Systematic Design and Implementation of a Micro Unmanned Quadrotor System

Abstract

This paper presents a guideline to systematically design and construct a micro quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), capable of autonomous flight. The designed micro UAV has a gross weight of less than 40 g including power supply sufficient for an 8-min flight. The design is divided into three parts. First, investigation is made on the structural design of a conventional quadrotor. The quadrotor frame is then carefully designed to avoid any potential structural natural frequencies within the range of rotors operating speeds, based on simulation results obtained from MSC Nastran. Second, avionic system of the aircraft will be discussed in detail, mainly focusing on the design of printed circuit boards which include sensors, microprocessors and four electronic speed controllers, specially catered for micro quadrotor design. Last, a mathematical model for the micro quadrotor is derived based on Newton–Euler formalism, followed by methods of identifying the parameters. The flight test results are later described, analyzed and illustrated in this paper.