Miniature Rotorcraft as Aerial Explorers

Ilan Kroo, Peter Kunz

Dept. of Aero/Astro
Stanford University
NASA/DoD Second Biomorphic Explorers Workshop

JPL Dec. 5, 2000

Outline
Introduction
Challenges
Development approach
Cooperative control issues
Summary and future directions

Introduction
Objectives:
Examine feasibility of small autonomous rotorcraft
Explore scaling issues and limits on feasible size
Develop some of the required technologies

Bio-Inspired aspects:
Insect-scale aerodynamics
Testbed for cooperative control / swarm behavior

The Concept: Meso-scale Flight

What is a meso-scale vehicle?

Larger than microscopic, smaller than conventional devices

Mesicopter is a cm-scale rotorcraft
Exploits favorable scaling
Unique applications with many low cost devices

Objectives
Is such a vehicle possible?
Develop design, fabrication methods
Improve understanding of flight at this scale

The Concept: Rotorcraft

Why rotorcraft for meso-scale flight?
As Reynolds number and lift/drag decrease, direct lift
becomes more efficient
Compact form factor, station-keeping options
More flexible take-off / landing
Direct 4-axis control

Scaling laws (and nature) suggest cm-scale flying devices

possible.

The Concept: Applications

Atmospheric Studies
Windshear, turbulence monitors
Biological/chemical hazard detection

Planetary Explorers
Swarms of low-mass mobile robots for
unique data on Mars, Titan
Terrain-independent

Aerial Explorers Complement Rovers

Planetary Explorer Missions

Accompany rovers
Atmospheric sampling
Imaging / mapping
Search
Earth, Mars, Titan

Features of Small Rotorcraft

Rotorcraft

Low ground speed

Operates in restricted areas
No runway requirement
Inefficient?

Small Vehicles
Favorable structural scaling
Lower cost (especially transport)
Many small > few large

The Concept: Challenges

Insect-Scale
Aerodynamics
3D Micro-Manufacturing
Power / Control /
Sensors

Challenges: Aerodynamics

Insect-scale aerodynamics
Highly viscous flow
All-laminar
Low L/D

New design tools required

Approach

Advanced aerodynamic analysis and design

methods
Novel manufacturing approaches
Teaming with industry for power and control
concepts
Stepwise approach using functional scale
model tests

Approach: Aerodynamics
Navier-Stokes analysis of rotor
sections at unprecedented low
Reynolds number
Novel results of interest to Mars
airplane program
Nonlinear rotor analysis and
optimization code

Aerodynamics: Section Optimization

Nonlinear optimization coupled with

Navier-Stokes simulation
New very low Re airfoil designs
Improved performance compared with
previous designs

Section Optimization
Preliminary solution
bears strong resemblance
to dragonfly section
(Newman 1977)
Structural advantages to
insect section

Optimized Solution

Aerodynamics: Section Flight Testing

Micro sailplanes permit testing of

section properties
Difficulties with very low force
measurements in wind tunnel
avoided
Optical tracking system

Aerodynamics: Rotor Optimization

Chord, twist, RPM, blade number designed
using nonlinear optimization
3D analysis based on Navier-Stokes section
data
Rotor matched with measured motor
performance

Approach: Rotor Manufacturing

1. Micro-machine bottom
surface of rotor on wax

3. Remove excess
epoxy

2. Cast epoxy

4. Machine top
surface of rotor

5. Melt wax

Rotor Manufacturing: Materials and Methods

Wide range of rotor designs

fabricated and tested
Scales from .75 cm to 20 cm
Materials include epoxy,
polyurethanes, carbon

Power and Control Systems:

Sensors / Control Laws
Innovative passive stabilization
under test at larger scale
Linear stability analysis suggests
configuration features
MEMS-based gyros provide
damping

Approach: Prototypes
Initial 3g device with external
power, controllers
Basic aero testing complete
Issues: S&C, electronics
miniaturization, power

Approach: Prototypes
Capacitor powered mesicopter
5mm Smoovy
Integrated electronics
Shrouded frame

