Examination Committee

Prof Michael WANG, ECE/HKUST (Chairperson)
Prof Zexiang LI, ECE/HKUST (Thesis Supervisor)
Prof Ling SHI, ECE/HKUST 

Abstract

Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is being used in various applications, such as consumer electronics, aerial filming and infrastructure inspection. Certain UAV applications require a fully autonomous system, which a single UAV cannot fulfill the requirement. In this project, a base station system is designed, developed and tested. The base station is a ground device which aid the UAV in an autonomous mission. The system can provide battery swapping, battery charging and management, autonomous precise landing, autonomous flight management, air-ground communication and UAV protection.

The base station has a three axes robotic arm, which manipulates the battery for the swapping procedure from the UAV to the station. The landing pad aids the UAV for autonomous accurate landing onto the base station. The battery compartments in the station can storage and charge batteries. The communication system connects to the UAV for command and video data downlink and connects to the Internet for remote monitoring. The accurate landing algorithm on the UAV can perform fully autonomous landing on the station utilizing computer vision.

Prototypes of the base station system were built and tested. They served the DJI Phantom 4 and modified DJI Matrice 100. The key procedures and performance are evaluated, namely the accurate landing, battery swapping and ventilation system performance. All tests had satisfying results, which prove the concept of the base station system. More outdoor mission and field tests will be conducted. This system has very promising future in autonomous commercial and industrial UAV application.