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Aerospace Engineering Commons™

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Navigation, Guidance, Control and Dynamics

Selected Works

2018

Articles 1 - 6 of 6

Full-Text Articles in Aerospace Engineering

Validation And Verification Flight Tests Of Fixed-Wing Collaborative Uass With High Speeds And High Inertias, A Ram (Bella) Kim Jun 2018

Validation And Verification Flight Tests Of Fixed-Wing Collaborative Uass With High Speeds And High Inertias, A Ram (Bella) Kim

A Ram (Bella) Kim

The research objective for this work is to validate and verify guidance, navigation, and control algorithms that are designed for fixed-wing collaborative unmanned aerial systems (UASs) in unstructured environments. A biologically-inspired swarm control theory provides a framework to distribute sensor payloads between several smaller and less complex agents that have local interactions. Controller design and flight testing of large UASs with high speeds and high inertias holding a formation in a dynamically changing environment and in the presence of external disturbances is complex and requires advanced planning and safety measures. Verification and validation flight tests were conducted using a fixed-wing …

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Control Of Multi-Agent Collaborative Fixed-Wing Uass In Unstructured Environment, A Ram (Bella) Kim Jun 2018

Control Of Multi-Agent Collaborative Fixed-Wing Uass In Unstructured Environment, A Ram (Bella) Kim

A Ram (Bella) Kim

Swarms of unmanned aircraft are the inevitable future of the aerospace industry. In recent years, swarming robots and aircraft have been a subject of much interest; however, many research projects make impractical assumptions such as point mass dynamics with no aerodynamic effects for aircraft models, and most works stop short of fully validating their methods via flight testing. This work presents a proximity based guidance, navigation, and control of multi-agent fixed-wing unmanned aerial systems in an unstructured environment. A scalable swarm navigation method is developed using adaptive moving mesh partial differential equations controlled by the free energy heat flow equation. …

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Validation And Verification Of Gnc For Large Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial System In Unstructured And Noisy Environment, A Ram (Bella) Kim Jun 2018

Validation And Verification Of Gnc For Large Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial System In Unstructured And Noisy Environment, A Ram (Bella) Kim

A Ram (Bella) Kim

The impact of high update rate on the disparity in eigenvalues of the auto-correlation matrix, along with slow convergence and reduced stability of numerical analysis are well studied. However, the impact of high update rates of autopilots on the performance of unmanned aircraft has been ignored due to the intrinsic limitations of COTS autopilots
computation power. Although MEMS based IMUs have very high update rates, the majority of existing UAS autopilot system processing power is limited to 20 Hz. In this work, the challenges and processes for developing and flight test validating an autonomous flight controller for a large 30-kg …

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Space Operations In The Suborbital Space Flight Simulator And Mission Control Center: Lessons Learned With Xcor Lynx, Pedro Llanos, Christopher Nguyen, David Williams, Kim O. Chambers Ph.D., Erik Seedhouse, Robert Davidson May 2018

Space Operations In The Suborbital Space Flight Simulator And Mission Control Center: Lessons Learned With Xcor Lynx, Pedro Llanos, Christopher Nguyen, David Williams, Kim O. Chambers Ph.D., Erik Seedhouse, Robert Davidson

Pedro J. Llanos (www.AstronauticsLlanos.com)

This study was conducted to better understand the performance of the XCOR Lynx vehicle. Because the Lynx development was halted, the best knowledge of vehicle dynamics can only be found through simulator flights. X-Plane 10 was chosen for its robust applications and accurate portrayal of dynamics on a vehicle in flight. The Suborbital Space Flight Simulator (SSFS) and Mission Control Center (MCC) were brought to the Applied Aviation Sciences department in fall 2015 at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Daytona Beach campus. This academic and research tool is a department asset capable of providing multiple fields of data about suborbital simulated flights. …

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Synthetic Jet Actuator-Based Aircraft Tracking Using A Continuous Robust Nonlinear Control Strategy, N. Ramos-Pedroza, W. Mackunis, M. Reyhanoglu May 2018

Synthetic Jet Actuator-Based Aircraft Tracking Using A Continuous Robust Nonlinear Control Strategy, N. Ramos-Pedroza, W. Mackunis, M. Reyhanoglu

William MacKunis

A robust nonlinear control law that achieves trajectory tracking control for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) equipped with synthetic jet actuators (SJAs) is presented in this paper. A key challenge in the control design is that the dynamic characteristics of SJAs are nonlinear and contain parametric uncertainty. The challenge resulting from the uncertain SJA actuator parameters is mitigated via innovative algebraic manipulation in the tracking error system derivation along with a robust nonlinear control law employing constant SJA parameter estimates. A key contribution of the paper is a rigorous analysis of the range of SJA actuator parameter uncertainty within which asymptotic …

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Analysis And Verification Of Cost-Effective Design Modifications To Commercially Available Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle To Improve Performance, Stability And Control Characteristics, And Structural Integrity, A Ram (Bella) Kim Jan 2018

Analysis And Verification Of Cost-Effective Design Modifications To Commercially Available Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle To Improve Performance, Stability And Control Characteristics, And Structural Integrity, A Ram (Bella) Kim

A Ram (Bella) Kim

In this work, several cost-effective design modifications were made to a commercially available fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicle in order to improve overall performance and reliability. These modifications included the addition of 3D-printed winglets to improve aerodynamic performance, applying fiberglass reinforcement to areas of structural concern, the addition of rudder control surfaces for improved control authority, increasing the length of the empennage booms for both stability and control improvements, and the addition of dorsal fins to improve vertical fin stall characteristics. Design methodology and manufacturing processes were outlined, a cost breakdown was presented, and results from dynamic analysis were validated through …

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