Precision airdrop is a technology whose required capabilities have become more exacting as combat situations necessitate greater degrees of accuracy. Ballistic and parafoil type delivery vehicles do not have the capacity to consistently deliver a payload on, for example, a particular rooftop in an urban combat situation. A gliding autogyro delivery platform has been investigated as a means of achieving greater airdrop performance. The autogyro has similar gliding characteristics to the parafoil, but has improved wind resilience and control authority. An initial simulation, based on momentum and blade element helicopter theory, has been constructed. A classical controller using a multiple loop closure strategy has been developed that uses a new nonlinear guidance law to follow paths generated by an algorithm considering initial conditions. An extended Kalman filter is used for state estimation. Results from simulations show consistent accuracy of about 5 feet, with the final position error rarely exceeding 10 feet.
Simulation and control design of a gliding autogyro for precision airdrop
2005
94 pages , 3480916 byte , 3485516 byte
Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 2005.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 93-94).
Hochschulschrift
Elektronische Ressource
Englisch
Hardware options for gliding airdrop guidance systems
AIAA | 1979
|TIBKAT | 2005
|Emerald Group Publishing | 2007