Adaptive Center-of-Mass Relocation for Aerial Manipulator Fault Tolerance

Abstract

This work proposes a fault tolerant aerial manipulator based on a standard hexarotor vehicle, which is able to maintain independent control of torque and vertical thrust in case of motor failure by adequately changing the manipulator configuration and therefore modifying the position of the system's center of mass. By analyzing the disturbance torque that the manipulator exerts on the vehicle, conditions to achieve stable flight and operation limits are established. To provide an experimental proof of concept, several flights are performed, both in indoor and outdoor environments, for different size and weight of manipulators.