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Faculty Publications

Series

2018

Multirotor

Articles 1 - 3 of 3

Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Visual Servoing For Multirotor Precision Landing In Varying Light Conditions, Jesse Wynn, Tim Mclain Aug 2018

Visual Servoing For Multirotor Precision Landing In Varying Light Conditions, Jesse Wynn, Tim Mclain

Faculty Publications

The problem of performing a precision landing of an autonomous multirotor UAV in various lighting conditions is studied. A vision-based approach is proposed and consists of varying degree-of-freedom image-based visual servoing (VDOF-IBVS), and a specialized landing marker. The proposed approach is validated through extensive flight testing outdoors in both lighted and dark conditions, and is done using a standard off-the-shelf autopilot system.


Relative Navigation: A Keyframe-Based Approach For Observable Gps-Degraded Navigation, David O. Wheeler, Daniel P. Koch, James S. Jackson, Timothy W. Mclain, Randal W. Beard Jul 2018

Relative Navigation: A Keyframe-Based Approach For Observable Gps-Degraded Navigation, David O. Wheeler, Daniel P. Koch, James S. Jackson, Timothy W. Mclain, Randal W. Beard

Faculty Publications

State estimation for micro air vehicles (MAVs) often depends heavily on reliable global measurements such as GPS. When global measurements are unavailable, additional sensors, such as cameras or laser scanners, are commonly used to provide measurements of the MAV’s translation and rotation relative to a previously observed keyframe image or scan. With the use of only relative sensors, however, the global position and heading of the vehicle are unobservable and cannot be reliably reconstructed. Many existing approaches work with respect to a global reference frame, resulting in a loss of state observability. This article highlights that unobservability leads to inconsistency …


Development Of A Vortex Particle Code For The Modeling Of Wake Interaction In Distributed Propulsion, Eduardo Alvarez, Andrew Ning Jun 2018

Development Of A Vortex Particle Code For The Modeling Of Wake Interaction In Distributed Propulsion, Eduardo Alvarez, Andrew Ning

Faculty Publications

Recent developments in electric aircraft technology have enabled the use of distributed propulsion for the next generation of vertical lift vehicles. However, the ability to rapidly assess the performance of these design concepts, with sufficient fidelity, is a current weakness of this nascent industry. This paper explores the capacity of the viscous Vortex Particle Method (VPM) to model wake interactions found in distributed propulsion. The elements of the vortex particle method are summarized, and a new approach for the calculation of vortex stretching through the complex-step derivative approximation is presented. Preliminary validation is performed on vortex ring cases resembling the …