Quadrotor team modeling and control for DLO transportation

94 p.Esta Tesis realiza una propuesta de un modelado dinámico para el transporte de sólidos lineales deformables (SLD) mediante un equipo de cuadricópteros. En este modelo intervienen tres factores: - Modelado dinámico del sólido lineal a transportar. - Modelo dinámico del cuadricóptero para que tenga en cuenta la dinámica pasiva y los efectos del SLD. - Estrategia de control para un transporte e ciente y robusto. Diferenciamos dos tareas principales: (a) lograr una con guración cuasiestacionaria de una distribución de carga equivalente a transportar entre todos los robots. (b) Ejecutar el transporte en un plano horizontal de todo el sistema. El transporte se realiza mediante una con guración de seguir al líder en columna, pero los cuadricópteros individualmente tienen que ser su cientemente robustos para afrontar todas las no-linealidades provocadas por la dinámica del SLD y perturbaciones externas, como el viento. Los controladores del cuadricóptero se han diseñado para asegurar la estabilidad del sistema y una rápida convergencia del sistema. Se han comparado y testeado estrategias de control en tiempo real y no-real para comprobar la bondad y capacidad de ajuste a las condiciones dinámicas cambiantes del sistema. También se ha estudiado la escalabilidad del sistema

Hybrid Modeling of Deformable Linear Objects for Their Cooperative Transportation by Teams of Quadrotors

his paper deals with the control of a team of unmanned air vehicles (UAVs), specifically quadrotors, for which their mission is the transportation of a deformable linear object (DLO), i.e., a cable, hose or similar object in quasi-stationary state, while cruising towards destination. Such missions have strong industrial applications in the transportation of hoses or power cables to specific locations, such as the emergency power or water supply in hazard situations such as fires or earthquake damaged structures. This control must be robust to withstand strong and sudden wind disturbances and remain stable after aggressive maneuvers, i.e., sharp changes of direction or acceleration. To cope with these, we have previously developed the online adaptation of the proportional derivative (PD) controllers of the quadrotors thrusters, implemented by a fuzzy logic rule system that experienced adaptation by a stochastic gradient rule. However, sagging conditions appearing when the transporting drones are too close or too far away induce singularities in the DLO catenary models, breaking apart the control system. The paper’s main contribution is the formulation of the hybrid selective model of the DLO sections as either catenaries or parabolas, which allows us to overcome these sagging conditions. We provide the specific decision rule to shift between DLO models. Simulation results demonstrate the performance of the proposed approach under stringent conditions.This work has been partially supported by spanish MICIN project PID2020-116346GB-I00, and project KK-2021/00070 of the Elkartek 2021 funding program of the Basque Government. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 777720

A Hybrid Control Approach for the Swing Free Transportation of a Double Pendulum with a Quadrotor

In this article, a control strategy approach is proposed for a system consisting of a quadrotor transporting a double pendulum. In our case, we attempt to achieve a swing free transportation of the pendulum, while the quadrotor closely follows a specific trajectory. This dynamic system is highly nonlinear, therefore, the fulfillment of this complex task represents a demanding challenge. Moreover, achieving dampening of the double pendulum oscillations while following a precise trajectory are conflicting goals. We apply a proportional derivative (PD) and a model predictive control (MPC) controllers for this task. Transportation of a multiple pendulum with an aerial robot is a step forward in the state of art towards the study of the transportation of loads with complex dynamics. We provide the modeling of the quadrotor and the double pendulum. For MPC we define the cost function that has to be minimized to achieve optimal control. We report encouraging positive results on a simulated environmentcomparing the performance of our MPC-PD control circuit against a PD-PD configuration, achieving a three fold reduction of the double pendulum maximum swinging angle.This work has been partially supported by FEDER funds through MINECO project TIN2017-85827-P, and project KK-202000044 of the Elkartek 2020 funding program of the Basque Government. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 777720

Quadrotor team modeling and control for DLO transportation

94 p.Esta Tesis realiza una propuesta de un modelado dinámico para el transporte de sólidos lineales deformables (SLD) mediante un equipo de cuadricópteros. En este modelo intervienen tres factores: - Modelado dinámico del sólido lineal a transportar. - Modelo dinámico del cuadricóptero para que tenga en cuenta la dinámica pasiva y los efectos del SLD. - Estrategia de control para un transporte e ciente y robusto. Diferenciamos dos tareas principales: (a) lograr una con guración cuasiestacionaria de una distribución de carga equivalente a transportar entre todos los robots. (b) Ejecutar el transporte en un plano horizontal de todo el sistema. El transporte se realiza mediante una con guración de seguir al líder en columna, pero los cuadricópteros individualmente tienen que ser su cientemente robustos para afrontar todas las no-linealidades provocadas por la dinámica del SLD y perturbaciones externas, como el viento. Los controladores del cuadricóptero se han diseñado para asegurar la estabilidad del sistema y una rápida convergencia del sistema. Se han comparado y testeado estrategias de control en tiempo real y no-real para comprobar la bondad y capacidad de ajuste a las condiciones dinámicas cambiantes del sistema. También se ha estudiado la escalabilidad del sistema

