Based in the Bartlett Centre for Advanced Special Analysis in UCL, we are leading drone technology workshops (Drones4Good) for young people organised by UCL Engineering. Our goal is to bring our expertise in drone technology to the public.
CASA took part in the first ever University Agility competition at the UK Drone Show over the weekend. The venue was the NEC in Birmingham, which was the ideal place to show the new extension to the RemapLima exhibit, which now includes the first open source quadcopter simulator. Visitors were able to fly around the Lima landscape and explore it for themselves using a control system simple enough for a 3 year old to master in a couple of minutes while we talked to his mum.
The 'QuadSim' simulator
The CASA stand is behind the blue #ukdroneshow logo, while the agility course is behind the "Parrot" logo
The tunnel and XFlight gates on the main FPV Racing course
The university agility event ran throughout the whole weekend, with Saturday being a test session and Sunday the actual event. Bearing in mind that our aircraft hadn't actually flown in this configuration before, both practice sessions on the Saturday were rather eventful. This was partly helped by the fact that we didn't arrive at the venue until after 1:30 and had to set up the Lima exhibit and get ready to fly in a bit of a hurry. In the ensuing chaos, the idiot doing the flying forgot that the new configuration has a mode switch on the transmitter and proceeded to fly the entire slot in "ACRO" mode (acrobatic), where all the gyro stabilisation is turned off. That's about as raw as it gets flying a quadcopter and it's the first time I've ever flown in that mode, so managing not to hit anything while I tried to edge around the course and attempt a landing on the box was a lot of fun. I had a couple of attempts at the landing, but dropped short both times, finishing up inverted on the floor.
Encouraged by the fact that I could get it into the air, but still too stupid to realise why it was virtually uncontrollable, I negotiated myself another flying slot later in the day. This was similar to the first, with me falling off the box two more times, but the real excitement was when I drifted over to the right, deliberately went deep to avoid hitting one of the flag obstacles, and then realised that I was quite a long way out over the main FPV racing course flying in free space. My next move was to do a fast 180 degree turn and zoom back towards myself at speed, before braking to avoid hitting the safety net. That was my 5 minutes up, so I landed and went back to the stand.
It was during dinner that evening that the existence of a flight mode switch popped into my head. I also had some repairs to do to the blade guards, so it was quite a late night.
Getting the blade guards off is quite a fiddly operation
Nice room, shame about the mess though
Having stuck everything back together and removed the FPV kit, which we weren't using, in order to get the flying weight down, we went back on Sunday for another go. I also reduced the control movements on aileron, elevator and rudder now I knew what the agility task was. With no testing time, I just had to make a guess and hope for the best.
The first part of the competition involved talking to the judges about the design, which is probably where we really lost out. Our original idea was to 3D print something unusual, but this never happened for reasons involving broken printers, students, money and weight. In the end we just used a Diatone polycarbonate frame costing £5, which fitted our budget nicely.
The CASA quadcopter prior to judging (nice flag)
The competition flight was a complete transformation. Apparently, there were comments along the lines of, "that's incredibly stable", coming from the other pilots in the pits area. So, I went through the little limbo obstacle, up and around, edged my way through the closest 45 degree hole, then circled up and left and tried a really difficult manoeuvre through the bigger hole flying towards myself. This is difficult because you can't see the aircraft when it goes behind the obstacle and I had to abort and drift out to the right flying blind as it went behind the flags. Back in view, I decided to try landing on the box again and promptly fell off. Then tried it again and fell off again. Determined not to be beaten, I did it on my third attempt, after which the 5 minute horn went, so that was it.
The entire competition flight was filmed, so you can watch it for yourself. All I can say is that I have a completely different viewpoint, so I can't see how far short of the box I am.
The post flight interview. Note the quad still in one piece.
I was really happy with that flight, even if we didn't win the competition. The prize of the DJI Phantom 3, Lumix G3 Camera and headphones went to Cranfield, while Loughborough got an honourable mention (and headphones) for their innovative carbon fibre frame design. Their aircraft never actually flew due to electronic problems. I did offer them our replacement flight controller and any other bits that would help, but the problem was with the integrated speed controller they were using.
At the prize-giving where Cranfield take it all. Why am I the only one with a T-Shirt?
All in all, only 3 out of the 5 universities actually managed to get their aircraft to fly, so, by my maths, that makes us either second or third. It would have been nice to know what position we came, but the judges only announced a winner. As for the main FPV race, that was won by Luke Bannister.
The prize was won by Cranfield University students, not Southampton. By the way, I am the guy with the brown pullover being applaused on the second to last photo.
Also, do you by any chance have footages of other flights of this competition?
Sorry, did I get the prizes the wrong way around? It was a bit hectic and I know one university got a special mention for their frame design, while the other won the prize for the flight.
Unfortunately, we don't have any footage of the other flights. We were also trying to see if anything turned up in the Drone Show's publicity, like on their Facebook page or Twitter, but there doesn't seem to be any. There's also nothing we can find from them on the University Agility Competition, so it seems like a bit of a lost publicity opportunity. A statement about won the prize would have been good as my memory is obviously failing me.
If you want to use any of our images, just ask and I'll check with Flora who took all the pictures for us. By the way, I'm the one in the purple T-shirt, standing on your right.
Dear Mr Milton
ReplyDeleteThe prize was won by Cranfield University students, not Southampton. By the way, I am the guy with the brown pullover being applaused on the second to last photo.
Also, do you by any chance have footages of other flights of this competition?
Many thanks,
Charles P.
Hi Charles,
DeleteSorry, did I get the prizes the wrong way around? It was a bit hectic and I know one university got a special mention for their frame design, while the other won the prize for the flight.
Unfortunately, we don't have any footage of the other flights. We were also trying to see if anything turned up in the Drone Show's publicity, like on their Facebook page or Twitter, but there doesn't seem to be any. There's also nothing we can find from them on the University Agility Competition, so it seems like a bit of a lost publicity opportunity. A statement about won the prize would have been good as my memory is obviously failing me.
If you want to use any of our images, just ask and I'll check with Flora who took all the pictures for us. By the way, I'm the one in the purple T-shirt, standing on your right.