Compact Pitot tube for drone
Hidetoshi Takahashi · The Proceedings of Conference of Kanto Branch · 2020
Drones are normally controlled via GPS and IMU so as not to crash by such as strong gusts. In this time, detailed information of airflow around the drone will be helpful for the control. Here we show a Pitot tube for a small drone. The developed Pitot tube was under 5 cm × 1 cm × 1 cm in size, and less than 10 g in weight. A MEMS differential pressure sensor chip, which was composed of a piezoresistive cantilever, was attached to the inside of the housing of the Pitot tube. We confirmed that the range and resolution of airflow velocity were 1 - 20 m/s and less than 0.1 m/s, respectively by wind tunnel test. It was also demonstrated that a toy drone with the developed Pitot tube was able to fly. Then the Pitot tube was able to measure the airflow velocity when the flying drone received crosswind.