Autonomous Drone Docking Bay

In my last semester as a Mechanical Engineering student, I decided to jump out of my comfort zone and tackle an area of engineering that I am deeply passionate about. Autonomous Systems. This semester, I designed, manufactured, and implemented an autonomous drone docking station controlled by an Arduino Uno microcontroller. This station will sense when a drone is nearby and actuate a linearly driven drone bay door. The drone will then proceed to land in the bay. There is also a take-off sequence for the entire system.

Milestones:

- Designed a complete bay system assembly in SolidWorks with all electrical components outfitted to the task
- Design components under the limitations of the manufacturer's capabilities. In this case, all parts were 3D printed, keeping in mind that it is essential to design critical elements per the manufacturing techniques available
- Incorporate autonomous drones into the demonstration using a low-latency LPS
- Incorporate two independent control loops:
1. Autonomous Detection of the Drone and Bay Door Actuation
2. Autonomous Drone Flight System