Autonomous soaring capability has the potential to significantly increase time aloft for fixed-wing UAVs. In this paper, we introduce ArduSoar, the first soaring controller integrated into a major autopilot software suite for small UAVs. We describe ArduSoar from the algorithmic standpoint, outline its integration with the ArduPlane autopilot, discuss parameter tuning for it, and conduct a series of flight tests on real sUAVs that show ArduSoar's robustness even in highly non-ideal atmospheric conditions.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1802.08215,
title = {ArduSoar: an Open-Source Thermalling Controller for Resource-Constrained Autopilots},
author = {Samuel Tabor and Iain Guilliard and Andrey Kolobov},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1802.08215},
year = {2018}
}