A Closed Loop Research Platform that Enables Dynamic Control of Wing Gait Patterns in a Vertically Constrained Flapping Wing - Micro Air Vehicle

A Closed Loop Research Platform that Enables Dynamic Control of Wing Gait Patterns in a Vertically Constrained Flapping Wing - Micro Air Vehicle
Author: Hermanus Van Niekerk Botha
Publisher:
Total Pages: 58
Release: 2016
Genre: Machine learning
ISBN:

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Research in Flapping Wing - Micro Air Vehicles(FW-MAVs) has been growing in recent years. Work ranging from mechanical designs to adaptive control algorithms are being developed in pursuit of mimicking natural flight. FW-MAV technology can be applied in a variety of use cases such a military application and surveillance, studying natural ecological systems, and hobbyist commercialization. Recent work has produced small scale FW-MAVs that are capable of hovering and maneuvering. Researchers control maneuvering in various ways, some of which involve making small adjustments to the core wing motion patterns (wing gaits) which determine how the wings flap. Adaptive control algorithms can be implemented to dynamically change these wing motion patterns to allow one to use gait based modification controllers even after damage to a vehicle or its wings occur. This thesis will create and present a hardware research platform that enables hardware-in-the-loop experimentation with core wing gait adaptation methods.

Adapting the Search Space While Limiting Damage During Learning in a Simulated Flapping Wing Micro Air Vehicle

Adapting the Search Space While Limiting Damage During Learning in a Simulated Flapping Wing Micro Air Vehicle
Author: Monica Sam
Publisher:
Total Pages: 75
Release: 2017
Genre: Artificial intelligence
ISBN:

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Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) are characterized by closely coupled physical and software components that operate simultaneously on different spatial and temporal scales; exhibit multiple and distinct behavioral modalities; and interact with one another in ways not entirely predictable at the time of design. A commonly appearing type of CPS are systems that contain one or more smart components that adapt locally in response to global measurements of whole system performance. An example of a smart component robotic CPS system is a Flapping Wing Micro Air Vehicle (FW-MAV) that contains wing motion oscillators that control their wing flapping patterns to enable the whole system to fly precisely after the wings are damaged in unpredictable ways. Localized learning of wing flapping patterns using meta-heuristic search optimizing flight precision has been shown effective in recovering flight precision after wing damage. However, such methods provide no insight into the nature of the damage that necessitated the learning. Additionally, if the learning is done while the FW-MAV is in service, it is possible for the search algorithm to actually damage the wings even more due to overly aggressive testing of candidate solutions. In previous work, a method was developed to extract estimates of wing damage as a side effect of the corrective learning of wing motion patterns. Although effective, that method lacked in two important respects. First, it did not settle on wing gait solutions quickly enough for the damage estimates to be created in a time acceptable to a user. Second, there were no protections against testing excessively aggressive wing motions that could potentially damage the system even further during the attempted behavior level repair. This work addresses both of those issues by making modifications to the representation and search space of wing motion patterns potentially visited by the online metaheuristic search. The overarching goals were to lessen the time to required to achieve effective repair and damage estimates and to avoid further damage to wings by limiting the search's access to overly aggressive wing motions. The key challenge was understanding how to modify representations and search space to provide the desired benefits without destroying the method's ability to find solutions at all. With the recent emergence of functional insect-sized and bird-sized FW-MAV and an expected need to modify wing behavior in service, this study, believed to be the first of its kind, is of contemporary relevance.

A Study on the Control, Dynamics, and Hardware of Micro Aerial Biomimetic Flapping Wing Vehicles

A Study on the Control, Dynamics, and Hardware of Micro Aerial Biomimetic Flapping Wing Vehicles
Author: Siara Hunt
Publisher:
Total Pages: 190
Release: 2017
Genre: Aerodynamics
ISBN:

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Biological flight encapsulates 400 million years of evolutionary ingenuity and thus is the most efficient way to fly. If an engineering pursuit is not adhering to biomimetic inspiration, then it is probably not the most efficient design. An aircraft that is inspired by bird or other biological modes of flight is called an ornithopter and is the original design of the first airplanes. Flapping wings hold much engineering promise with the potential to produce lift and thrust simultaneously. In this research, modeling and simulation of a flapping wing vehicle is generated. The purpose of this research is to develop a control algorithm for a model describing flapping wing robotics. The modeling approach consists of initially considering the simplest possible model and subsequently building models of increasing complexity. This research finds that a proportional derivative feedback and feedforward controller applied to a nonlinear model is the most practical controller for a flapping system. Due to the complex aerodynamics of ornithopter flight, modeling and control are very difficult. Overall, this project aims to analyze and simulate different forms of biological flapping flight and robotic ornithopters, investigate different control methods, and also acquire understanding of the hardware of a flapping wing aerial vehicle.

