*********************************
There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
*********************************
Date & time: 29 May 2019, from 10:00-11:00 am
Location: MK 317
Title: Enabling Technologies for Autonomous Landing with Robotic Landing Gear
Abstract:
Runways or prepared landing sites are not always available for vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft, such as rotorcraft. Unprepared or moving surfaces encompass situations that result in the rotorcraft coming to rest outside of its ideal roll and pitch specifications. Research and development into robotic landing gear (RLG) for rotorcraft provided a tool for these aircraft to land on completely unprepared surfaces by articulating the gear until it conforms to the surface below the aircraft. This work proposes the development of two RLG technology contributions for autonomous rotorcraft landings on static or moving surfaces using RLG. Namely, these two technologies are a low force large deformation force sensor form ground contact sensing and a discrete, real-time sensor fused RLG controller. These technologies will be transformative from previous RLG research because of their ability to increase autonomy, reliability, and applicability for fielded VTOL systems. Each technology is developed generally from first principles and applied to a crashworthy, cable-driven four-bar mechanism RLG on a commercial airframe. Simulations are then used to improve each technology’s design for the specific application, and experiments are conducted to show their performance and benefits. A series of ground and flight tests on the commercial airframe are proposed to support each technology’s contribution to autonomous, robust, and practical RLG.
Committee members:
Dr. Claudio V. Di Leo, Advisor
School of Aerospace Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Dr. Ashish Bagai
buGi Aero, LLC
Dr. Julian J. Rimoli
School of Aerospace Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Dr. Jonathan Rogers
School of Aerospace Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Dr. William Singhose
School of Mechanical Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
