Browsing by Author "Bustos Cabezas, Diego Enrique"

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    Operación simultánea y sincronizada de múltiples RPA para aerofotogrametría.
    (Universidad de Concepción, 2023) Bustos Cabezas, Diego Enrique; Tinapp Dautzenberg, Frank Joachim
    This report develops a way of simultaneous and synchronized operation of multiple RPAS by means of the use of the Mission Planner software. For this purpose, two experimental multicopters available at the Aerospace Techniques Laboratory of the Universidad de Concepción were used. The simultaneous operation of RPAS in groups is known as swarm flight (also known as "drone swarm"). For this to be possible, each drone must have sensors and appropriate hardware that makes it a compatible member of the system. One of the possible applications of this technology is aerial photogrammetry, a surveying technique that collects information from a specific geographical area. It is possible to equip a multirotor with several types of camera at the same time, since in aerial photogrammetry it is advantageous to use sensors that work in different ranges of the light spectrum (multispectral), in order to increase the usefulness of the product. The disadvantage of this, is the size of the drone, since it requires a higher lift capacity (due to the higher mass when carrying multiple sensors), which implies a larger size. An alternative to this is, instead of equipping a large drone with multiple cameras, to enable a swarm of smaller drones, flying in a coordinated manner and equipped with different cameras, in order to collect the same amount of information as in the previous case. This proposal is particularly attractive if you want to work in a difficult access area, where the equipment must be transported manually, a complex situation if you use a drone too massive, both for its size and its weight. The synchronization method explored is through the use of an experimental function in a control software, which obtains the position data from a "guide" or "master" drone (defined as RPA 1) and delivers it to the other members of the swarm with a certain predefined position offset (slave drone, defined as RPA 2). GPS-RTK technology is essential for the operation, as it provides greater positioning accuracy than traditional GPS, offering centimeter-scale precision. This is particularly important since the swarm behavior is guided by GPS, therefore a high level of position uncertainty is unacceptable. Three successful test flights were performed, where the performance of the RPAs in operation based on position plots generated from the flight data, based on the GPS-RTK, can be seen. In them, a clear synchronization between both aerial vehicles is observed, but it is somewhat overshadowed by an unexpected hardware limitation (telemetry, a key component). Despite this, an approximate delay of 1.5 seconds in the movements of the RPA 2 can be noted, thus proving the usability of this infrastructure for aerial photogrammetry, since the slave drone behavior is remarkably consistent with the flight attitude of the master drone, following with certainty the trajectory of the latter (with some mismatch).
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