Attitude control of a flying robot in disturbances with stall detection by feather-inspired sensors

Abstract

It has been reported that flying organisms like birds and insects have wind-sensing organs on their body surfaces that help them not only sense the subtle wind but also control their body posture in natural environment. In this study, we have developed a wind sensor that is inspired from birds feathers due to the disturbances during flight. The bird-inspired wind sensor is composed of a rectangular film with a magnet and reacts with a Hall sensor in the wing to obtain a voltage variation depending on the deflection. The study evaluated the characteristics of the wind sensor on a tethered robot in a wind tunnel. The results demonstrated that the wind sensor value fluctuates during stall, and can be used for recovery from stall.