2010 International Conference on Electrical and Control Engineering

Research and Design on Physical Multi-UAV System

for Verification of Autonomous Formation
and Cooperative Guidance

Ji Xiangyu, Wu Sentang, Liu Xing, Du Yang Tang Jiqiang

School of Automation Science and Electrical Engineering School of Electronic and Information Engineering
Beihang University Beihang University
Beijing, China Beijing, China
jixiangyu@asee.buaa.edu.cn

Abstract—Based on wireless Ad Hoc networks, physical multi-UAV
system is designed for realizing and verifying algorithms of
autonomous formation and cooperative guidance. The whole system
includes four subsystems: the data link subsystem based on RF
modem, ARM and VxWorks embedded technology; autonomous
formation and cooperative guidance subsystem based on ARM and
WinCE embedded technology; formation flight control subsystem
based on ARM, single-chip and DSP embedded technology; multi-
UAV with piston engine and servos. Finally, subaerial semi-physical
simulation and flight test are carried out based on the system, which
show the feasibility and validity of both algorithms and hardware.
Keywords-wireless Ad Hoc networks; formation aircraft flight
control; embedded technology; multi-UAV system; autonomous
formation; cooperative guidance
The following is a summarization on the technologies with
experimental results.
II. OVERALL SYSTEM
The physical multi-UAV system includes wireless Ad Hoc
data link subsystem, autonomous formation and cooperative
guidance subsystem, formation flight control subsystem, and
actuators of UAVs, while the major idea of multi-UAV
autonomous formation and cooperative guidance embodies
information fusion subsystem and functions in physical
verification system, as shown in Fig. 1.

I. INTRODUCTION
The damage efficiency of guided weapons has been
impaired by the modern aerial defense systems, especially the
system of the defense in depth including the area air defense
and the close-in defense. In order to improve the damage
efficiency, countries start to research the advanced precision
attack weapon system with intelligent guidance ability. One of
the tendencies is the autonomous formation and cooperative
guidance technology of multi-unmanned air vehicle (UAV)
which fits for the demand of combat mission and fire
distribution [1].
The system of autonomous formation and cooperative
guidance technology of multi-unmanned air vehicle [2] has
many advantages over conventional systems. It can plan the
path of guided-weapons’ team, reduce the cost of system,
enhance the robustness and efficiency of the system, increase
the penetration probability, achieve saturation attack, enervate
defensive system and reach the purpose of cooperative
engagement [3].
In order to realize and verify autonomous formation and
cooperative guidance technology, a physical system of multi- Figure 1. Overall system of autonomous formation and flight control
UAV based on embedded technology is designed. Then series
of experiments are carried out to verify the feasibility and The wireless Ad Hoc data link subsystem through RF
validity of both algorithms and hardware. modems, ARM embedded MCU with VxWorks OS running
wireless Ad Hoc algorithm realizes network self-organization

978-0-7695-4031-3/10 $26.00 © 2010 IEEE 1570

DOI 10.1109/iCECE.2010.387
of UAVs. Autonomous formation and cooperative guidance
subsystem through ARM embedded MCU with WinCE OS
running relative algorithms realizes formation construction and
control, cooperative path planning, dequeuing and enqueuing
management, fault tolerant formation and cooperative
guidance. Formation aircrafts flight control subsystem through
DSP, relative sensors, ARM, single-chip embedded MCU and
electronic components realizes integrated navigation, flight
control, actuators control, and manual/auto switch logic
control. Actuators of UAVs with piston engine and servos
carrying all other subsystems realize flight test and verification
of autonomous formation and cooperative guidance
technology.
III. KEY TECHNIQUES
A. Ad HocData Link Subsystem
The data link subsystem transmits three kinds of
information: attitude and position of flight, target detection,
coordinated decision. As significant guarantee for ensuring the
cooperative engagement of multi-UAV, a newly complex
STDMA data link module [4], which combines fixed slot
allocation mode with reserved slot allocation mode, is adopted
for the system of autonomous formation and cooperative
guidance of multi-UAV. The system could, according to the
net traffic, switch the modes and adjust the frame structure.
The model could implement the dynamic management of the
modes, slots and the network with self organization and thus
satisfy the requirements of the system [4].
1) Network Topology Structure
The network topology of data link should adapt to the
dynamic characteristic of nodes in formation flight. So, the
mobility management and self-organization are required. Two
common topological structures are shown in Fig. 2 [3].
a) Handshake frame: Construct initialization
information of network, seek for slave node/s after host node
initialized, and achieve communication.
b) Confirm frame: Confirmation information sent by
new slave node/s for joining network.
c) Control frame: Permission or denial information sent
by host node to new slave node/s for joining network.
d) Data frame: Send or receive data in real time. All
information about autonomous formation and cooperative
guidance is carried in it.
e) Bulletin frame: Announce all slave nodes of network
about new joined node/s and lost node/s.
For dynamic network, the adjustment of nodes is very
frequent, including joining network, leaving network, and
changing host node. The change of network nodes will cause
readjustment of slot allocation. The following Fig. 3 and Fig. 4
show the process about new node joining in network and
sending/receiving data after joining in. Because of situations
like out of communication range and crash exist for UAVs,
nodes may be lost. This solution makes sure the network
running steadily if nodes are left from network.

