Simulation Environment for Multirotor UAVs

A Modular Simulation Environment for the Improved Dynamic Simulation of Multirotor UAVs

This simulation is part of the Master's thesis titled "A Modular Simulation Environment for the Improved Dynamic Simulation of Multirotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles", submitted to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in May 2016. The thesis itself can be found here: http://hdl.handle.net/2142/90660
Multirotor unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have gained immense popularity in both research and commercial applications due to their versatility and mechanical simplicity. However, despite these advantages, multirotor systems still constitute a considerable challenge in the design of powerful control architectures that guarantee safe and reliable flight performance. As is customary today, the design of guidance, control and navigation algorithms (GNC) is mostly performed in simulation. In order to guarantee a seamless transition between control solutions generated in a simulation environment and real-world flight performance, the simulation should reproduce real-world behavior with sufficient fidelity.
This simulation includes an improved dynamic model of an arbitrary multirotor UAV. The simulation is very modular and allows the user to specify just about any imaginable multirotor airframe, regardless of symmetry or specific layout. The included environmental effects also help to make the simulation behave more naturally when compared to flying a real UAV outside. The simulation includes all scenarios described in the accompanying thesis text. These include: arbitrary nonsymmetric airframe, the ability to change airframe mass or moment of inertia or introduce actuator failures during flight, aerodynamic drag on the airframe body, dynamic thrust generation, different aerodynamic propeller modes such as vortex ring state, and blade flapping effects. All these effects can be turned off by the user if so desired.
The controller currently implemented is an inner-loop angular rate control only. It is up to the user to implement a more advanced control scheme of their choosing.