Testing procedure of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) trajectory in automatic missions

Abstract

This paper describes an experimental test campaign while using an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and measuring the obtained UAV positions during different flight tasks and in different operative conditions. A new test procedure has been presented and tested for different devices in various weather conditions. This paper describes and analyses the measurements of the flight trajectory of the UAV that was performed with the use of a robotic total station (RTS), as compared to the design data and the data recorded in the internal memory of the UAV. Five different test tasks have been conducted. The obtained results have allowed for the assessment of the correctness of task performance as compared to the design and to determine the flying accuracy of the entire UAV set. The proposed set of tasks can be successfully utilised to control the correctness of operation of various types of UAVs and it may be implemented as a universal test to verify the algorithms optimising take-offs and landings, test flights of the objects, as well as flight planning in various terrain and weather conditions, which will increase the safety of the flights while using UAVs.