Phase 1 Vehicles: Field Testing
We recently tested our Phase 1 vehicles in the field. For this particular test, we used one rover, one Small AERPAW Multicopter (SAM), one portable node (PN), and two Large AERPAW Multicopters (LAMs). Our portable node includes an Intel NUC computer and a USRP B205mini. The SAM is used to test the software on a lower-stakes vehicle before testing it on the LAM. The tests included manual tests as well as fully autonomous tests where the rover, SAM and LAM were fully under the control of the PN: the safety pilots were present for “just in case”. The results (shown in the videos) show good control both for the rover and for the LAM. One of the figures shows the consistency of the trajectory of two consecutive runs of the LAM. The rovers, the SAM, and the LAM were commanded to traverse a square with a side of 10m, each command being relative to the previous one (takeoff, 10m north, 10m west, 10m south, 10m east, land). Although this is a simple mission, the test runs through all the relevant instructions we plan to support on the testbed in Phase 1.
