Vector thrust multi-rotor copter and its application for building inspection
Andreas Leber, Christian Boller · 2013
Multi-rotor copters are becoming increasingly popular for research and experimen-tation of air vehicle control, aerial imaging (photo/video) and even the hobby market, due to its excellent performance and mechanical downscaling as well as cost when compared to its conventional full scaled and possibly even manned siblings. The re-search groups at both Fraunhofer IZFP and Saarland University have carried out ex-periments, using a multi-rotor copter with an o the shelf camera for building in-spection (aerial photo) for years [1]. With possibly all of the conventionally built ro-tary wing micro aerial vehicles (MAV) the translation of the vehicle in any direction will cause the vehicle to tilt its body, which leads to distortion of images/photos even with an integrated gimbal system as a tool for image stabilization. In order to keep the vehicle in a stable, horizontal position even during translation, a novel vector thrust system has been designed, analyzed through use of numerical simulations, and proven by means of hardware realization and experimental ights. The rst part of this paper discusses the modeling of the vector thrust system using a plus- and x-conguration. The second half of the paper consists of the numerical simulation to prove the concept. The last part describes demonstration of the concept with real hardware and experimental ight results. Glossary: