This document describes an embedded real-time system for autonomous flight control of an aircraft model. The system uses sensors like gyroscopes and accelerometers to acquire sensory data and control actuators like motors for autonomous flight. It is implemented on a microcontroller using the Erika Enterprise real-time kernel to manage tasks for flight control, communication with a ground station, and power consumption of devices. The system aims to allow both manual and autonomous flight modes while managing limited onboard resources in real-time.

1. AN EMBEDDED REAL-TIME
SYSTEM FOR AUTONOMOUS
FLIGHT CONTROL
Presented by
N.VINOTHINI
S.SORNA LAKSHMI

2. OBJECTIVE
 Our aim is to control flight system by using
autonomous aircraft model.
 This application is implemented on top of a
real-time operating system suitable for
embedded microprocessors, which manages
to sensory acquisition, flight control,
communication, and resource management
(including energy).

3. CONTENTS
 INTRODUCTION
 SYSTEM DESCRIPTION
A. Onboard controller
B. The real-time kernel
C. Sensors and actuators
D. Wireless communication system
 THE CONTROL APPLICATION
A. Sensor data capture
B. Actuators control
C. Real-time issues
 POWER MANAGEMENT
A. Dynamic voltage scheduling
B. Peripheral I/O
C. Kernel support
 CONCLUSION

4. INTRODUCTION
 This paper performs both autonomous
navigation and mission related activities, and it
allow easy interchange of sensors and for
adapting the vehicle to different monitoring
applications.
The aircraft model has two flight modes: manual
and autonomous.
 Manual mode,
 Autonomous flight mode.
 The application is implemented on the Erika Enterprise
real-time kernel with limited onboard resources.

5. SYSTEM DESCRIPTION:

6. System description
 The system performs
 sensory acquisition
 uses such data to trigger the motors for speed
 direction control during autonomous flight,
 control the power consumption of the external
devices
 send the relevant sensor information to the
ground station.

7. On board controller
 Microchip’s dsPIC 30F6014 microcontroller
 integrates the control features of a Micro-
Controller Unit (MCU) with Digital Signal Processor
(DSP).
 It is a 16-bit microcontroller with a maximum
processing power of 30 MIPS.
 program memory space of 144 Kbytes, a data
memory space of 8 Kbytes, and a non-volatile data
EEPROM of 4 Kbytes
 The MCU power management system allows
two modes, idle and sleep.
 The idle mode disables the CPU
 In the sleep mode, both the CPU and the system
clock source are disabled.

8. The real-time kernel
 ERIKA (Embedded Real time Kernel
Architecture) Enterprise real-time kernel. T
 configurable both in terms of services and
kernel objects (tasks, resources, and events).
 achieving a minimal memory footprint of 2
Kbytes.
 available for a wide variety of 8, 16, and 32 bit
CPUs.
 Two layers:
 HAL
 Kernel Layer

9. Sensors and actuators
 The microcontroller is connected to several
sensors.
 3 gyroscopes, one for each axis
 2 pressure sensors one inclinometer
 MMC (Multimedia Card) memory module
 digital 3-axis accelerometer
 temperature sensor
 GPS module
 wireless communication module
 video camera and infrared camera
 The microcontroller integrates the busses SPI
and I2C

10. Wireless communication system
 The data communication module-To exchange
information with the ground station.
 Two independent video channels for the
normal and infrared cameras.
 The receiver for manual control -normal
manual operations.
 A dedicated channel -to select the
manual/autonomous navigation mode.
 The solution adopted control separates the
manual control system from the
microcontroller.

11. THE CONTROL APPLICATION

12.  The UAV has six
degrees of
freedom, 3 linear
and 3 rotational
 sufficiently high
frequency (80 Hz)
control.

13. POWER MANAGEMENT
 All the systems are
powered by 2 different
battery packs.
 one for the receiver, the
manual/auto selection
custom board, the
throttle motor and flaps
servomotors.
 The second feeds sensors
and control board.
 monitoring based on
the Texas Instruments
bq27200 chip( Li-Ion
and Li-Pol ).

14. Dynamic voltage scheduling
 To save energy.
 By alternating two discrete clock frequencies,
 A PWM signal, to obtain the optimal clock value.
 To calculate different speeds.
 A combination of those two.
off-line calculation of the optimal
working speed is integrated by on-line
reclamation techniques.

15.  PERIPHERAL I/O
 Power consumption ranges from 1 up to 4
orders of magnitudes between enabled
and disabled modes
 A source of energy wasting is idle listening
and packet collisions
 KERNEL SUPPORT
 To get the maximum and minimum power
level
 To get the power level required by a
running, ready or idle task;
 To set the power level for a device
 To set/get the power level required by the
task

16. CONCLUSION
 This paper describes a real-time control
system for the autonomous flight of model
aircrafts.
 The description focuses on all the relevant
architecture components. The hardware
platform and software platform
 The platform is flexible enough to allow
changing the application specific sensors to
adapt the aircraft to other purposes, such as
surveillance or different monitoring activities