and lateral dynamics modeling of morphing unmanned aerial vehicle having active flow control manufactured in Erciyes University, Faculty of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Model Aircraft Laboratory is considered in order to obtain simulation environments. Our produced morphing unmanned aerial vehicle is called as ZANKA-II, which has a mass of 6.5 kg, range of 30 km, endurance of 0.5 h, and ceiling altitude of 6000 m. von Karman turbulence modeling is used in order to model atmospheric turbulence during flight in both longitudinal and lateral simulation environments. A stochastic optimization method called as simultaneous perturbation stochastic approximation is also applied for the first time in order to obtain optimum dimensions of morphing parameters (i.e. extension ratios of wingspan and tail span), optimum positions of blowers, and optimum magnitudes of longitudinal and lateral controllers' gains (i.e. P, I, and D gains) while minimizing cost index capturing terms for both longitudinal and lateral autonomous flight performances and there exist lower and upper constraints on all optimization variables in the literature.

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Using a Large 2 Degree of Freedom Tail for Autonomous Aerobatics on a Flapping Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

Volume 5A: 40th Mechanisms and Robotics Conference ◽

10.1115/detc2016-60387 ◽

2016 ◽

Author(s):

Luke Roberts ◽

Hugh Bruck ◽

S. K. Gupta

Keyword(s):

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles ◽

Flight Control ◽

Flapping Wing ◽

Degree Of Freedom ◽

Simple Method ◽

Orientation Change ◽

Aerial Vehicles ◽

Angular Velocities ◽

Aerial Vehicle ◽

Rotary Wing

Flapping wing unmanned aerial vehicles (FWUAVs) provide an alternative to traditional platforms because they are more maneuverable than fixed wing platforms while being faster, quieter, and more natural looking than rotary wing platforms. While real birds are able to execute complex and highly controlled aerobatic maneuvers, executing FWUAV aerobatics presents unique challenges due to difficulty in execution of controlled quick orientation change. This paper demonstrates a simple method for using a large 2 degree of freedom tail for quick orientation changes and flight control, enabling execution of a pre-programmed backflip maneuver on the Robo Raven V, a hybrid FWUAV. The platform reached angular velocities of up to 420° per second during the maneuver.

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A Combined Control Strategy for Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Journal of Computational and Theoretical Nanoscience ◽

10.1166/jctn.2016.5692 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 13 (10) ◽

pp. 7199-7211

Author(s):

Jicheng Ding ◽

Kai Zou ◽

Junling Zhang

Keyword(s):

Flight Control ◽

Control Strategy ◽

Pid Control ◽

High Speed ◽

Computational Effort ◽

Parameter Tracking ◽

Combined Control ◽

Aerial Vehicle ◽

Simple Implementation ◽

Physical Limitations

This study proposes a combined proportional–integral–derivative (PID) flight control strategy within a fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). This type of UAV has high speed and high maneuverability. Considering relatively simple implementation, low computational effort, and intuitive operation, the classic PID controller is still popular but imperfect because of several well-known reasons. A number of practical and improved PID control methods, such as integral separation, anti-windup, and gearshift integral, are always used separately in many control fields. In this study, the combined PID flight control strategy is designed and applied to promote the classic PID control performance, along with the aforementioned methods, to fixed-wing UAV. The proposed approach adopts different controls depending on the deviation outputs and UAV physical limitations. The design flowchart and flight control loop are also presented. The combined PID flight control strategy can achieve a smaller overshoot and a shorter settling time than the conventional PID control. Comparable typical flight parameter tracking results (i.e., pitch, roll, altitude, and path angle) from principle simulation, hardware-in-the-loop simulation, and real flight experiment validate the efficacy and practicability of the combined PID flight control strategy.

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Bird-mimetic Wing System of Flapping-wing Micro Air Vehicle with Autonomous Flight Control Capability

Journal of Bionic Engineering ◽

10.1016/s1672-6529(16)60319-0 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 13 (3) ◽

pp. 458-467 ◽

Cited By ~ 13

Author(s):

Sriyulianti Widhiarini ◽

Ji Hwan Park ◽

Bum Soo Yoon ◽

Kwang Joon Yoon ◽

Il-Hyun Paik ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Flight Control ◽

Flapping Wing ◽

Micro Air Vehicle ◽

Autonomous Flight ◽

Air Vehicle ◽

Control Capability

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