| Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are useful in wide range of applications. Among their applications are search and rescue in the aftermath of a catastrophe or surveillance of hazardous areas. However, complexity of their dynamical model and intense computation for autonomous path planning hinders wider use. In this work a more intuitive and accurate method for modeling PUC-Fly, a UAV with coaxial rotor configuration is discussed. The effectiveness of the model is verified by simulation and compared with dynamical equations derived based on multibody dynamics technique. The model derived is utilized successfully for a controller design in another project. Finally, a new real time path planning method is introduced which combines fuzzy based method with gap searching technique. With no prior map of environment, this method uses easy to implement functions to follow a near global distance optimal trajectory. Simulation results show the effectiveness of this method for small scale helicopters with limited sensing and computational capabilities. |
