Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T04:22:13.316Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

On-board cable attitude measurement and controller for outdoor aerial transportation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 September 2021

Pratik Prajapati
Affiliation:
Human-Centered Robotics Lab, IIT Gandhinagar, Ahmedabad, India
Sagar Parekh
Affiliation:
Human-Centered Robotics Lab, IIT Gandhinagar, Ahmedabad, India
Vineet Vashista*
Affiliation:
Human-Centered Robotics Lab, IIT Gandhinagar, Ahmedabad, India
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract

Deploying quadcopters for aerial transportation can be cost effective in impromptu material handling applications. However, such applications are limited mainly due to the requirement of onboard localization sensors and associated computation. The current work presents a human-controlled modality to successfully execute spontaneous outdoor flight of a quadcopter with a cable-suspended payload. Stable and smooth flights are achieved through an onboard integration of a custom-built sensor system and a controller to minimize payload oscillations. The feasibility of the proposed modality is demonstrated by conducting outdoor experiments and a case study in an unstructured environment.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Cubero, S., Industrial Robotics: Theory, Modelling and Control (Pro Literatur Verlag, 2006).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, M. and Matson, E. T., “A Cost-Optimization Model in Multi-Agent System Routing for Drone Delivery,” In: International Conference on Practical Applications of Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (Springer, 2017), 40–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thomas, J., Loianno, G., Polin, J., Sreenath, K., and Kumar, V., “Toward autonomous avian-inspired grasping for micro aerial vehicles,” Bioinsp. Biomimet. 9(2), 025010 (2014).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mellinger, D., Lindsey, Q., Shomin, M. and Kumar, V., “Design, Modeling, Estimation and Control for Aerial Grasping and Manipulation,” In: 2011 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IEEE, 2011) pp. 26682673.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mellinger, D., Shomin, M., Michael, N. and Kumar, V., “Cooperative Grasping and Transport Using Multiple Quadrotors,” In: Distributed Autonomous Robotic Systems (Springer, 2013) pp. 545558.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Loianno, G. and Kumar, V., “Cooperative transportation using small quadrotors using monocular vision and inertial sensing,” IEEE Robot. Automat. Lett. 3(2), 680687 (2017).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, Z., Singh, S., Pavone, M. and Schwager, M., “Cooperative Object Transport in 3D with Multiple Quadrotors Using No Peer Communication,” In: 2018 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (May 2018) pp. 1064–1071.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, S., Choi, S. and Kim, H. J., “Aerial Manipulation Using a Quadrotor with a Two DOF Robotic Arm,” In: 2013 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IEEE, 2013) pp. 49904995.Google Scholar
Pereira, P. O., Zanella, R. and Dimarogonas, D. V., “Decoupled Design of Controllers for Aerial Manipulation with Quadrotors,” In: 2016 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) (2016) pp. 4849–4855.Google Scholar
Lindsey, Q., Mellinger, D. and Kumar, V., “Construction of cubic structures with quadrotor teams,” Proc. Robot. Sci. Syst. VII (2011).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Augugliaro, F., Lupashin, S., Hamer, M., Male, C., Hehn, M., Mueller, M. W., Willmann, J. S., Gramazio, F., Kohler, M. and D’Andrea, R., “The flight assembled architecture installation: Cooperative construction with flying machines,” IEEE Cont. Syst. Mag. 34(4), 4664 (2014).Google Scholar
Augugliaro, F., Mirjan, A., Gramazio, F., Kohler, M. and D’Andrea, R., Building tensile structures with flying machines,” In: 2013 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IEEE, 2013) pp. 34873492.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mirjan, A., Gramazio, F., Kohler, M., Augugliaro, F. and D’Andrea, R., Architectural Fabrication of Tensile Structures with Flying Machines,” In: Green Design, Materials and Manufacturing Processes (2013) pp. 513518.Google Scholar
Sreenath, K., Lee, T. and Kumar, V., “Geometric Control and Differential Flatness of a Quadrotor UAV with a Cable-Suspended Load,” In: 52nd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (IEEE, 2013) pp. 22692274.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sreenath, K., Michael, N. and Kumar, V., “Trajectory Generation and Control of a Quadrotor with a Cable-Suspended Load-A Differentially-Flat Hybrid System,” In: 2013 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (IEEE, 2013) pp. 48884895.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kotaru, P., Wu, G. and Sreenath, K., “Differential-Flatness and Control of Quadrotor(s) with a Payload Suspended Through Flexible Cable(s),” In: 2018 Indian Control Conference (ICC) (2018) pp. 352–357.Google Scholar
Zeng, J., Kotaru, P., Mueller, M. W. and Sreenath, K., “Differential flatness based path planning with direct collocation on hybrid modes for a quadrotor with a cable-suspended payload,” IEEE Robot. Automat. Lett. 5(2), 30743081 (2020).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zeng, J., Kotaru, P. and Sreenath, K., “Geometric Control and Differential Flatness of a Quadrotor UAV with Load Suspended from a Pulley,” In: 2019 American Control Conference (ACC) (2019) pp. 24202427.Google Scholar
