The presented embodiments relates to a path-based flight maneuvering system and a method for providing easier operation control and enhanced operation capability of unmanned aerial vehicles and their associated features. The embodiments further entails a method for maneuvering an aircraft by means of a positioning device, a camera and a display displaying an image captured by the camera including a cursor projected on the image in the display.
The present invention relates to a system and a method for measuring and determining the depth, offset and translation in relation to one or several features in the field of view of an image sensor equipped UAV. The UAV comprises at least an autopilot system capable of estimating rotation and translation, processing means, height measuring means and one or more imaging sensor means. Given the estimated translation provided by the autopilot system, the objective of the present invention is achieved by the following method; capturing an image, initiating a change in altitude, capturing a second image, comparing the images and the change in height provided by the sensor to produce a scale factor or depth. If depth is estimated, then calculating the scale factor from the depth, and calculating the actual translation with the resulting scale factor.
The present invention discloses a rotor control system where rapid changes in rotor torque are transferred into moment forces acting about the blade pitch axis of a rotor blade in a thrust-generating rotor, to ultimately control the movements of a rotary wing aircraft. The moment forces acting on the rotor blade are transferred through a carefully adjusted damping member in order to allow rapid changes in rotor torque to create cyclic changes in blade pitch angle, while slow or permanent changes are cancelled out and affects the rotational speed and the thrust generated by the rotor, without permanently affecting the blade pitch angle of individual rotor blades.
Local wind fields can be predicted if both the airspeed and the ground speed of the helicopter are known. An aircraft that uses an inertial navigation unit, autopilot and estimator allows a measure of ground speed to be known with good certainty. The embodiments herein extends this system to allow an estimate of the local wind field to be found without actively using an airspeed sensor, but instead combining the measurements of an accelerometer and a drag force model and a model of controlled aerodynamics of the aircraft to estimate the airspeed, which again can be used to estimate the local wind speed.
The invention describes a method and device for precise control of and controller design for aircrafts consisting of at least one spinning part and at least one non spinning part. Typically, but without loss of generality, the spinning part is a rotor, whereas the non-spinning part is a fuselage. The principle described can be extended to any number of spinning and non-spinning parts, making the invention applicable to traditional single rotor helicopter design as well as multi rotor designs. The method and device is particularly suitable for UAVs, where the operator does not see the aircraft during all flight, and thus is unable to correct the attitude. However, the method is applicable also for model aircrafts and full size aircrafts. The inventions principle is to continuously and individually calculate the required torques for control of the spinning parts and for the non-spinning parts, and combine all torques to get the correct torque for the complete aircraft. Doing this, it's possible to continuously apply the correct torque, both correctly distributed among the roll and pitch axes (correct angle), and correct magnitude. The result is a decoupling of the roll and pitch axes, simplifying controller design to a design of two single input single output controllers, one for each axe.
The embodiments herein disclose a method and a remote control for controlling and monitoring surrounding areas of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) by an operator with a remote control comprising a flight display. The embodiments disclose combining the image captured by a UAV camera with a transparently overlaid positional and navigation map providing a perceptual view enabling the operator to have a complete overall view of the situation. Observation images overlaid by positional and navigation information in the way described has shown surprising and advantageous effects.
The present invention discloses a control interface for controlling an UAV formed by a bar with buttons on the bar head and a GUI displaying airplane like icons providing feedback of current steering control status of the UAV.
The embodiments herein disclose a personal UAV kit for storing, preparing and remote control of micro UAVs (40). The UAV kit includes a base unit (10), a control unit (30) and at least one UAV. The UAVs can typically be a winged aircraft with foldable wings or a helicopter with a two-bladed or foldable rotor. The base unit comprises UAV compartments for housing at least one UAV, bay (14) for storing the control unit, batteries and electronic components for charging, communication, control and processing and storing of data. In addition, the system includes an eye near display device for viewing system information and sensor data, typically live video, transmitted from the UAV.
The present invention provides a rotor assembly for helicopter vehicles for providing an easy way of controlling pitch, roll and lift of the aircraft by respective servo actuators (8a, 8b, 8c). The rotor assembly has a rotor shaft (5a) and at least two rotor blades (la) coupled to a rotor head (2) which in turn is connected to the rotor shaft. The rotor assembly further comprises a non- rotating swash plate (7) through which centre the rotor shaft runs, being adjusted to tilt around its entire radial axis. A respective pitch hinge (2b) for each rotor blade connecting said respective rotor blade to the rotor head is provided, wherein a hinge axis which the pitch hinge rotates around is generally parallel to and is positioned in front of the longitudinal centre axis of the respective rotor blade in the rotational direction. A respective guide member (6) for each rotor blade is connected to an inner blade tip (16). The inner blade tip is positioned in front of the hinge axis in the rotational direction, and the guide member is adjusted to follow an upper surface of the non -rotating swash plate when the rotor assembly rotates. One or more forces, e.g. a magnetic (3,4) and/or an aerodynamic force, are applied on the rotor blades being sufficiently strong to create a valve effect on the pitch hinge pressing the guide members downwards against the non -rotating swash plate, whereby movements of the non-rotating swash plate are transferred to blade pitch movements of the rotor blades.
B64C 27/605 - Transmitting means, e.g. interrelated with initiating means or means acting on blades mechanical including swash plate, spider or cam mechanisms
B64C 27/68 - Transmitting means, e.g. interrelated with initiating means or means acting on blades using electrical energy, e.g. having electrical power amplification
The present invention provides a rotor assembly for helicopter vehicles for stabilizing the aircraft and thus providing an easy way of controlling pitch and roll of the aircraft by respectively associated magnetic actuators. The rotor assembly comprises a rotor with two flexible rotor blades coupled to a rotor head which in turn is rotationally coupled to the rotor shaft, a rotating swash plate through which centre the rotor shaft runs, with at least three fly bars extending from and being distributed around said centre provided with a weight element on respective outer tips. The swash plate is further being rotationally coupled to and synchronized with the rotor shaft and adjusted to tilt in all directions relative to a plane perpendicular to the rotor shaft, wherein the rotor head is hinged to the rotor shaft in one direction so that the rotor head and the rotor blades jointly are able to tilt around their concurrent longitudinal axis, but not around their traversal axis. The rotating swash plate is also coupled to the rotor head by two tilt links being hinged to both the rotating swash plate and the rotor head, one at each side of the longitudinal axis of the rotor head, providing synchronized tilt movements between the rotor head and the rotating swash plate around the longitudinal axis of the rotor head.
B64C 27/605 - Transmitting means, e.g. interrelated with initiating means or means acting on blades mechanical including swash plate, spider or cam mechanisms
B64C 27/625 - Transmitting means, e.g. interrelated with initiating means or means acting on blades mechanical including rotating masses or servo rotors
The present invention discloses a rotor assembly that enables a rotor to be magnetically mounted on a rotor shaft. The thrust from the rotor is transmitted to the shaft by magnets, while mechanical members transfer torque from the shaft to the rotor. If the rotor blades hit an obstacle the magnetic forces will no longer be able to hold the rotor in place and it will disconnect from the shaft.
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