Designing autopilot system for fixed-wing flight mode of a tilt-rotor UAV in a virtual environment: X-Plane

Year 2018, Volume: 2 Issue: 1, 33 - 42, 15.04.2018

Erhan Ersoy , Mehmet Kürşat Yalçın

Abstract

This paper describes an
autopilot system design to regulate the altitude, heading and forward speed in
the fixed-wing flight mode of the Osprey V22 VTOL (vertical takeoff and land)
tilt rotor UAV accordingly to a reference, which is generated the trajectory
sub-block. X- Plane flight simulator developed by Laminar Research, is used to
test and optimize the parameter values of the autopilot system, which is
designed using feedback, feedforward and PID controllers in MATLAB / Simulink
environment (Software in the Loop- SIL). The receiver and sender blocks to
perform the data interactions between MATLAB / Simulink and X-Plane flight
simulator are created in MATLAB / Simulink environment. The receiver block is
used to transfer data from the X-Plane flight simulator to the controller,
while the sender block is used to transfer control signals from the controller
to the X-Plane flight simulator program. The data communication between the two
is UDP. The autopilot system under test is embedded in the Raspberry-Pi
minicomputer and a hardware-in loop (HIL) test system created. The reaction of
the control algorithm running on the Raspberry-Pi minicomputer to the virtual
sensor data generated by the X-Plane flight simulator investigated. It is
observed that, the Osprey-V22 aircraft can perform tasks autonomously in the
horizontal flight mode, from the experiments and the results obtained. This
study also describes the first stage of an undergoing project which aims to
develop a robust autopilot for Osprey V22 VTOL UAV.

Keywords

Autopilot controller, Raspberry Pi, Tilt-rotor, X-Plane flight simulator

References

• 1. Escareño, J., Salazar, S. and Lozano, R., Modelling and Control of a Convertible VTOL Aircraft. Proceedings of the 45th IEEE Conference on Decision & Control, San Diego, CA, USA, 2006：p 69-74.
• 2. 43r5Miller, M. and Narkiewicz, J., The application of General Model of Moving Object for Tiltrotor Stability Analysis, Journal of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics, Warsaw, 2006, Vol. 44 No. 4, p 881-906
• 3. Malang, Y., Design and control a Vertical Takeoff and Landing Fixed-Wing UAV, Master of applied Science 2016. University of Toronto.
• 4. Sanchez, A., Escareño, J., Garcia, O. and Lozano, R., Autonomous Hovering of a Noncyclic Tiltrotor UAV: Modeling, Control and Implementation. Proceedings of the 17th World Congress The International Federation of Automatic Control Seoul, Korea, 2008. p 803-808.
• 5. Yongzhong, L., Danping, Y. and David, L., Parameter Estimation Of Vertical Takeoff And Landing Aircrafts By Using A PID Controlling Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm, Applied Intelligence, 2016. 44: p 793-815.
• 6. Meyer, A. X-Plane 9/10. X-Plane Operation Manual, 2011.
• 7. Bittar, A., Figuereido, H.V., Guimaraes, P.A. and Mendes, A. C., Guidance Software-in-The-Loop Simulation Using X-Plane and Simulink for UAVs, 2014 International Conference on Unmanned Aircraft Systems (ICUAS), 2014. Orlando, FL, USA. p 993-1002
• 8. Figes Engineering, Simulink Technical Source, http://www.figes.com.tr/matlab/E-Technical-Kit. Simulink / index.html
• 9. Öner, K.T., Çetinsoy, E., Sırımoğlu, E., Hançer, C., Ünel, M., Akşit, F., Gülmez, K. and Kandemir, İ., Mathematical Modeling and Vertical Flight Control of a Tilt-Wing UAV, Turk J Elec Eng & Comp Sci, Vol.20, No.1, 2012. p 149-157.
• 10. McVeigh, M.A., Nagib, H., Wood, T. Kiedaisch, J. Stalker, A. and Wygnanski, I., Model & Full Scale Tiltrotor Download Reduction Tests Using Active Flow Control, 60th Annual Forum, Paner No 1, Baltimore, 2004. P 181-192.
• 11. J.M. Weakley, K.M. Kleinhesselink, D.H. Mason and D.G. Mitchell, Simulation Evaluation of V-22 Degraded-Mode Flying Qualities, 59 AHS Forum 2003, Paper No 135, Phoenix, AZ, USA, 2003.
• 12. Yonghua, F. and Jun, Y., Design of Tiltrotor Flight Control System Using Optical Control, Proceedings of the 26th Chinese Control Conference 2007, Zhangjiajie, Hunan, China, 2007. p 687-691
• 13. Muraoka, K., Okada, N., Kubo, D. and Sato, M., Transition Flight of Quad Tilt Wing VTOL UAV, 28th International Congress Of The Aeronautical Sciences, 2012. p 1-10.
• 14. Yüksek, B., Vuruskan, A., Özdemir, U., Yükselen, A. and İnalhan, G., Transition Flight Modeling of a Fixed-Wing VTOL UAV, Journal of Intelligent & Robotics Systems, vol 81, No. 1 International Publishing, 2016. p 1-23
• 15. Warsi, F., Hazry, D., Ahmed, S., Joyo, M. and et.al, Yaw,Pitch and Roll Controller Design For Fixed-Wing UAV under Uncertainty and Perturbed Condition, Signal Processing and its Applications, IEEE 10th International Colloquium, 2014. p 151-156.
• 16. Casau, P., Cabecinhas, D. and Silvestre, C., Hybrid Control Strategy for Autonomous Transition Flight of a Fixed –Wing Aircraft, IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, vol 21, No.6 IEEE, 2013. p 2194-2211.
• 17. Papachristos, C., Alexis, K., Nikolakopoulos, G. and Tzes, A., Model Predictive Attitude Control of an Unmanned Tilt-Rotor Aircraft, IEEE International Symposium, Gdansk, Poland, 2011. p 922-927
• 18. Riberio, R.L. and Oliveria, N.F., Using Autopilot Controllers Test Platform Using MATLAB/Simulink and X-Plane, 40th Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), Washington, DC, USA, 2010.
• 19. MathWorks, Raspberry Pi Programming with MATLAB and Simulink, https://www.mathworks.com/discovery/raspberry-pi-programming -matlab-simulink.html
• 20. Bittar, A. and Oliveira, N. M. F., Central Processing Unit for an Autopilot: Description and Hardware-In-the-Loop Simulation, J Intell Robot Syst, 2013. Vol. 70. p 557-574
• 21. Andrievsky, B. and Fradkov, A., Combined Adaptive Autopilot for an UAV Flight Control. In 2002 IEEE International Conference on Control Applications,2002. p. 290–291.
• 22. Wu, H.Y., Zhou, Z.Y. and Sun, D., Autonomous Hovering Control and Test for Micro Air Vehicle. In Proceedings of the International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Taiwan, 2003 p. 528–533.
• 23. https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/v-22-flt-cntrl.htm
• 24. https://www.raspberrypi.org/help/what-%20is-a-raspberry-pi/
• 25. Oktay T., Uzun M., Çelik H., Konar M., "PID based hierarchical autonomous system performance maximization of a hybrid unmanned aerial vehicle (HUAV)", Anadolu University Journal of Science and Technology, cilt.4, ss.1-10, 2017.
• 26. Oktay T., "Performance Of Minimum Energy Controllers on Tiltrotor Aircraft", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol.86, no.5, pp.361-374, 2014