Performance Analysis of a Fully-Actuated Screwdriving UAV

The task of horizontal aerial screwdriving has been a relatively unexplored area of aerial manipulation, yet has immense potential and use cases in fields such as construction, maintenance and inspection, especially in dangerous or costly scenarios. This paper presents an analysis of a novel screwdriving actuator integrated with a fully-actuated UAV, identifying critical performance limits of the proposed design. As the UAV uses frictional torque generated from a highfriction contact plate to counteract reactional torque from screwdriving, a relationship is derived to identify the minimum contact plate annulus diameter. The robustness of the UAV and screwdriving actuator are also quantified by identifying relationships for preventing pivoting about the contact plate from lateral disturbances. An analysis in screw torque requirements is performed and a flight test is conducted to investigate the performance of the screwdriving actuator in flight, which shows successful mitigation of reactional torques up to 0.03 Nm.