Stability Control of a Quad-rotor Using a PID Controller

Abstract

This paper describes the stages of identification, dynamic modelling and control of an unmanned aerial vehicle of type quad-rotor designed to capture images and video in high definition with relatively low cost. The identification process describes the methods used to identify the elements of the vehicle such as propellers parameters, mathematical modeling of the whole ESC-Motor-Propeller and modeling of the complete structure of the quad-rotor. PID controllers were used for the control and stabilization of the structure, controlling the rotational speed of the four motors independently. To tune the controller we have used the pole placement method, followed by simulations in MATLAB, based on the models obtained in identification. The simulations were validated with experimental measurements in prototype quad-rotor, leading to satisfactory results.