Investigation of Flight Dynamics and Controls for a Solar-Tracker-Mounted UAV

Optimizing solar panel orientation with regards to the sun while minimizing power consumed by the tracking device could result in more efficient UAV power systems.

Air Force Research Laboratory, Unit 45002, APO AP 96338-5002

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have been widely used to carry cameras, sensors or products for applications such as mapping, frame monitoring, goods delivery, entertainment and more. The most common UAVs are powered by battery only, which limits the duration of operation. However, current batteries of the system depending on vehicle, payload, and wind conditions enable only flights up to 30 min for quadrotors, which can limit the usage of these UAVs for long time missions and experiments.

Battery powered electric UAVs suffer from uncertainties in estimating the remaining charge and hence, most flight plans are highly conservative in nature. Batteries also decrease in capacity with time and usage during operating. The output current plays a big role in determining the losses inside a battery and is an important parameter to consider when analyzing battery performance. For a long-time mission like large farm observation or border monitoring, a UAV must return to its recharging station, which limits its operation range. A technology of energy supply which makes a UAV operate longer and be able to recharge anywhere during its mission would be an advantage for continuous operation.