Design and Implementation of Fuzzy Logic Flight Controller for a Quad Copter using Image-based Feedback
Over the past few years, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have become the main element in Aviation Eco System. Drones find applications in agricultural monitoring, disaster management, surveillance, remote sensing, target acquisition, border patrol, infrastructure monitoring, photography and videogra
2025-06-28 16:31:43 - Adil Khan
Design and Implementation of Fuzzy Logic Flight Controller for a Quad Copter using Image-based Feedback
Project Area of Specialization RoboticsProject SummaryOver the past few years, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have become the main element in Aviation Eco System. Drones find applications in agricultural monitoring, disaster management, surveillance, remote sensing, target acquisition, border patrol, infrastructure monitoring, photography and videography. UAV’s are also being used to test Air Traffic Management algorithms. Moreover, UAVs are a useful tool for researchers to test and evaluate new ideas in a number of different fields, including flight controls theory, navigation, real-time systems and robotics. In the past decade, comprehensive efforts were made to make the UAVs fully autonomous; however, flying a UAV is still a quite challenging task.
The idea of this project is to develop a flight controller for a quadcopter in line with Avionics System Design methodology. The key feature of the project will be to control the quadcopter by replacing the function of manual levers, in standard remote control, with voltages induced via a microcontroller manual switches will be removed, and desired voltages will be directly fed to the circuitry. Controller response will be empirically developed. The controller shall be able to make the quadcopter fly in a horizontal displacement, vertical displacement and a box.
As other Machine learning and Artificial intelligence can have undetermined states so they are not certifiable for Avionics purposes, that is why we will develop a Fuzzy Logic Controller for position determination. The quadcopter will start from a random position and its fuzzy logic controller will make it fly to the final position. The fuzzy feedback will be provided by a low-cost camera to determine the offset from the desired target. The flight controller will be implemented through PC and Arduino.
[1] S.A.A. Shakoor S.R. Munasinghe D.M.W . Abeywardena, L.A.K. Amaratunga. A velocity feedback fuzzy logic controller for stable hovering of a quadrotor UAV. Fourth Intemational Conference on Industrial and Information Systems, IClIS, 2009. (Cited on pages 27 and 28.)
[2] M. Santos, V. Lopez, F. Morata (2010) Intelligent fuzzy controller of a quadrotor. International Conference on Intelligent Systems and Knowledge Engineering (ISKE). pp.141-146.
Project Objectives- Controlling remote control car by modifying remote control unit from manual to electronics
- Controlling the car through PC and microcontroller
- Implementing fuzzy logic controller in PC
- Implementing an image processing algorithm to generate fuzzy logic input signal.
- Implementing autonomous control of the car using fuzzy logic.
- Controlling Quadcopter by modifying remote control unit from manual to electronics
- Implementing fuzzy logic controller in PC for Quadcopter.
- Implementing automatic fuzzy logic flight controller for Quadcopter.
- Literature review
- Circuit modification of Remote Control Car
- Implementation of microcontroller-based controller for car
- Implementation of Fuzzy Logic controller using image-based sensors for car
- Circuit modification of quadcopter remote control
- Implementation of microcontroller-based flight controller for a quadcopter
- Implementation of Fuzzy Logic controller using image-based sensors for Quadcopter
- System integration of Quadcopter
- Testing
- Documentation
- Air Traffic Management of UAV’s and manned aircrafts together is a major aspect in avionics these days. By developing this hardware and software, a basic setup can be provided which can be used to carry out further research.
- Automatic Flight Controllers of UAV’s, which are available as COTS are expensive. This project will provide a low-cost alternative to UAV automatic flight controller.
- The algorithm developed here can also be used for the automatic landing of manned aircraft.
- A quadcopter with a modified remote control that is interfaced with a microcontroller for the quadcopter to fly predefined paths.
- Microcontroller software
- Fuzzy Logic code implemented in PC / Laptop
- A fully functional system
- A journal or a conference paper. Along with the BS thesis report.
| Item Name | Type | No. of Units | Per Unit Cost (in Rs) | Total (in Rs) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total in (Rs) | 72000 | |||
| Remote control car for modification and trials | Equipment | 1 | 2000 | 2000 |
| Quadcopter for modification and trials | Equipment | 1 | 10000 | 10000 |
| Arduino Mega board | Equipment | 2 | 5000 | 10000 |
| Webcam Camera | Equipment | 1 | 5000 | 5000 |
| FPGA Board | Equipment | 1 | 30000 | 30000 |
| Miscellaneous Electronic Components | Miscellaneous | 1 | 10000 | 10000 |
| Mechanical Fixtures | Equipment | 1 | 5000 | 5000 |