A system is designed to deploy and support a tethered ground robot from an autonomous helicopter. A winch is designed and built. Electrical hardware for power distribution and control are designed. Several applied controls problems are investigated. A control architecture is established and low level controllers are designed to meet the demands of two higher level algorithms. A tether tension controller is designed to avoid the danger of excess slack in the tether interfering with the robot's mobility. A payload sway damping controller is investigated and simulated. Its is shown to be effective in damping dangerous payload oscillations by modulating the vertical manipulation of the winch during hoisting. Future design recommendations are given regarding improvements for a second design iteration. / Master of Science

A tension control algorithm for the deployment of a unmanned ground vehicle from an autonomous helicopter is designed and tested in this thesis. The physical hardware which the controller will run on is detailed. The plant model and underlying controllers are derived and modeled. The tension controller algorithm is selected, derived, and modeled. The parameters of the tension controller are chosen and simulations are run with the chosen parameters. The tension control algorithm is run on the physical hardware, successfully demonstrating tension control on a ground vehicle. Robustness simulations are run for a change in the radius of the spool and the length of the tether. Lastly, Future work is outlined on several paths to move forward with the tension controller. / Master of Science