Figure 3. Node join in network flow chart

Figure 2. Two commonly used topological structures

In peer-to-peer network, every node has the same priority.

Also, host node is set to manage the network and transmit
command relating to network changes. When one host node
lost, one of other nodes will inherit the host function and take
over the control of network to maintain the stability of data
link.
2) Network Self-Organization
To achieve dynamic network and communication between
nodes, a compact and reliable protocol is needed. The
following are the structure of networking protocol for
autonomous formation and cooperative guidance technology of
Figure 4. Sending and receiving flow chart of node after joining network
multi-UAV.

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 3) Real-time System and Embedded Implement
Modern real-time systems are based on the complementary
concepts of multitasking and intertasking communications.
Another key facility in real-time systems is hardware interrupt
handling [5].
VxWorks OS is famous for high reliability and excellent
real-time characteristic, and widely used in communication,
military affairs and aerospace fields. And, the interrupt service
routines [5] make it get the fastest possible response to
interrupts. Considering multi-thread programming capability,
real-time communication and high reliability characteristics of
Ad Hoc date link system, VxWorks is applied for algorithms
implement and hardware access, as shown in Fig. 5.
Figure 5. Ad Hoc data link implimental flow chart on VxWorks OS
B. Autonomous Formation and Cooperative Guidance
WinCE is another multitasking and multithreading real-
time embedded OS. Compared with others, the main
advantages are excellent graphical interface and convenient
integrated development environment for the transplant of
autonomous formation and cooperative guidance algorithms
researched and simulated in Windows environment, as in
[2][6][7][8].
WinCE supports up to 32 running processes. Each process
has a number of threads, and one of them is main thread.
WinCE uses a priority-based polling method of time-slice [9].
In this paper, three threads are created which have the
same priority for autonomous formation and cooperative
guidance subsystem, as shown in Fig. 6. The surveillant thread-
1 can, on the one hand, send status information of UAV to
ground monitor system, and on the other hand, extract
navigation information and send for autonomous formation and
cooperative guidance. The surveillant thread-2 can, on the one
hand, send information from ground monitor system, and on
the other hand, send return data for autonomous formation and
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cooperative guidance. The autonomous formation and
cooperative guidance thread can, on the one hand, send and
receive formatting information among UAVs, and on the other
hand, send control instructions to formation aircraft flight
control subsystem.
In order to solve the problem of thread synchronization,
WinCE OS provides four synchronization modes (Event,
Mutex, Semaphores, and Critical Section) [10]. The paper uses
the Event and the Critical Section to synchronize three threads
and ensure that there is no conflict among the three threads.
Figure 6. Autonomous formation and cooperative guidance implimental flow
chart on WinCE OS
C. Formation Flight Control Subsystem
1) Fomation Aircraft Flight Control
The formation aircraft flight control subsystem realizes
manual/auto switch logic control and power supply, inertial
navigation, flight control of formational UAVs, and
communication protocol. The main distinctions between
formational flight control and conventional flight control are:
• Control instructions are generated from autonomous
formation and cooperative guidance module rather than
autopilot itself.
• Formation aircrafts’ relative position (includes height,
longitude, and latitude) and relative speed information
is fed back into control loops.
The following Fig. 7 is a typical height control loops of
formation aircraft flight control. Both height of UAV and
relative height difference between formational UAVs are fed
back in into control loops. The longitude control and latitude
control are the same principle.
 Fig. 8 is a typical lateral-direction control framework of
formation aircraft flight control. Both roll and yaw instructions
are from autonomous formation subsystem to control the
horizontal position of UAV and horizontal relative position of
formational UAVs.
Figure 7. Foramtion aircrafts height control framework
Figure 8. Foramtion aircrafts height lateral-direction control framework
The control framework of formation aircrafts are shown in
Fig. 9.
Figure 9. Control framework of formational aircraft
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2) Manual/Auto Switch Logic and Power Supply Module
This module is designed to guarantee the reliability of
UAV. When emergency happens, operators can switch the
UAV into manual module. Considering the basic channels of
an UAV (aileron, elevator, throttle and rudder), one 74HC157
quad 2-input multiplexer can meet the need. The logic equation
[11] is:
− −
Y = E ( I1 • S + I 0 • S )
(1)
Accordingly, ATMEL Mega8 single-chip is chosen as the
control MCU.
Also, to improve the logical reliability, a separated power
should supply for switch logic module, remote receiver and
servos of UAV. Thus, regardless other parts of system, as long
as servos work, UAV can be switch into manual mode. Fig. 10
is the printed circuit board (PCB) design of this module.
Figure 10. Manual/Auto switch and power supply PCB
3) Integrated Navigation Module
As a mature technology, GPS/INS and digital compass is
widely used for navigation of air vehicles. Lots of advanced
algorithms base on Quaternion Method and Kalman Filter
emerge, keeping improving the measure precision and long-
term bias stability. Considering both performance and price,
ADIS16355 tri-axis inertial sensor, u-blox LEA-5H GPS
module, HMR3100 digital compass and TMS320F28335 DSP
are adopted to realize 50Hz attitude output and integrated
navigation.
a) GPS design
U-blox 5 module can be connected to passive pitch or
active antennas. For the maximum receiving effect, the
impedance of the antenna connection has to match the 50 Ohm
impedance of the receiver. To achieve an impedance of 50
Ohms, the width of the micro strip has to be chosen depending
on the dielectric thickness, the dielectric constant of the
dielectric material of the PCB and on the build-up of the PCB 50Hz. To improve the precision, output result is corrected by
[12]. Impedance matching design is shown in Fig. 11. Kalman Filter per second, as shown in Fig. 13.

