DESIGN AND SIMULATION OF DRONE

Abstract

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have become increasingly important in applications such as aerial surveillance, agriculture, inspection, mapping, disaster management, photography, and environmental monitoring. Among different UAV configurations, quadcopters are widely used because of their simple mechanical structure, vertical take-off and landing capability, hovering ability, and high maneuverability. This paper presents the design and simulation of a four-rotor quadcopter drone and evaluates its dynamic and flight-control performance. The proposed drone consists of a lightweight X-type frame, four brushless DC (BLDC) motors, propellers, electronic speed controllers (ESCs), a flight controller, inertial sensors, and a lithiumpolymer battery. A mathematical model of the quadcopter is developed based on its translational and rotational dynamics. The model is implemented in MATLAB/Simulink, and a PID-based control strategy is used for attitude stabilization. Simulation tests are performed for roll, pitch, yaw, altitude, and disturbance rejection. The simulation results indicate that the proposed controller can stabilize the quadcopter around the desired attitude with small steady-state error and acceptable settling time. The study provides a simulation-based foundation for future fabrication and experimental testing of a physical drone.