Experimental Study of the Purpose-Built Unmanned Aerial Vehicle for Surveillance Applications Enabling Adaptivity and Flexibility

This work addresses the purpose-built aerial surveillance drone for surveillance missions. The proposed architecture of the drone aims to specifically consider operational requirements, such as extended flight times, discrete operation, and compatibility with advanced imaging systems, e.g., IR cameras. The key sub-systems notably a transmitter, receiver, electronic speed controllers (ESCs), and flight controller are developed, fabricated on printed circuit boards (PCBs), and programmed to ensure complete control and optimal system performance. The flight controller is the central sub-system combining input data from the receiver with information from onboard sensors to maintain flight stability. It employs custom control algorithms to interpret control variables to regulate the electric propulsion drivetrain ensuring smooth and reliable flight operation. This paper focuses on the designed transmitter circuit board and how the proposed ESC manages the speed and torque of the motors through interactions with the flight controller. This modular design allows for optimized performance in each subsystem, ensuring flexibility and scalability. A preliminary evaluation of the integrated proposed transmitter, receiver, and ESC validated a satisfactory response for handling the demands of extended surveillance missions supported by the simulations and experiments.