Rosales, Jesus (New Mexico State University), Guijarro Reyes, Gabriel Alexis (New Mexico State University), Sun, Liang (New Mexico State University), Garcia Carrillo, Luis Rodolfo (New Mexico State University), Gross, Andreas (New Mexico State University)

Development of an Autonomous Soaring Algorithm for Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems

Scheduled for presentation during the Regular Session "Autonomy II" (FrB1), Friday, June 18, 2021, 12:20−12:40, Macedonia Hall

2021 International Conference on Unmanned Aircraft Systems (ICUAS), June 15-18, 2021, Athens, Greece

This information is tentative and subject to change. Compiled on April 25, 2024

Abstract

An autonomous flight control algorithm is proposed for a fixed-wing unmanned aircraft system (UAS) to carry out waypoint navigation tasks while exploiting thermals to cut down on energy consumption. The main components of the flight control algorithm are a waypoint navigation system that is coupled with an altitude controller, a thermaling flight controller, and a gliding flight controller that is combined with a proportional-integral controller to maintain a desired heading angle. The flight control algorithm is tested using a three degrees-of-freedom point mass model for a notional fixed-wing aircraft model. The flight control algorithm is demonstrated to perform satisfactorily. The aircraft reaches all of the desired waypoints and exploits thermals to save energy.