Theory and Experiments for a Practical Usecase

Abstract

In many aerial robot applications such as search and rescue, the task consists on providing assistance in hostile environments such as mountains or civil areas after natural catastrophes. In this scenarios it is very likely that the terrain is not flat, making the landing and takeoff maneuvers of the aerial robot very complicate and unsafe. In contact-free conditions, the complexity of the task is increased by the underactuation of standard unidirectional-thrust aerial vehicle. In this chapter we shall show that the use of physical interaction, and in this case exploiting the tether, a unidirectional-thrust aerial vehicle can perform the task in a much robust and reliable way. In this chapter we will provide a formal study of the problem, proving the superiority of the tethered system. We shall then how how the results of Chap. 4 have been exploited to perform the task. A simple but effective trajectory generator is also derived for the particular task. Real experiments are presented validating the proposed method.