A miniature unmanned rotorcraft designed to fly inside a building could use a mothership that stays outside to help process indoor navigation decisions, say researchers at Linklab, a Linkoping University/Saab future aviation systems joint venture, writes Rob Coppinger.
The 600g (21oz), electrically powered UAV, with 280mm (11in) diamater coaxial contra-rotating rotors, is due to fly autonomously outside by July and researchers have longer-term plans for it to operate wirelessly from an unmanned mothership.
Launched through a window, the mini UAV would transmit sensor data from a laser radar or video feed, and the mothership would process the information.
"It is electrically powered, can run for 25min and is quieter than a gasoline-driven vehicle," says Simone Duranti, a systems engineer from Saab Aerosystems' decision support and autonomous systems unit, working with Linklab.
With the mini UAV weighing just 600g, designers can use commercial off-the-shelf parts and still build something that can fly through windows and doorways.
The vehicle could also use general packet radio service technology to send short video clips to a mothership or a third party.
In the next three months the Linklab also aims to operate a modified Yamaha R-Max agricultural UAV via mobile telephone. The telephone control would involve pre-programmed number sequences triggering pre-planned flightpaths.
The LinkLab is also researching automated decision-making, distributed and co-operative systems, human-machine interaction, indoor and outdoor navigation mapping and sensor fusion technologies.
Source: Flight International
