Vector field path following for a micro flapping-wing robot
Huang, Haifeng; Liu, Yingte; Niu, Tao; Wang, Chang; Zou, Yao; He, Wei
Sci China Inf Sci, 2024, 67(6): 164201
Flapping-wing robots mimic the flight patterns of natural flying creatures, granting them natural camouflage. They hold promising applications in the military reconnaissance, urban surveillance, and various other fields. However, the current limitations in size often restrict the suitability of existing bird-like flapping-wing robots, such as E-Flap and USTBird, for indoor tasks. Furthermore, while micro flapping-wing robots such as Delfly and H2Bird excel in navigating confined spaces, their progress towards attaining stable autonomous flight capabilities requires further development. Accurately following preplanned paths is essential for enabling micro flapping-wing robots to autonomously execute tasks. Among the path following algorithms currently in use, the vector field algorithm stands out for its ability to minimize cross-track error and control effort in guiding miniature air vehicles, but its application to micro flapping-wing robots has yet to be explored. This work presents two primary contributions. First, a novel X-wing flapping-wing robot capable of hovering and stable flight was designed. Second, a vector field-based guidance algorithm was proposed for the autonomous straight-line path following of the robot, and flight experiments verified the effectiveness of the control system.