Dufour Aerospace Aero2 | Digest be it an actuator, its power source or its control source. “Again, there’s not much available in terms of servos for 200 kg UAVs – military actuators are too expensive, and hobby-grade actuators are too flimsy – but there are a few commercial suppliers that have the robustness and MTBF we’re after,” Bendrey says. “We’re using Hitec for our independent control surfaces, specifically an industrial version of one of their actuators, while Volz provides our elevator actuator, which is fully redundant in power and control. The elevator works hard during transition to augment the pitch, so the Volz servo manages higher loads relative to the other surfaces.” Dufour has over-specified the processor in its flight computer to leave bandwidth for future testing, optimisation and expansion of the flight control and autonomy stack (and achieve higher levels of certification in the future). At the time of writing, the prototypes were using single flight control systems without redundancies, but the design provides for redundant controllers depending on the use case and specific assurance integrity level. “We use several different protocols in the aircraft, although we try to keep things simple and industry-standard,” Kent explains. “For the most part it’s CAN buses for the telemetry systems, serial links for electronics, PWM for actuation control, and separate power and control links going to everything so that none of the subsystems create interference with each other.” The Aero2 uses a combination of inputs for navigation. Dual GNSS antennas are installed on top of the hull to ensure headings can be calculated during lift, descent and hover. The satnav also takes information from a MEMS IMU as well as a Simtec air data system designed originally for general aviation. The aircraft has as standard 40 kg of payload capacity and 12 kg of fuel capacity, although this can be traded off as needed for logistics, public safety, search & rescue and other missions Imagine the power of Arnold in a tiny metal box. Power, Precision, Performance: VOLZ Servos Reliability for progress VOLZ Servos - the most reliable servo solution, made for uncrewed and autonomous systems. www.volz-servos.com DA 15-N-HT
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjI2Mzk4