Virtual Cockpit 1.5 - Unmanned Aircraft & Drones

Ground Control StationHardware and SoftwareGround station hardware:The ground station requires the ground station hardware; commbox, Futaba compatible RCtransmitter, and ground station software. The Futaba transmitter is only used during developmentand is not required for autonomous flight.The ground station commbox consists of the mainboard, digital modem, and GPS. The main boardhas an 8bit CPU that decodes the pulse train fromthe transmitter into stick positions for controllingthe airplane. It also passes data from the digitalmodem to and from the ground station computerand parses position information from the GPS.The ground station has 3 main purposes. 1) Tosend up RC transmitter stick information to theaircraft for pilot in the loop control. 2) To handlecommunications between the ground stationcomputer and the aircraft. An AerocommAC4490-500 m is used to communicate with theairplane. 3) To pass the position information fromthe ground station GPS to the ground stationcomputer.Procerus Technologies www.procerusuav.com November 2004

Virtual Cockpit 1.5Ground station softwareThe Virtual Cockpit software runs on a PC computer and offers a graphical interface thatprovides the user control of the airplane by wirelessly interacting with the onboard KestrelAutopilot. The Virtual Cockpit is a complete software system that is used to configure, debug,program, and monitor the autopilot. Its various screens, status indicators, and display windowsare intuitive and easy to use. With professional simulated cockpit gauges you can easilyvisualize, manage, and control micro and mini UAVs.Features:• Moving map display with 'click N' fly' flight mission programming and in-flightwaypoint adjustment• Graphical flight instruments provide look and feel of an aircraft cockpit• Fully configurable integrated data loggingo Choose exactly what sensors or flight parameters to log• All sensors• Control inputs (from RC rx)• Control outputs (PID loop efforts)• Internal system variableo Choose data sample rate (up to 1khz)o Select number of samples and click "start"o When the requested number of samples has been collected, the ground stationwill automatically start downloading data with extra bandwidth on the data link.o Save the data log in either Microsoft Excel format or Mathworks Matlab format.• Real time mapping of PID loop performanceo Moving map allows user to compare desired values, actual values, and controlefforts of any PID loop• In-flight tuning of PID gainso Gains can be uploaded, downloaded, or saved to disk on the ground orprogrammed to flash memory on board the vehicle in-flight; user accessible andmodifiable• Graphical PID loop selectiono PID loop toggle switches allow users to select exactly what PID loops areenabled for PID tuning and different levels of autonomy• Remote server connectiono Connectable to PDA Ground Station Software forcontrol of airplane's: altitude, velocity, and rollangles from hand-held computer.o Capable of voice recognition with the followingcommands: turn left, turn hard left, turn right, turnhard right, climb, descend, speed up, slow down,go-home, orbit.PDA control of mini UAV:www.procerusuav.com/video/PDAvideo.aviProcerus Technologies www.procerusuav.com November 2004