Study of Gyroscope and Accelerometer Dynamic Characteristics on Flapping Wing Micro Aerial Vehicle

Abstract

Sensors have become inseparable components in designing control systems, but performance is often degraded by noise from the environment or system. In this paper, the performance of a gyroscope and accelerometer on a flapping wing micro aerial vehicle (FW-MAV) was studied. The effect of a flapping wing on the sensors was observed. The benefit of using a mechanical damper or foam were also compared. The vibration generated by the flapping motion caused the accelerometer to suffer rectification errors, leading to bias or offset shifts in the measurement. Common filtering methods, such as low pass filters and complementary or Kalman filters, are affected by this problem. This study demonstrates that the use of foam can reduce the rectification error significantly.