Diagnosis of UAV Pitot Tube Defects Using Statistical Change Detection

Søren Hansen, Mogens Blanke, Jens Adrian

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    Abstract

    Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need a large degree of tolerance to faults. One of the most important steps towards this is the ability to detect and isolate faults in sensors and actuators in real time and make remedial actions to avoid that faults develop to failure. This paper analyses the possibilities of detecting faults in the pitot tube of a small unmanned aerial vehicle, a fault that easily causes a crash if not diagnosed and handled in time. Using as redundant information the velocity measured from an onboard GPS receiver, the air-speed estimated from engine throttle and the pitot tube based airspeed, the paper analyses the properties of residuals. A dedicated change detector is suggested that works on pre-whitened residuals and a generalised likelihood ratio test is derived for a Cauchy probability density, which the residuals are observed to have. A detection scheme is obtained using a threshold that provides desired quantities of false alarm and detection probabilities. Fault detectors are build based on raw residual data and on a whitened edition of these. The two detectors are compared against recorded telemetry data of an actual event where a pitot tube defect occurred.
    Original languageEnglish
    Title of host publication7. Symposium on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles
    Publication date2010
    Publication statusPublished - 2010
    Event7th IFAC Symposium on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles - Lecce, Italy
    Duration: 6 Sept 20108 Sept 2010
    Conference number: 7
    http://iav2010.unile.it/

    Conference

    Conference7th IFAC Symposium on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles
    Number7
    Country/TerritoryItaly
    CityLecce
    Period06/09/201008/09/2010
    Internet address

    Keywords

    • Change detection
    • Pitot tube
    • Unmanned Aerial Vehicle
    • Fault detection

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