Small aerial vehicles such as quad-rotors have been widely used commercially, for research and for hobby for the last decade with use still growing. The high interest is mainly due to the vehicles being small, simple, cheap and versatile. Among rigid body dynamics fast dynamics exist cohering to motors and other fast actuators. A linear quadratic control design technique is here investigated. The design technique suggests that the linear quadratic controller can be designed with penalties on the slow states only. The fast dynamics are modeled but the states are not penalised in the linear quadratic design. The design technique is here applied and evaluated. The results show that this in several cases is a suitable design technique for linear quadratic control design. MATLAB and Simulink have been widely used for design and implementation of control systems. With additional toolboxes these control systems can be compiled to and run on remote computers. Small, lightweight computers with high computational capacity are now easily accessible. In this thesis an avionics solution based on a small, powerful computer is presented. Simulink models can be compiled and transferred to the computer from the Simulink environment. The result is a user friendly way of rapid prototyping and evaluation of control systems.

The tumbling tip vortex effect of a reduced-scale, 1 m diameter, four-bladed rotor during hover is studied using vortex methods, combined with a center of mass analysis approach. Measurements of all three components of the velocity field are acquired using a stereo PIV system synchronized to capture up to 500 degrees of vortex age, with 10 degree wake age offsets, during hover conditions. The nominal operating condition of the rotor is at a rotational rate of 1520RPM, corresponding to ReC = 248,000 with a chord length of 58.5mm. The rotor is operated with a pitch of 7.2± 0.5 degrees and a CT/sigma of 0.045. The far wake vortex tumbling phenomenon is captured and described. It is shown that tip vortices from two blades tumble through approximately 90 degrees of rotation before they coalesce. It is also seen that the constituent parent vortices do not combine to create a stronger daughter vortex as was previously thought to happen. Instead, the merged vortex has a lower large-radius circulation than either of its parent vortices. An accurate characterization and prediction of the trajectory of the far wake vortex tumbling can enhance the ability to predict and alleviate the resuspension of particles during brownout as well as provide a database for far wake validation of CFD codes. / text

No description available.

Kassel, Universiẗat, Diss., 2007.

Universiẗat, Diss., 2008--Kassel.

Sensorless speed estimation in induction machines (IMs) presents an attractive proposition for eliminating the need for physical speed measurement sensors and thus avoiding the associated reliability and cost issues, such as the requirement of extra wiring, careful mounting, maintenance and adjustment. In this thesis, the feasibility of utilising the stator current and power signals to establish spectral search based (SSB) sensorless speed estimation schemes in wound rotor induction machines (WRIMs) operating in extended slip and open-loop controlled conditions is investigated. The research is performed on three different industrial WRIM designs. The thesis first investigates the spectral content of WRIM electrical and mechanical signals with the principal aim of identifying spectral patterns that can facilitate the development of real-time sensorless speed estimation. The examination is based on detailed harmonic models of the considered machine designs as well as experimental results obtained from tests performed on laboratory test rigs. A generalised theoretical analysis of the possible spectral content of machine signals that enables the derivation of closed form analytical expressions linking individual spectral frequencies to rotor speed is also undertaken. The results demonstrate that it is possible to clearly identify speed dependent components in the stator current and power signals and map the boundaries of the narrowbands maximised by these for extended slip and open-loop operating conditions. To enable improvement in attainable real time SSB estimation rates a dichotomous search algorithm real-time spectral processing method was employed for frequency tracking in this research. The algorithm performance is evaluated in real-time tests performed on a measured steady-state laboratory machine stator current and power signals. The results demonstrate that the dichotomous routine provides an inherent advantage in the frequency estimation rate without compromising the estimation accuracy and can therefore enable significant estimation rate improvement in SSB speed estimation algorithms. Novel sensorless speed SSB estimation techniques are then proposed for WRIM operation in extended slip and voltage/frequency controlled conditions. The algorithms utilise the reported analysis of electrical signals and are separately defined for each assessed operation mode and the stator current, phase power and three-phase power signals. It is shown that, in principle, power signal based estimation algorithms can offer an inherent capability of estimation rate reduction. A novel adaptive sliding window algorithm is defined for open-loop operating conditions that enable estimation in a wide operating speed range while minimising the potential for undesirable overlap with PWM harmonics. The proposed algorithms have been verified and their performance limitations assessed in real-time experiments on three different industrial WRIM designs. It is shown that reliable real-time speed estimation in steady-state and transient operating conditions is possible at an improved estimation rate while maintaining a low estimation error.

The aim of this thesis is to improve understanding of the effects of rotor-rotor interference on small scale rotor systems used on Micro Air Vehicles (MAVs). Previous research on rotor-rotor interactions has focused primarily on planar co-axial and tandem rotors of large scale rotorcraft. The work presented is distinct from prior research not only in its consideration of non-planar rotor systems, but also because of the lower Reynolds numbers and the use of fixed-pitch variable-speed propulsion systems. A design for a novel adjustable rotor interaction test-rig is presented along with a methodology for acquiring accurate and repeatable steady state performance data for two interacting rotor systems. Two six-axis force balances are used to acquire instantaneous and time averaged force and torque data and PIV is used to derive instantaneous and time-averaged flow field data for single and interacting rotor cases. The resulting performance and flow field data represents a unique dataset that can be used in the analysis of small scale rotor interactions, and in the validation of CFD investigations. Results show that for disc angles of between 180 degrees and 90 degrees interactions between rotors are negligible. As the disc angle is reduced from the orthogonal case to the coaxial case interactions significantly effect thrust, pitching moment, and efficiency. It is recommended that in the design of non-planar multirotor vehicles disc angles greater than 75 degrees are utilised to avoid the strong rotor-rotor interactions seen at lower disc angles. A review of existing and future non-planar multirotor concepts shows that the majority avoid significant rotor interactions by virtue of large disc angles.

Current wind turbine performance codes are not yet able to predict the rotor aerodynamic behaviour with sufficient certainty. This has led to both the over-design of blades and to operational restrictions in certain wind conditions. Essentially the problem is one of aerodynamic stall. Steady 3-dimensional stall can occur near the blade root in high wind conditions and may produce more power than predicted. Dynamic stall can also be expected due to the effects of yawed operation, turbulence, tower shadow and the earth's boundary layer. The main aim of this work is to provide a coherent set of measured aerodynamic data accounting for both axial/non-axial flow and stall in high winds. These measurements are designed to highlight the effects of both steady and dynamic stall on the rotor aerodynamic performance. In addition, the data will enable current performance prediction codes to be developed and validated. A completely new turbine has been designed and built at Cranfield to make aerodynamic measurements using pressure transducers. The design has been dominated by the requirements of accommodating the transducer signal processing equipment and allowing variation of many of the rotor parameters. Three commercial glass fibre blades were installed and performance curves measured on a conventional field site at a height of 11.5m for three rotor speed settings. These measurements show the turbine to give adequate power performance. A mobile trailer has been used to tow the turbine at a height of 4m along the Cranfield runways. Mobile testing facilitates an accelerated test schedule and allows aerodynamic data to be acquired under controlled wind conditions. A fully instrumented blade, fitted with forty transducers, has been tested under these circumstances and produced a large database of pressure measurements covering operation in winds up to 25 iq/s and yaw angles between -4511 and +55°. Analysis of the data has shown it to be of good quality and allowed some of the effects of yaw and stall to be identified. The use of the data base for performance prediction code validation has also been established.

No description available.

No description available.