Approach: Prototypes

Low cost unaugmented 60g

system
Includes receiver, speed
controllers, lithium batteries
Closed loop control using offboard vision

Approach: Prototypes
PC-board system with
digital communication and
on-board microcontroller

Mesicopter Development: Prototypes

Prototypes
From 13g to 200g

Flight video

Mars Rotor Development

Very low Re
environment
Tests in Mars
atmosphere
simulator at
JPL

Mesicopters as Cooperative
Control Testbeds

Ideal for studying collaborative control strategies (CO, COIN)

Multi-resolution mapping mission
Decentralized control and navigation
DoD / NASA applications
Real, 3D problem features

Control Approaches
Self-organizing systems display interesting emergent
behavior.
Self-optimizing systems display desired emergent
behavior.
Approaches here employ nonlinear optimization, exploit
recent progress in distributed design and large-scale MDO.
Focus on high-level control, planning

Control Approaches
Centralized design
Behavior of each agent determined by system-level control law

Heuristic rules
Individual actions determined by global rules, local data

Reduced basis optimization

Rules used to reduce dimensionality of optimal design problem

Distributed design
Individuals seek local goals leading to desired system properties

An Example Application
Simple example to illustrate approaches:
Formation flight of geese
Goal is not just to maintain formation, but to optimize
performance
Include aerodynamic interactions, test control concepts

Formation Flight of Geese

Each bird leaves wake that influences
others. Drag includes viscous, selfinduced, interference.
Objective to is maximize the range of
the group (minimize drag of least
fortunate individual).
Control is individual speed
Consider coplanar formation (optimal)

Centralized Design
Nonlinear optimization used
directly to find best speed and
position.
Works in steady case for
limited size flock, good initial
distributions.
Fails completely in other
cases, scales poorly.

Heuristic Rules
Assume V-Formation
Set Vi = V0 + k (xi xi-1 Dx0)
Specify reasonable values of V0, k, Dx0
Drag reduction is achieved
Requires little communication

Reduced Basis Rule Design

Use rule to reduce design dimensionality
Optimize V0, k, Dx0 using nonlinear programming for
steady state solution or Monte Carlo.
This works but:
Not robust. Individual parameters sensitive to uncertainties, disturbances
Not correct (sub-optimal)

Distributed Design
Concept:
Let each individual seek best local solution.
Choose objective definition and decomposition to produce system
optimum.

Exploit previous work:

Collaborative optimization and MDO
Collective Intelligence concepts

Distributed Design
Collaborative optimization (CO):
Multi-agent control problem analogous to large scale multidisciplinary
design optimization problem.
CO is a multi-level decomposition and design strategy developed to solve
this.

Collective intelligence (COIN):

Ideas under development in AI (NASA Ames) to help select local
objectives.
Useful in traffic management, economics, network routing.

Distributed Design Example

Greedy objective: every goose flies at speed that
minimizes his or her drag with interference
Result: Tragedy of the Commons
Example

Distributed Design Improved

Basic idea:
Modify local objectives to include effect on others.

Specific idea:
Vote on best speed to fly, then fly at Vi = ( k1 Vv + k2 Vi*)
k2/k1 determines self-interest or altruism

Distributed Design Improved

Control History
Collaborative, rulebased control law

Distributed Design
Result is a robust
method that efficiently
produces correct
solutions with limited
communications
Distributed design
approaches allow think
globally, act locally to
work.

Mesicopter Status
5 self-powered prototypes at various scales
Largest (200g) can carry video, INS, digital
FCS and fly for 15 min
Successful closed-loop hover demo using offboard vision
Work continues on FCS, simulation, optical
flow stabilization, inter-vehicle
communication

Future Work
Near-term applications
Testbed for multi-agent, cooperative control
Earth-based tests

Longer term aspects

Mars rotorcraft
Alternate power source potential
Further miniaturization of electronics

Acknowledgements
Work supported by:
NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts
JPL
Langley, Ames

Work undertaken by:

Profs. Prinz, Kroo
5 Stanford Ph.D. students