Evolution and Analysis of Neuromorphic Flapping-wing Flight Controllers

Evolution and Analysis of Neuromorphic Flapping-wing Flight Controllers
Author: Sanjay Kumar Boddhu
Publisher:
Total Pages: 142
Release: 2010
Genre: Micro air vehicles
ISBN:

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The control of insect-sized flapping-wing micro air vehicles is attracting increasing interest. Solution of the problem requires construction of a controller that is physically small, extremely power efficient, and capable. In addition, process variation in the creation of very small wings and armatures as well as the potential for accumulating damage and wear over the course of a vehicle's lifetime suggest that controllers be able to self-adapt to the specific and possibly changing nature of the vehicles in which they are embedded. Previous work with Evolvable Hardware Continuous Time Recurrent Neural Networks (CTRNNs) as applied to adaptive control of walking in legged robots suggests that CTRNNs may provide a suitable control solution for flapping-wing micro air vehicles. However, upon complete analysis, it can be seen that perceived similarities between the two problems are somewhat superficial, and that flapping-wing vehicle control requires its own study. This dissertation constitutes the first attempt to apply evolved CTRNN devices to the control of a feasible flapping-wing micro air vehicle. It is organized as a sequence of control experiments of increasing difficulty and explores the following issues, development of behavior-based analog circuit modules, architectures to combine those modules into multi-functional controllers, low-level circuit analyses to explain how evolved modules operate and interact. Also included are experiments in the creation of physically polymorphic behavior modules that combine multiple flight functions into a monolithic analog device. In addition to providing first-of-its-kind feasibility results, this dissertation develops a new frequency-grouping based analysis method to explain the operation of evolved devices.

Attitude and Position Control of Flapping-wing Micro Aerial Vehicles

Attitude and Position Control of Flapping-wing Micro Aerial Vehicles
Author: Ning Che
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2018
Genre:
ISBN:

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Compared with the fixed-wing and rotor aircraft, the flapping-wing micro aerial vehicle is of great interest to many communities because of its high efficiency and flexible maneuverability. However, issues such as the small size of the vehicles, complex dynamics and complicated systems due to uncertainty, nonlinearity, and multi-coupled parameters cause several significant challenges in construction and control. In this thesis, based on Euler angle and unit quaternion representations, the backstepping technique is used to design attitude stabilization controllers and position tracking controllers for a good control performance of a flapping-wing micro aerial vehicle. The attitude control of a apping{wing micro aerial vehicle is achieved by controlling the aerodynamic forces and torques, which are highly nonlinear and time{varying. To control such a complex system, a dynamic model is derived by using the Newton{Euler method. Based on the mathematical model, the backstepping technique is applied with the Lyapunov stability theory for the controller design. Moreover, because a flapping-wing micro aerial vehicle has very exible wings and oscillatory flight characteristics, the adaptive fuzzy control law as well as H1 control strategy are also used to estimate the unknown parameters and attenuate the impact of external disturbances. What is more, due to the problem of the gimbal lock of Euler angles, the unit quaternion representation is used afterwards. As for position control, the forward movement is controlled by the thrust and lift force generated by the wings of flapping-wing micro aerial vehicles. To make the actual position and velocity follow the desired trajectory and velocity, the backstepping scheme is used based on a unit quaternion representation. In order to reduce the complexity of differentiation of the virtual control in the design process, a dynamic surface control method is then used by the idea of a low-pass filter. Matlab simulation results prove the mathematical feasibility and also illustrate that all the proposed controllers have a stable control performance.

Acsynt Inner Loop Flight Control Design Study

Acsynt Inner Loop Flight Control Design Study
Author: National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Total Pages: 200
Release: 2018-07-17
Genre:
ISBN: 9781722917531

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The NASA Ames Research Center developed the Aircraft Synthesis (ACSYNT) computer program to synthesize conceptual future aircraft designs and to evaluate critical performance metrics early in the design process before significant resources are committed and cost decisions made. ACSYNT uses steady-state performance metrics, such as aircraft range, payload, and fuel consumption, and static performance metrics, such as the control authority required for the takeoff rotation and for landing with an engine out, to evaluate conceptual aircraft designs. It can also optimize designs with respect to selected criteria and constraints. Many modern aircraft have stability provided by the flight control system rather than by the airframe. This may allow the aircraft designer to increase combat agility, or decrease trim drag, for increased range and payload. This strategy requires concurrent design of the airframe and the flight control system, making trade-offs of performance and dynamics during the earliest stages of design. ACSYNT presently lacks means to implement flight control system designs but research is being done to add methods for predicting rotational degrees of freedom and control effector performance. A software module to compute and analyze the dynamics of the aircraft and to compute feedback gains and analyze closed loop dynamics is required. The data gained from these analyses can then be fed back to the aircraft design process so that the effects of the flight control system and the airframe on aircraft performance can be included as design metrics. This report presents results of a feasibility study and the initial design work to add an inner loop flight control system (ILFCS) design capability to the stability and control module in ACSYNT. The overall objective is to provide a capability for concurrent design of the aircraft and its flight control system, and enable concept designers to improve performance by exploiting the interrelationships between aircraft...

