Design and Evaluation of a Perching Hexacopter Drone for Energy Harvesting from Power Lines
Ryan Kitchen, Nick Bierwolf, Sean Harbertson, Brage Platt, Dean Owen, Klaus Griessmann, Mark A. Minor
Abstract
With a growing number of applications in the world for UAVs, there is a clear limitation regarding the need for extended battery life. With the current flight times, many users would benefit greatly with an innovative option of field charging these devices. The objective of this project is to investigate feasibility of inductively harvesting energy from a power line cable for applications such as charging a UAV drone. Research investigates a dual hook perching device that securely attaches to a power cable and aligns an inductive core with the cable for harvesting energy from its electro-magnetic field. Modeling and analysis of the core highlights critical design parameters, leading to evaluation of circular, semi-cylindrical, and u-shaped prototypes designed to interface with a 1" power cable. Underactuated two jaw manipulators at each end of the coil are proposed for grasping the cable and aligning it with the charging coil, ultimately providing a firm grasp and perch. An open source hexacopter drone was used in this study to integrate with the charging novelty. The results provided can be used as a starting point to study the reliability of this method of charging and to further investigate perching abilities of UAVs.
BibTeX
@inproceedings{iros2020_designandevaluat,
title = {Design and Evaluation of a Perching Hexacopter Drone for Energy Harvesting from Power Lines},
author = {Ryan Kitchen and Nick Bierwolf and Sean Harbertson and Brage Platt and Dean Owen and Klaus Griessmann and Mark A. Minor},
booktitle = {IROS 2020},
year = {2020}
}