During the last years, there is an increasing demand for cheap and easy to operate platforms for surveillance and reconnaissance purposes. Therefore, the development of Micro Aerial Vehicles (MVA) is receiving an increasing attention. However, especially Vertical Take-off and Landing (VTOL)-MAVs often show an inherent instability that makes at least an automatic stabilization necessary. This paper addresses the development of an integrated navigation system based on Microelectromechanical System (MEMS) inertial sensors and Global Positioning System (GPS) for a VTOL-MAV. The challenge hereby is the poor quality of the MEMS inertial sensors and the possibility of a permanent loss of GPS, e.g. inside buildings. While usually periods without GPS aiding can be bridged using the unaided strapdown solution, the rapid growth of navigation errors with time prohibits this approach here. Therefore, the navigation system described in this paper assures a sufficient accuracy of the attitude solution during GPS outages by handling the accelerometer data as approximate measurements of the local gravity vector. Additionally, the usage of a magnetometer providing measurements of the Earth's magnetic field is motivated and discussed. Finally, flight test results illustrate that the developed system is able to maintain an attitude accuracy that is sufficient for the automatic attitude control of the MAV. This holds in situations with permanent GPS loss and dynamic maneuvering, too. The paper describes the design of an integrated navigation system for a small four rotor helicopter, which comprises a MEMS Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) and a small, light-weight GPS-receiver. Additionally, a baro-altimeter and a magnetometer is included. A Kalman filter processes the accelerometer and magnetometer measurements, providing an estimate of the current attitude errors and gyroscope biases. Although the paper focuses on the type of VTOL-MAV shown in a figure, the integrated navigation system described here can also be applied to a variety of other vehicles, including fixed-wing MAVs, as long as the assumption holds that the accelerometer measurements are dominated by the local gravity vector.


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    Title :

    VTOL-MAV navigation: integration of MEMS inertial sensors and GPS


    Additional title:

    VTOL-MAV Navigation: Integration von MEMS Trägheitssensoren und GPS


    Contributors:
    Wendel, J. (author) / Meister, O. (author) / Schlaile, C. (author) / Trommer, G.F. (author)


    Publication date :

    2005


    Size :

    11 Seiten, 4 Bilder, 11 Quellen


    Type of media :

    Conference paper


    Type of material :

    Print


    Language :

    English




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