Fall 2022 Progress Updates

Pre-flight Planning

The idea was to generate a occupancy grid of campus that can be used as an occupancy grid.

• Used OpenStreetMap to generate a isolated 3d map of campus.
  • https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=5/38.007/-95.844
• Converted that into a 2D map using Rasterization techniques.
• Initially planned on using Octrees, but later decided not to due to the vast amount of memory that would consume.
• Has a separate page, which describes the stack in much greater detail. /wiki/active-projects/drone-delivery/images/ The following is the point cloud generated from OpenStreetMap.

The Octree that was generated.

The occupancy gird that was generated.

Obstacle Avoidance:

• Migrate the code for Realsense camera from Python → C++
  • Able to get depth matrix
  • Can convert to occupancy matrix
• Implimenting a the D* and A* algorithms.
  • There are issues in how the paths are generated, in that sometimes diagonal paths are taken over straight ones, even though the latter is possible to produce.
  • To be improved in Spring 2023.
• OpenCV integration for detecting obstacles at a greater depth.

The Output from the A* algorithm we develped:

An example of an unideal path:

Hardware:

• Established mission objectives, such as flight time and pay load weight.
• Picked a drone kit, selected baterries, motor controllers, motors and propellers.
  • A detailed document describing all the design choices that were made: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YcgpvD2AsxBpSHcqvRHN5PRzlyk0kKi2nl-Srrc2DXE/edit?usp=sharing
• Check the main page for details on what hardware components were selected.

Interfacing:

• Repaired the old drone, and interfaced a computer with it.
• Simulated pre-programmed fight paths using Gazebo and QGroundControl.
• Worked on importing OpenStreetMap data into Gazebo.

Research:

• Over the course of the semester, the team reseached several important topics and developed whitepapers, and plan documents.
  • Deegan Osmundson: A* based navigation algorithms. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XcB0w0IvobgjAYehDYUqe3qoPYX0miRA/view
  • Seth Deegan: Drone Delivery Tech Stack https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ekadDu0ogtgF6m-fK_AaudN6HzlPpPMSJ_rsvxW74-M/edit#heading=h.fliy5digh3xk
  • Sooraj Chetput: Steps in implimenting the software stack for DD. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RyhzLklxlVaUF0ReHZfJ17z1Qm90ic8P/view
  • Jake Harrelson and several Authors: Design and Implementation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle for Local Food Delivery https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YcgpvD2AsxBpSHcqvRHN5PRzlyk0kKi2nl-Srrc2DXE/view

Acknowledgements:

• Project Managers: Sooraj Chetput
• Obstacle Avoidance Team Members: Guna Avula (Lead), Deegan Osmundson, Chris Qiu, Ethan Baird, Mouli Sangita
• Pre-flight planning: Seth Deegan (Lead), Vincent Wang
• Research: Sreevickrant Sreekanth (Lead), Vignesh Charapalli
• Hardware: Jacob Harrelson (Lead), Evan Zher
• Interfacing: Sooraj Chetput (Lead), Atharva Bhide