Experimental Study on Low-Cost Sensor Sensitivity of Inspection Quadcopter’s Anti-Collision System

Abstract

This manuscript presents the experimental study on low-cost sensor sensitivity of inspection quadcopter’s anti-collision system. This inspection quadcopter is designed to be operated in aerodrome or hanger for the inspection of wide body aircraft for lightning strikes. One of most important features that the inspection quadcopter must equipped with is anti-collision system. The anti-collision system will ensure the inspection quadcopter maintain a safe distance from the aircraft and other structures during the inspection process. As one of the project’s objectives is to design and develop an anti-collision system for the inspection quadcopter, it is aimed at developing using low-cost sensors and components. Experiments were done to choose the best low-cost sensor to be used as the rangefinder in the inspection quadcopter’s anti-collision system. The sensitivity of the low-cost sensors were tested by comparing the measured distance and the actual distance of obstacles. The percentage error reflects the sensitivity of the sensor under certain circumstances. The second objective of this research is integrating the best low-cost sensors the anti-collision system. The anti-collision system was programmed using Arduino IDE software. Lastly, the third object of this research, which is to experiment the performance of anti-collision system was achieved by performing the ground test on the anti-collision system of the inspection quadcopter. The performance of anti-collision was shown on the PWM correction signal generated by the anti-collision system. In conclusion, this paper shows the engineering approach on an industrial problem on developing an anti-collision system using low-cost sensors.