Dynamic UAV Flight Simulator Utilizing a Stewart Platform

This paper focuses on replicating the motion profile of a UAV flying in different conditions on a Stewart platform testbed. The resulting system provides a safe platform to operate indoors reproducing the same signals to those of a UAV flying outdoors. This approach results in more frequent use of all flying abilities while retaining high safety standards. To illustrate the effectiveness of the testbed, experimental results are presented. Six linear actuators are used in the testbed to achieve the desired orientation and position. The desired length of each actuator is calculated via an inverse kinematics algorithm. To validate the algorithm, Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) data from three aerial platforms of different configurations/size are used. The IMU data captured from flying/hovering the aerial platforms indoors, with and without disturbance, is pre-processed using Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) and used as an input to the Stewart platform.