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Full-Text Articles in Engineering
Tailsitter Heading Estimation Using A Magnetometer, Timothy Mclain, Jason M. Beach, Matthew E. Argyle, Randall W. Beard, Stephen Morris
Tailsitter Heading Estimation Using A Magnetometer, Timothy Mclain, Jason M. Beach, Matthew E. Argyle, Randall W. Beard, Stephen Morris
Faculty Publications
The tailsitter aircraft merges the endurance and speed of fixed-wing aircraft with the flexibility and VTOL abilities of rotorcraft. Typical control and estimation schemes make assumptions about the maximum attitude an aircraft will experience that are not valid for tailsitters. This paper discusses the limitations of a typical EKF magnetometer measurement update that uses Euler angles. It is shown how to use a second set of Euler angles to avoid gimbal lock. A method is given that bypasses the use of Euler angles altogether and directly uses the quaternion to determine heading error and update the attitude estimate. This method …
Quaternion Based Attitude Error For A Tailsitter In Hover Flight, Timothy Mclain, Matthew E. Argyle, Jason M. Beach, Randall W. Beard, Stephen Morris
Quaternion Based Attitude Error For A Tailsitter In Hover Flight, Timothy Mclain, Matthew E. Argyle, Jason M. Beach, Randall W. Beard, Stephen Morris
Faculty Publications
The tailsitter is a promising airframe that can take off and land on its tail and transition to level flight. While this ability provides vertical takeoff and landing capabilities with no additional moving parts, it introduces interesting control challenges. In this paper, we look at the attitude control system of a tailsitter in hover flight and show that the behaviour of the aircraft relies on the method used to compute the attitude error. We investigate three different methods of computing the attitude error, quaternion feedback, resolved tilt twist, and the resolved Euler angles, and compare them through simulated hover flight.
Tailsitter Attitude Control Using Resolved Tilt-Twist, Timothy Mclain, Jason M. Beach, Matthew E. Argyle, Randall W. Beard, Stephen Morris
Tailsitter Attitude Control Using Resolved Tilt-Twist, Timothy Mclain, Jason M. Beach, Matthew E. Argyle, Randall W. Beard, Stephen Morris
Faculty Publications
The tailsitter aircraft merges the endurance and speed of fixed-wing aircraft with the flexibility and VTOL abilities of rotorcraft. Because of the requirement to be functional at a full range of attitudes, quaternions are typically employed to calculate attitude error. Attitude control is then accomplished by using the vector component of the error quaternion to drive flight control surfaces. This paper demonstrates that this method of driving the flight control surfaces can be suboptimal for tailsitter type aircraft and can lead to undesired vehicle movement. An alternate method of calculating attitude error called resolved tilt-twist is improved and validated. The …