Tang, S. and Kumar, V., “Mixed Integer Quadratic Program Trajectory Generation for a Quadrotor with a Cable-Suspended Payload,” In: 2015 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (IEEE, 2015) pp. 2216–2222.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foehn, P., Falanga, D., Kuppuswamy, N., Tedrake, R. and Scaramuzza, D., “Fast Trajectory Optimization for Agile Quadrotor Maneuvers with a Cable-Suspended Payload,” In: Robotics: Science and Systems (2017) pp. 110.Google Scholar
De La Torre, G., Theodorou, E. and Johnson, E. N., “Autonomous Suspended Load Operations via Trajectory Optimization and Variational Integrators,” J. Guid. Cont. Dyn. 40(2), 278291 (2017).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dai, S., Lee, T. and Bernstein, D. S., “Adaptive Control of a Quadrotor UAV Transporting a Cable-Suspended Load with Unknown Mass,” In: 53rd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (IEEE, 2014) pp. 61496154.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Guo, D. and Leang, K. K., “Image-based estimation, planning, and control of a cable-suspended payload for package delivery,” IEEE Robot. Automat. Lett. 5(2), 26982705 (2020).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Guerrero-Sánchez, M. E., Mercado-Ravell, D. A., Lozano, R. and García-Beltrán, C. D., “Swing-attenuation for a quadrotor transporting a cable-suspended payload,” ISA Transactions 68, 433449 (2017).Google ScholarPubMed
Faust, A., Palunko, I., Cruz, P., Fierro, R. and Tapia, L., “Learning Swing-Free Trajectories for UAVs with a Suspended Load,” In: 2013 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (IEEE, 2013) pp. 49024909.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Faust, A., Palunko, I., Cruz, P., Fierro, R. and Tapia, L., “Automated Aerial Suspended Cargo Delivery Through Reinforcement Learning,” Artif. Intell. 247, 381398 (2017).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee, T., Sreenath, K. and Kumar, V., “Geometric Control of Cooperating Multiple Quadrotor UAVs with a Suspended Payload,” In: 52nd IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (IEEE, 2013) pp. 55105515.Google Scholar
Goodarzi, F. A. and Lee, T., “Stabilization of a rigid body payload with multiple cooperative quadrotors,” J. Dyn. Syst. Meas. Cont. 138(12), 121001 (2016).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mohammadi, K., Sirouspour, S. and Grivani, A., “Control of multiple quad-copters with a cable-suspended payload subject to disturbances,” IEEE/ASME Trans. Mechatron. 25(4), 17091718 (2020).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gassner, M., Cieslewski, T. and Scaramuzza, D., “Dynamic Collaboration without Communication: Vision-Based Cable-Suspended Load Transport with Two Quadrotors,” In: 2017 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (IEEE, 2017) pp. 5196–5202.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bisgaard, M., A. l. Cour-Harbo, E. N. Johnson and J. D. Bendtsen, “Vision aided state estimator for helicopter slung load system,” IFAC Proc. Vol. 40(7), 425–430 (2007).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tang, S., Wüest, V. and Kumar, V., “Aggressive flight with suspended payloads using vision-based control,” IEEE Robot. Automat. Lett. 3(2), 11521159 (2018).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bernard, M. and Kondak, K., “Generic Slung Load Transportation System Using Small Size helicopters,” In: 2009 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (2009) pp. 32583264.Google Scholar
Tagliabue, A., Kamel, M., Verling, S., Siegwart, R. and Nieto, J., “Collaborative Transportation Using MAVs via Passive Force Control,” In: 2017 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (IEEE, 2017) pp. 5766–5773.Google Scholar
Tagliabue, A., Kamel, M., Siegwart, R. and Nieto, J., “Robust collaborative object transportation using multiple MAVs,” Int. J. Robot. Res., 0278364919854131 (2017).Google Scholar
Lee, D., Franchi, A., Son, H. I., Ha, C.-S., Bülthoff, H. H. and Giordano, P. R., “Semiautonomous haptic teleoperation control architecture of multiple unmanned aerial vehicles,” IEEE/ASME Trans. Mechatron. 18(4), 13341345 (2013).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Masone, C., Bülthoff, H. H. and Stegagno, P., “Cooperative Transportation of a Payload Using Quadrotors: A Reconfigurable Cable-Driven Parallel Robot,” In: 2016 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) (2016) pp. 1623–1630.Google Scholar
Prajapati, P., Parekh, S. and Vashista, V., “On the Human Control of a Multiple Quadcopters with a Cable-Suspended Payload System,” In: 2020 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) (2020) pp. 2253–2258.Google Scholar
Prajapati, P., Parekh, S. and Vashista, V., “Collaborative Transportation of Cable-Suspended Payload Using Two Quadcopters with Human in the Loop,” In: 2019 28th IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN) (IEEE, 2019) pp. 1–6.Google Scholar
Vergouw, B., Nagel, H., Bondt, G. and Custers, B., “Drone Technology: Types, Payloads, Applications, Frequency Spectrum Issues and Future Developments,” In: The Future of Drone Use (Springer, 2016) pp. 2145.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Perez-Grau, F. J., Ragel, R., Caballero, F., Viguria, A. and Ollero, A., “Semi-Autonomous Teleoperation of UAVs in Search and Rescue Scenarios,” In: 2017 International Conference on Unmanned Aircraft Systems (ICUAS) (IEEE, 2017) pp. 1066–1074.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Michael, N., Mellinger, D., Lindsey, Q. and Kumar, V., “The grasp multiple micro-UAV testbed,” IEEE Robot. Automat. Mag. 17(3), 5665 (2010).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fortin-Côté, A., Cardou, P. and Campeau-Lecours, A., “Improving Cable Driven Parallel Robot Accuracy through Angular Position Sensors,” In: 2016 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) (2016) pp. 4350–4355.Google Scholar
Meier, L., Tanskanen, P., Fraundorfer, F. and Pollefeys, M., “Pixhawk: A system for autonomous flight using onboard computer vision,” In: 2011 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (2011) pp. 29922997.Google Scholar