Wind Characterization Using Onboard IMU of sUAS

Donnell, Geoffrey W.; Feight, Jordan A.; Lannan, Nate; Jacob, Jamey

doi:10.2514/6.2018-2986

Cited by 27 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…Wind can be determined using two different approaches in UAVs: Indirect methods measure the response of the UAV to the wind and can determine wind speed, azimuth and elevation directly from the sensors that are also used to control the UAV (e.g. Neumann et al, 2010;Johansen et al, 2015;Xiang et al, 2016;Lauer and Fengler, 2017;Donnell et al, 2018). Such methods require knowledge about the inertia and drag coefficients of the UAV in a larger set of situations.…”

Section: Uav-based Wind Speed Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the past, full-sized sonic anemometers were rarely applied to UAVs due to size and weight constraints (Elston et al, 2014). An exception is presented by Donnell et al (2018) and Natalie and Jacob (2019), where a full-sized 1.7 kg sonic sensor (R.M. Young 81000 3D ultrasonic anemometer) has been attached to a large, 12 kg commercial multirotor (DJI M600).…”

Section: Uav-based Wind Speed Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the study from Donnell et al (2018), measurements were averaged in bins of 10 s, the resulting wind speed has a bias of 16% and a root-mean-square-error (RMSE) of 46%. The wind azimuth has a bias of -59 • with an RMSE of 114 • .…”

Section: Uav-based Wind Speed Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A distance of 0.97 rotor diameters was used in the two studies mentioned above. These circumstances might explain the relatively large measurement uncertainty in Donnell et al (2018) and Natalie and Jacob (2019) despite the use of an industry standard sonic anemometer.…”

Section: Uav-based Wind Speed Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Lately, several small-sized sonic anemometer have become commercially available (e.g. Decagon Devices DS-2, Anemoment TriSonica, FT Technologies FT205), which have subsequently been successfully applied to UAVs (Palomaki et al, 2017;Donnell et al, 2018;Nolan et al, 2018;Hollenbeck et al, 2018;Natalie and Jacob, 2019;Adkins et al, 2020). Palomaki et al (2017) used a small 2D sensor (Decagon Devices DS-2) on a DJI Flame Wheel F550 hexrotor.…”

Section: Uav-based Wind Speed Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Towards accurate and practical drone-based wind measurements with an ultrasonic anemometer

Thielicke¹,

Hübert²,

Müller³

2020

Preprint

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Abstract. Wind data collection in the atmospheric boundary layer benefits from short term wind speed measurements using unmanned aerial vehicles. Fixed and rotary wing devices with diverse anemometer technology have been used in the past to provide such data, but the accuracy still has the potential to be increased. We developed a light weight drone (weight including sensor 45 min) for carrying an industry standard precision sonic anemometer. Accuracy tests have been performed with the isolated anemometer at high tilt angles in a calibration wind tunnel, with the drone flying in a large wind tunnel, and with the full system flying at different heights next to a bistatic lidar reference. The propeller-induced flow deflects the air to some extent, but this effect is compensated effectively. Our data fusion shows no signs of crosstalk between ground speed and wind speed. When compared with the bistatic lidar in very turbulent conditions, with 10 seconds averaging interval and with the UAV constantly circling around the measurement volume of the lidar reference, wind speed measurements have an average absolute bias of 1.9 % (0.073 m s−1), wind elevation average absolute bias is 0.5°, and wind azimuth average absolute bias is 1.5°, indicating excellent accuracy under challenging and dynamic conditions. The system was finally flown in the wake of a wind turbine, successfully measuring the spatial velocity deficit distribution during forward flight, yielding results that are in very close agreement to lidar measurements and the theoretical distribution. We believe that the results presented in this paper can provide important information for designing flying systems for precise air speed measurements either for short duration at multiple locations (battery powered) or for long duration at a single location (power supplied via cable). UAVs that are able to accurately measure three-dimensional wind might be used as cost effective and flexible addition to measurement masts and lidar scans.

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Section: Uav-based Wind Speed Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%