Unit I - INTRODUCTION TO DRONE Flashcards
drone
An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or uncrewed aerial vehicle commonly known as a
drone, is an aircraft without any human pilot, crew or passengers on board.
unmanned aircraft system (UAS),
UAVs are a component of an unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which include
additionally a ground-based controller and a system of communications with the UAV
SOC
The SOC is a miniature computer on a chip of a present generation systems, especially a
drone system. It’s a semiconductor device and an integrated circuit that usually integrates
digital, analog, mixed signal, and radio frequency devices on a single chip. SOCs are
most commonly used in mobile computing and embedded systems.
* In general, there are three distinguishable types of SOCs: SOCs built around a
microcontroller, SOCs built around a microprocessor, and specialized SOCs designed for
specific applications
bottom side of the SO
. The bottom side of the SOC shows pins (called as
balls in a ball grid array), which are soldered on to a PCB to establish the connection with
the subsystems through PCB traces.
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Subsystems
Subsystems or electrical subsystems are technologies required in a system to fulfill the
intended usage of the system.
subsystems fall into any one of the
following computer architecture parts: input, output, storage, and communication
devices.
HARDWARE
Hardware is the electrical part of the drone system, which is eventually a PCBA (printed
circuit board assembly).
* Hardware is a multilayer PCB that accommodates the SOC (system on a chip) and
different
* components of the subsystems interconnected through copper traces (part of the PCB) or
physical wires. Figure shows the PCBA assembled with SOC and subsystems on the top
side (primary side).
SOFTWARE
- There are four categories of software that need to use on the drone system:
- Firmware components
5 - OS and drivers
- Sensing, navigation, and control
- Application-specific components
MECHANICAL
The mechanical system is basically the enclosures, form factor, or simple ID (industrial
design) of the drone.
* The ID determines the exterior and appearance of the drone. The ID of the drone will
usually have numerous mechanical parts in a complicated assembly with electrical parts
interconnected through mechanical or thermal interconnects.
* The most popular drone, has a quadcopter built from an X-frame or H-frame with four
servo motor/propeller units on each end with numerous other mechanical parts along with
the PCBA enclosed in plastic.
* A drone with frame as a base includes propellers, motors, landing gear, body (usually
PCBA, flight controllers, and motor drivers), and a battery
CLASSIFICATION
UAVs may be classified like any other aircraft, according to design configuration such as
weight or engine type, maximum flight altitude, degree of operational autonomy,
operational role,
Based on their weight, drones can be classified into five categories —
nano (weighing up to 250 g), Micro air vehicles (MAV) (250 g - 2 kg), Miniature
UAV or small (SUAV) (2-25 kg), medium (25-150 kg), and large (over 150 kg)
Based on the degree of autonomy
Drones could also be classified based on the degree of autonomy in their flight
operations. ICAO classifies uncrewed aircraft as either remotely piloted aircraft or fully
autonomous.
Some UAVs offer intermediate degrees of autonomy. for example, a vehicle that is
remotely piloted in most contexts but having an autonomous return-to-base operation.
* Some aircraft types may optionally fly manned or as UAVs, which may include manned
aircraft transformed into uncrewed or Optionally Piloted UAVs (OPVs)
Based on the altitude
Based on the altitude, the following UAV classifications have been used at industry
events such as Unmanned Systems forum:
* Hand-held 2,000 ft (600 m) altitude, about 2 km range
* Close 5,000 ft (1,500 m) altitude, up to 10 km range
* NATO type 10,000 ft (3,000 m) altitude, up to 50 km range
* Tactical 18,000 ft (5,500 m) altitude, about 160 km range
* MALE (medium altitude, long endurance) up to 30,000 ft (9,000 m) and range over
200 km
* HALE (high altitude, long endurance) over 30,000 ft (9,100 m) and indefinite range
* Hypersonic high-speed, supersonic (Mach 1–5) or hypersonic (Mach 5+) 50,000 ft
(15,200 m) or suborbital altitude, range over 200 km
* Orbital low earth orbit
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* CIS Lunar Earth-Moon transfer
* Computer Assisted Carrier Guidance System (CACGS) for UAVs
* Based on the composite criteria
An example of classification based on the composite criteria is U.S. Military’s unmanned
aerial systems (UAS) classification of UAVs based on weight, maximum altitude and speed
of the UAV component
TYPES OF DRONES
Combat: Combat drones are used for attacking in the high-risk missions. They are also
known as Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles (UCAV)
.Logistics: Logistics drones are used for delivering goods or cargo. There is a number of famous
companies, such as Amazon and Domino’s, which deliver goods and pizzas via drones.
Civil: Civil drones are for general usage, such as monitoring the agriculture fields, data
collection, and aerial photography
.Reconnaissance:
These kinds of drones are also known as mission-control drones. A drone is assigned to do a task
and it does automatically, and usually returns to the base by itself, so they are used to get
information from the enemy on the battlefield.
Target and decoy:
These kinds of drones are like combat drones, but the difference is, the combat drone provides
the attack capabilities for the high-risk mission and the target and decoy drones provide the
ground and aerial gunnery with a target that simulates the missile or enemy aircrafts
Research and development:
* These types of drones are used for collecting data from the air. For example, some drones
are used for collecting weather data or for providing internet.
TYPES BASED ON WING
There are three types of drones depending on their
wings or flying mechanism:
**A fixed wing drone ** or gliding droneshas a rigid wing. They look like airplanes. These types of drones
have a very good battery life, as they use only one motor (or less than the multi-wing).
They can fly at a high altitude.
ROTARY WING
* Single rotor: Single rotor drones are simply like helicopter.
Multirotor: Multirotor drones are the most common among the drones. They are
classified depending on the number of wings they have, such as tricopter (three propellers
or rotors), quadcopter (four rotors), hexacopter (six rotors), and octocopter (eight rotors).
TYPES OF MULTIROTOR DRONES