Autonomous Micro Air Vehicles with Hovering Capabilities

Autonomous Micro Air Vehicles with Hovering Capabilities
Author: Sergey Shkarayev
Publisher:
Total Pages: 108
Release: 2009
Genre: Micro air vehicles
ISBN:

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In this project was investigated novel concepts of micro aerial vehicles (MAVs) with vertical takeoff and landing capabilities. Two fixed-wing MAV configurations were tested in a wind tunnel. These concepts were a tilt-wing concept MAV by two non-coaxial counter-rotating propellers and a tilt-body concept based on coaxial motors and counter-rotating propellers. Values of thrust, torque, power, and efficiency were measured for these concepts. The development of an automatic control system and the investigation of the flight dynamics of the VTOL MAV during the hovering phase of flight were undertaken for the second stage of the project. The second focus of the project was on the development of a dynamic model for a flapping-wing air vehicle (ornithopter) and on the identification of the model parameters for this vehicle using in-flight data. The system identification procedure is proposed based on the value of a scalar objective function in the least squares sense. Finally, the ornithopter was equipped with an automatic control system that provides stability augmentation and navigation of the vehicle and flight data acquisition. Wind tunnel tests were conducted with the control surfaces fixed in neutral position and the flapping motion of the wings activated by a motor at a constant throttle setting. Coefficients of a lift, drag, and pitching moment were determined. The report is organized in six chapters comprised of papers published during the course of the project.

A Multi-Agent System for Adaptive Control of a Flapping-Wing Micro Air Vehicle

A Multi-Agent System for Adaptive Control of a Flapping-Wing Micro Air Vehicle
Author:
Publisher:
Total Pages: 109
Release: 2016
Genre: Adaptive control systems
ISBN:

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Biomimetic flapping-wing vehicles have attracted recent interest because of their numerous potential military and civilian applications. In this dissertation is described the design of a multi-agent adaptive controller for such a vehicle. This controller is responsible for estimating the vehicle pose (position and orientation) and then generating four parameters needed for split-cycle control of wing movements to correct pose errors. These parameters are produced via a subsumption architecture rule base. The control strategy is fault tolerant. Using an online learning process, an agent continuously monitors the vehicle's behavior and initiates diagnostics if the behavior has degraded. This agent can then autonomously adapt the rule base if necessary. Each rule base is constructed using a combination of extrinsic and intrinsic evolution. Details of the vehicle, the multi-agent system architecture, agent task scheduling, rule base design, and vehicle control are provided.

Modeling and Control of a Flapping Wing Micro Air Vehicle

Modeling and Control of a Flapping Wing Micro Air Vehicle
Author: Pratik N. Vernekar
Publisher:
Total Pages: 94
Release: 2012
Genre:
ISBN:

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Abstract: In this thesis we propose a new wingbeat control strategy with amplitude modulation and time-rescaling for a six-degree-of-freedom flapping-wing micro air vehicle (MAV) model. Implementation of the amplitude modulation and time-rescaling is discussed, and modifications to the wingbeat forcing function are made to maintain continuity of the wing position. Cycle-averaged forces and moments, and cycle-averaged control derivatives are computed to derive nonlinear and linear control design models (CDMs) of the MAV. The proposed wingbeat control strategy is capable of generating non-zero cycle-averaged x-body and z-body axis forces, and non-zero cycle-averaged rolling, pitching, and yawing moments. A thorough analysis of all possible output candidates is done based on the conditions of vector relative degree and internal dynamics of the linear CDM. Finally for the selected outputs, a controller is designed based on the normal form of the linear CDM. The controller is first tested on the nonlinear CDM, and finally on two higher-fidelity instantaneous blade-element models. One simulation model is based on the actual values of the vehicle parameters, while the other is based on the perturbed values where parametric uncertainties are taken into consideration. Simulation results indicate that the proposed controller is robust to parametric uncertainties and modeling errors introduced by the cycle-averaged control-oriented model.

Recent Progress Towards Developing an Insect-Inspired Flapping-Wing Micro Air Vehicle

Recent Progress Towards Developing an Insect-Inspired Flapping-Wing Micro Air Vehicle
Author:
Publisher:
Total Pages: 13
Release: 2007
Genre:
ISBN:

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This paper presents an overview of the on-going research activities at Shrivenham, aimed at the design of an autonomous flapping-wing micro air vehicle. After introducing the problem of insect wing kinematics and aerodynamics, we describe our quasi-three-dimensional aerodynamic model for flapping wings. This is followed by a brief discussion of some aerodynamic issues relating to the lift-generating leading-edge vortex. New results are then presented on modelling of wing aeroelastic deflections. Finally, some brief observations are made on flight control requirements for an insect-inspired flapping-wing micro air vehicle. Overall, it is shown that successful development of such a vehicle will require a multi-disciplinary approach, with significant developments in a number of disciplines. Progress to date has largely been concerned with hover. Little is known about the requirements for successful manoeuvre.