Decentralized collaborative transport of fabrics using micro-UAVs

Small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have generally little capacity to carry payloads. Through collaboration, the UAVs can increase their joint payload capacity and carry more significant loads. For maximum flexibility to dynamic and unstructured environments and task demands, we propose a fully decentralized control infrastructure based on a swarm-specific scripting language, Buzz. In this paper, we describe the control infrastructure and use it to compare two algorithms for collaborative transport: field potentials and spring-damper. We test the performance of our approach with a fleet of micro-UAVs, demonstrating the potential of decentralized control for collaborative transport.Comment: Submitted to 2019 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA). 6 page

Quadrotor team modeling and control for DLO transportation

94 p.Esta Tesis realiza una propuesta de un modelado dinámico para el transporte de sólidos lineales deformables (SLD) mediante un equipo de cuadricópteros. En este modelo intervienen tres factores: - Modelado dinámico del sólido lineal a transportar. - Modelo dinámico del cuadricóptero para que tenga en cuenta la dinámica pasiva y los efectos del SLD. - Estrategia de control para un transporte e ciente y robusto. Diferenciamos dos tareas principales: (a) lograr una con guración cuasiestacionaria de una distribución de carga equivalente a transportar entre todos los robots. (b) Ejecutar el transporte en un plano horizontal de todo el sistema. El transporte se realiza mediante una con guración de seguir al líder en columna, pero los cuadricópteros individualmente tienen que ser su cientemente robustos para afrontar todas las no-linealidades provocadas por la dinámica del SLD y perturbaciones externas, como el viento. Los controladores del cuadricóptero se han diseñado para asegurar la estabilidad del sistema y una rápida convergencia del sistema. Se han comparado y testeado estrategias de control en tiempo real y no-real para comprobar la bondad y capacidad de ajuste a las condiciones dinámicas cambiantes del sistema. También se ha estudiado la escalabilidad del sistema

Neural network control design for an unmanned aerial vehicle with a suspended payload

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) demonstrate excellent manoeuvrability in cluttered environments, which makes them a suitable platform as a data collection and parcel delivering system. In this work, the attitude and position control challenges for a drone with a package connected by a wire is analysed. During the delivering task, it is very difficult to eliminate the external unpredictable disturbances. A robust neural network-based backstepping sliding mode control method is designed, which is capable of monitoring the drone's flight path and desired attitude with a suspended cable attached. The convergence of the position and attitude errors together with the Lyapunov function are employed to attest to the robustness of the nonlinear transportation platform. The proposed control system is tested with a simulation and in an outdoor environment. The simulation and open field test results for the UAV transportation platform verify the controllers' reliability

Neural network control design for an unmanned aerial vehicle with a suspended payload

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) demonstrate excellent manoeuvrability in cluttered environments, which makes them a suitable platform as a data collection and parcel delivering system. In this work, the attitude and position control challenges for a drone with a package connected by a wire is analysed. During the delivering task, it is very difficult to eliminate the external unpredictable disturbances. A robust neural network-based backstepping sliding mode control method is designed, which is capable of monitoring the drone's flight path and desired attitude with a suspended cable attached. The convergence of the position and attitude errors together with the Lyapunov function are employed to attest to the robustness of the nonlinear transportation platform. The proposed control system is tested with a simulation and in an outdoor environment. The simulation and open field test results for the UAV transportation platform verify the controllers' reliability

A survey of single and multi-UAV aerial manipulation

Aerial manipulation has direct application prospects in environment, construction, forestry, agriculture, search, and rescue. It can be used to pick and place objects and hence can be used for transportation of goods. Aerial manipulation can be used to perform operations in environments inaccessible or unsafe for human workers. This paper is a survey of recent research in aerial manipulation. The aerial manipulation research has diverse aspects, which include the designing of aerial manipulation platforms, manipulators, grippers, the control of aerial platform and manipulators, the interaction of aerial manipulator with the environment, through forces and torque. In particular, the review paper presents the survey of the airborne platforms that can be used for aerial manipulation including the new aerial platforms with aerial manipulation capability. We also classified the aerial grippers and aerial manipulators based on their designs and characteristics. The recent contributions regarding the control of the aerial manipulator platform is also discussed. The environment interaction of aerial manipulators is also surveyed which includes, different strategies used for end-effectors interaction with the environment, application of force, application of torque and visual servoing. A recent and growing interest of researchers about the multi-UAV collaborative aerial manipulation was also noticed and hence different strategies for collaborative aerial manipulation are also surveyed, discussed and critically analyzed. Some key challenges regarding outdoor aerial manipulation and energy constraints in aerial manipulation are also discussed