Structures containing tension-only members, i.e., cables, are widely used in engineered structures (e.g., suspension and cable-stayed bridges, tents, and bicycle wheels) and are also found in nature (e.g., spider webs). We seek to use the ground structure method to obtain optimal cable network configurations. The structures are modeled using principles of nonlinear elasticity that allow for large displacements, i.e., global configuration changes, and large deformations. The material is characterized by a hyperelastic constitutive relation in which the strain energy is nonzero only when the axial stretch of a member is greater than or equal to one (i.e., tension-only behavior). We maximize the stationary potential energy of the equilibrated system, which avoids the need for an additional adjoint equation in computing the derivatives needed for the solution of the optimization problem. Several examples demonstrate the capabilities of the proposed formulation for topology optimization of cable networks. Motivated by nature, a spider web–inspired cable net is designed.
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Self-Localization of Tethered Drones without a Cable Force Sensor in GPS-Denied Environments
This paper considers the self-localization of a tethered drone without using a cable-tension force sensor in GPS-denied environments. The original problem is converted to a state-estimation problem, where the cable-tension force and the three-dimensional position of the drone with respect to a ground platform are estimated using an extended Kalman filter (EKF). The proposed approach uses the data reported by the onboard electric motors (i.e., the pulse width modulation (PWM) signals), accelerometers, gyroscopes, and altimeter, embedded in the commercial-of-the-shelf (COTS) inertial measurement units (IMU). A system-identification experiment was conducted to determine the model that computes the drone thrust force using the PWM signals. The proposed approach was compared with an existing work that assumes known cable-tension force. Simulation results show that the proposed approach produces estimates with less than 0.3-m errors when the actual cable-tension force is greater than 1 N.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1914635
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10311089
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Drones
- Volume:
- 5
- Issue:
- 4
- ISSN:
- 2504-446X
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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To this end, we consider an approach to partition task-execution into a primary (fast) winch-tension control and secondary (slow) reconfiguration and joint-stiffness modulation. This would enable a primary trajectory-tracking task together with secondary task-space stiffness tailoring, using system-reconfiguration and joint-stiffness modulation. In this paper, we limit our scope to feasibility-evaluation to achieve the stiffness modulation as a secondary goal within an offline design-optimization setting (but with an eye towards real-time implementation).
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.3390/drones5040135
