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Anthony Luo Dhruv Upadhyay pls halp
The Attitude Manager is designed to maintain attitude and stability of the quadcopter, residing on a separate chip and taking commands from operator inputs or from PM Waypoints. This module functions as an asynchronous (PLEASE CONFIRM) State machine with 7 (PLEASE CONFIRM) distinct states.
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Kinematic Controls Module
This controls module resides within Attitude Manager, and is responsible for keeping the drone in the air in all states of motion. At it’s simplest, the kinematic controls module ensures that our quadcopter always moves from our current position to a target position within a specified distance. It does this by using a variety of PID controllers on a quadcopter modelled in the la place domain.
In teleoperated scenarios, our controls algorithms use the remote inputs as target set-distances, before generating trajectories (either as splines, curves, or straight lines) that our controllers will aim to follow. This means that the operator is able to focus on flying to the right locations, instead of having to maintain attitude of the quadcopter. In fully automated flight, our controls algorithms work together with Path manager to define fine splines and curves to follow, allowing more complex flight dynamics using more advanced controllers.
In the event there are unseen variables such as wind gusts or payload balance changes that affect the attitude of the drone, the Controls module will compensate automatically to keep flying towards the location that the operator or Path Management have specified.
BVLOS
The on-board autopilot is fully capable of autonomous navigation. Its main method of doing so is by following a pre-loaded path of GPS waypoints. This path can be adjusted by the groundstation on the fly if need be. To do so, Path Manager constantly reads GPS and altitude data, and uses a waypoint navigation algorithm to determine the optimal real time attitude and airspeed of the aircraft in order to achieve the path as quickly as possible. The Attitude Manager in the safety firmware then reads those commands and uses a series of PID algorithms to produce real time aileron, rudder, elevator and throttle positions in order to achieve the requested attitude/airspeed as quickly as possible.
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