College Quadcopter Project

bshea85

bshea85

Member
Hi all,

I'm a college student and I was assigned a project involving a quadcopter. I would appreciate any help this forum can offer as I don't know much about quadcopters other than watching some neat Youtube videos. This is a list of things that the quadcopter must be able to do:
  • Fly in a flight pattern indefinitely, powered by a tether.
  • Hand flight control over to a user when remote is used.
  • Maintain an autonomous flight pattern when not controlled manually.
  • Will have a "perch" or landing pad, which is to be attached to a second floor railing overlooking a large atrium (flight will occur indoors).
  • If any problems occur, must be able to return to "perch" safely.
  • Entire system must cost $400 or less (though I may be able to negotiate for more).
  • Be able to upload custom programs.
  • Not kill anyone.
Now, the good news is, I'm not required to build a quadcopter from scratch, but I am basically responsible for getting all the right components/systems together. Personally, I feel that this project is not feasible and could turn into a huge liability issue (I'm thinking about what happens if this quadcopter loses control and careens into somebody's face). However, this is my task and I'm going to give it the "old college try." Can someone please send me in the right direction?
 
"Not kill anyone" is my favourite. Buy in all seriousness does anyone on your team have experience with Arduino, Raspberry Pi or Beagle Bone? How much time are you granted? Most of the flight controllers I know of that have similar features are out of your price range. Take a look at this link for an overview of prices and features most available flight controllers. To do what you are trying at such a budget, you'll want to go open source. The MutiWii is Arduino based as is the ArduPilot. there is probably not a big community behind it, but the Citrus All In One Pro is a fairly nice system at a low price. With the proper modifications it (along with about any open-source FC) could be made to do what you need.

As for the "not kill anyone" this might be a big help.



Sky-Walker-1306-Quadcopter1.png
 
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GJH105775 said:
"Not kill anyone" is my favourite. Buy in all seriousness does anyone on your team have experience with Arduino, Raspberry Pi or Beagle Bone? How much time are you granted? Most of the flight controllers I know of that have similar features are out of your price range. Take a look at this link for an overview of prices and features most available flight controllers. To do what you are trying at such a budget, you'll want to go open source. The MutiWii is Arduino based as is the ArduPilot. there is probably not a big community behind it, but the Citrus All In One Pro is a fairly nice system at a low price. With the proper modifications it (along with about any open-source FC) could be made to do what you need.

As for the "not kill anyone" this might be a big help.



Sky-Walker-1306-Quadcopter1.png
Click to expand...

Wow, thank you so much. The information about the flight controllers will definitely come in handy. After taking a brief look, it looks if the ArduPilot and Multiwii look promising, so thank you again for those suggestions.

To answer your question, some people on the team have limited experience with Arduino and it looks as if a lot of the flight controllers use Arduino tech. Suffice it to say, this project will be a learning experience for us all. Also, for our time-frame, we need to get this thing completed by May 5th, which adds a bit of pressure.

So, I have some more questions, if you're willing to help. You've given me a nice list of flight controllers, which was very helpful, but what other components am I looking for? So far, it looks as if I'll need a GPS receiver, radio receiver and remote transmitter (for manual control), battery-pack, brush-less motors (for indefinite flight), rotors, and a frame. Are there any other components I need to look at?

By the way, I like the caged frame you pictured, where can I get that?
 
Take a look at this diagram. 4 motors, 4 ESC (Electronic Speed Controllers), 1LiPo Battery, 1 Flight controller, and one Rx (Receiver). This is all on the quadcopter's side, and the simplest. you will probably add sensors like sonar/IR and GPS to your project.

wiring%20diagram%204.png
 
The simple part is getting it in the air. once you start having to control it to do what you want it gets tricky. Though all of what you have stated has been done, if your lucky one of those projects were opensource.
 
holtneil said:
Hi mate have you seen the TED videos they used pc to control quads with movement sensors take a look
Click to expand...


I have watched those, and this is what I was thinking about when I saw the post. All of this could be recreated with a Beagle Bone controlling the quads or a Raspberry Pi. I don't think that the Arduino alone could handle this, though if you add a connection between the Arduino and Wi-Fi or such it could.
 
After meeting with the team today, we all discussed our concerns with the project and tried to talk through each one of the design criteria. We feel that the project is not feasible as it is written and we are going to try to persuade the department into putting more money into the project, go completely battery powered, and to use the UAV only outside (due to liability issues, I doubt the insurance company will allow an uncontrolled drone to fly indefinitely in a populated atrium). Essentially, we want to just buy an RTF machine that uses either the Pixhawk or the APM flight controller like the 3DR Iris+. I like the ability to program a flight plan using an android phone. I'm sure the kids will get a kick out of it.
 
Great decision, I did not think it was possible on such a budget. The RTF will save you guys time that would be otherwise wasted on doing something that has been done too many times to be impressive. If I remember right there was a quadcopter controlled by a smart phone at CES.
 
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