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Anatomy of A Drone
Anatomy of A Drone
Anatomy of a drone
• Airframe (structure)
• Fixed hardware
• Motors, speed controllers, servos
• Gimbal and camera?
• Avionics
• All electronics associated with Tarot Hex frame kit with landing gear,
maintaining flight speed controllers, motors, and props.
• Payload
• Mission dependent
• Cameras (thermal/visual/UV)
• Pressure, temperature, humidity, gas PixHack autopilot kit with GPS, PPM encoder,
sensor, deployable items telemetry modems, and power supply
Anatomy of a drone
Design Considerations
• Building a custom solution is a
systems integration problem
• Many components are available Payload mass
commercial off-the-shelf (COTS)
Total mass
Airframe Propeller or
wing size
Law of
Payload
diminishing
power returns
Battery Motor speed
voltage and and torque
capacity
Endurance
Speed controller
requirement current and voltage
Structure
Fixed Wing Airframes
Conventional Airplane Delta Wing Sailplane/Glider
Pitch
Airspeed
Roll
Throttle
*for the delta-wing the ailerons and elevator are combined into elevons
3DR Pixhawk has five serial Teensy 3.2 Microcontroller can Cables and adapters for
ports for communications with communicate over several serial connecting serial devices to a PC
GPS modules, telemetry radios, protocols (TTL, I2C, SPI) and also
or additional microcontrollers read analogue voltages
MultiGAS sensor with serial output 3DR telemetry modem U-BLOX NEO-7 GPS module
Avionics
Flight Computer
Common features
Standard external inputs
- GPS + magnetometer Multiple
- Airspeed power
options
Pilot inputs
- PPM
- SBUS Telemetry ports
- TTL serial
- I2C
PWM Outputs - USB
- Servos Internal sensors
- Speed controllers - IMU (accelerometers + gyro)
- Payload? - 2nd magnetometer
- Barometer
Avionics
Many options
Propeller Specs.
• Diameter
• Pitch – the amount of air “pulled” Phantom 9450 Anticlockwise Propeller
9.4” diameter, 5.0” pitch
through the propeller disc
• Greater diameter or pitch increases Brushless Motor Specs.
drag, therefore increases torque • Maximum continuous current
requirement of motor • Voltage range
• RPM, nominal airspeed, and blade • Kv (Motor Velocity Constant) is the
pitch must be matched for optimal RPM per volt
thrust to power ratio
DJI2312 960Kv
-high speed, low torque
-more slender
-14A max KDE4014XF 380Kv
-2-4S LiPo -low speed, high torque
-flatter and wider
-36A max
-4-8S LiPo
Avionics
Speed Controllers and Servos
Electronic Speed Controller (ESC) Specs.
• Maximum continuous current - match the motor
• Voltage range – stated in LiPo cell count (S)
• UBEC or OPTO options
• Connections usually include 3 wires to motor, 2
wires to battery, and control input via a standard
servo connector carrying a PWM signal Hobbyking ESC
• PWM input from flight computer sets the RPM 30A, 2-4S LiPo, UBEC
Servos
• Torque and speed are interchangeable. The
internal gear ratio is usually designed for
either high torque or high speed.
• Voltage range – normally 5 – 7.5V
• Controlled and powered by a single servo
connector (Vcc, GND, PWM)
HiTec HS7655TG
• PWM input from flight computer controls the
High torque, 4.8 – 6V arm rotational position
Long Range Data Communication
Sensor GPS+Time Wireless Radio Modems
• Often come transceiver pairs for two-way
Flight Computer
communication
• Act as virtual “wire” whereby serial data sent
Transmitter Modem into the transmitter is repeated at the receiver
• Bandwidth reduces as range increases
Antenna • Diversity system allows two antennas to
Replaces
wired serial
increase reliability and flexibility
connection • Antenna size is determined by the frequency
Antenna
Receiver Modem
VCC
GND
Ground Station Rx/Tx
RTS/CTS
3DR Radio Modem RFDesign Radio Modem
Storage Display • Single antenna • Diversity dual antenna
• <2km • <40km