Introduction to Unmanned Aerial Systems

Introduction

     On Monday March 10, 2014, our Geography 336 class met at the ground of the Eau Claire Indoor Sports Center (Figure One shows a reference map).  There was still a lot of snow on the ground, but the high temperature for the day was 50°F and the sun was shining brightly.  This day was used to get familiar with the different kinds of unmanned aerial systems and the kinds of cameras that can be used to take quick aerial imagery of a small area of interest.  There was a light constant amount of wind, making it not too difficult for the rotary crafts to be flown, but enough to fly the kite successfully.

Figure One - At the center of the map is the Eau Claire Indoor Sports Center

UAV Equipment

Multi-Armed Rotary Crafts

     The first UAV (Figures Two and Three) that we looked at was Joe Hupy's three armed rotary craft.  Each arm had two propellers on the ends of it.  Underneath the main craft was where the camera was mounted.  It was just a normal digital camera that was set to take pictures for a specific interval of time.  It was mounted in a way that no matter which way the aircraft was tilted while flying through the air, the camera was always pointing down.  Joe had a system put in place with his UAV so that you could look through this binocular head set that should exactly what the camera was shooting (Figure Three).  There were settings you could change about the camera right on the head set too.  This craft has a flight time of about 15 minutes.

Figure Two - Joe Hupy's three armed rotary craft in flight.

Figure Three - Nathan is looking through the headset to see exactly what the camera sees.

     Max (shown in Figure Four) is a physics student who has been working with Joe on these unmanned aerial systems.  He basically built this six armed rotary craft as a project (Figures Four and Five).  It only had one propeller on each arm, but having six arms appeared to be a more precise flyer.  Average flight time for this craft was also about 15 minutes.  Max told us that if for some reason something went wrong with the remote control and he wasn't able to drive it himself, the craft was programmed to automatically land at the same location that it took off from.  Technology is amazing!

Figure Four - Max, the physics student, flying his six armed rotary craft over the snow.

Figure Five - A close up of the six armed rotary craft in flight.

     Max flew both of these crafts (Figure Six) successfully just from a little remote control.  He began each flight at a distance away from the group of students just in case the take off was rough or if he would have a difficult time trying to control the craft.  Each craft was landed successfully around the same location without any crashes.

Figure Six - This shows both three and six armed rotary crafts side by side.

Kite

     The next piece of equipment we got to witness was the kite.  The kite was an up scale, but simple kite purchased at a place like Wal-Mart for about $80.  It came with poles that needed to be put together then attached to the kite.  Blake had used this kite in a class field trip to France, so he was appointed to set it up (Figures Seven and Eight).    

Figure Seven - Blake is shown setting up the kite.  He knew how to set up the kite because he had used it in a previous class.

Figure Eight - Blake is installing the poles into the kite to give it structure. 

     The wind was just right to fly a kite and we were in a wide open flat area that would allow the wind to keep the kite in flight.  All they had to do was hold the kite over their heads and the wind did the rest (Figure Nine).

Figure Nine - It looks like it is ready to fly!

Figure Ten - Blake is flying the kite about 30 feet above his head.  This was an attempt at a panoramic
 view upwards.  Since the kite was moving in the wind, the string looks broken up in the photo.

     While Blake was flying the kite, Joe set up a contraption that held a small digital camera (Figure Eleven). The kite was about 100 feet in the air before Joe attached the camera to the string of the kite (Figure Twelve).  Because it was attached to a string, the camera's weight was enough to make sure it was pointed down for most of the time while attached to the kite (Figure Thirteen).

Figure Eleven - Joe is figuring out how to attach the camera to this stringed contraption.

Figure Twelve -  Joe is attaching the camera to the string of the kite while Blake continues to fly the kite.

Figure Thirteen - Here flies the kite with the camera attached.

Rocket

     The last piece of equipment Joe wanted to try out was a rocket.  This was just a simple box rocket that Joe put together prior to this meeting.  Inside the main body were two engines, which in theory would make the rocket fly twice as high as it normally would.  After reaching its peak, there should be a parachute that opens up so the remainder can gently glide back to the surface with a soft landing.  The idea was to attach the camera to this part of the that would slowly glide down, and that is when the pictures would be most useful.  When finally putting the rocket into flight, it did not seem to fly too high and the parachute did not engage.  It turns out one of the engines were put in backwards, which meant only one of them went off.  Had it been put in correctly, the rocket could have flown higher.  Also, something was not quite right with the way the top was put on, which is why the parachute did not open up.

Figure Fourteen - Joe is taping the tiny camera on the rocket.

     Seeing all of these pieces of equipment close up was very useful in my understanding of unmanned aerial systems.  It is amazing how much work you can actually do with a small budget.