Figure 11. Impedance eetching design of GPS antenna

U-blox LEA-5H GPS is a programmable module. The

parameter can be adjusted by u-center [13], or MCU via SCI
bus. An illustration of control command is shown in blue block
area of u -center in Fig. 12.

Figure 13. Flow chart of 50Hz calculation and output with 1Hz Kalman
filtering and result correcting

IV. SIMULATION AND DEMONSTRATION

A. Semi-physical Simulation
The real wireless Ad Hoc data link subsystem and
computer make up the semi-physical simulation system which
is shown in Fig. 14.

Figure 12. Update rate ajustment command of u-blox 5 GPS

b) Digital compass design

HMR3100 module communicates through SCI bus and
works at 19200 baud for maximum update rate of 20Hz. The
baud rate selection is determined by the position of jumpers J1
and J3 [14].
c) Embedded implement
TMS320F28335 is a low price, highly integrated, high-
performance 32-bit CPU for demanding control applications,
with a single-precision (32-bit) IEEE 754 floating-point-unit
(FPU) and up to 150MHz [15]. It is a very efficient
microcontroller for users to handle high numerical resolution
problems.
In this subsystem, Fourth-Order Runge-Kutta Method, Figure 14. Semi-physical simulation
Quaternion Method and Kalman Filter with 12-dimensional
state variable are used for integrated INS/GPS/Pressure Connected with data link, a formation of three aircraft
Altimeter/Magnetic navigation [16]. The hardware framework system in entire multi-UAV flight trajectory with six degree of
is shown in Fig. 9. Output rate of integrated navigation are

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freedom (6DOF) is simulated to display the autonomous
formation flight and cooperative guidance.
The trajectories of each aircraft as a function of time are
depicted on surface monitoring system in Fig. 15, which show
the validity and reliability of wireless Ad Hoc network, and
demonstrate the autonomous formation and cooperative
behavior of an UAV team.
Figure 15. trajectories of 3 UAV formation flight
B. Physical Demonstration
Physical multi-UAV demonstrations are the most effective
way to test and verify the autonomous formation and
cooperative guidance. Finally, physical multi-UAV system is
integrated, as shown in Fig. 16 and Fig. 17.
Figure 16. Hardware platform of UAV system
Accordingly, a series of fly tests are carried out.
Experimental program is designed as follows, and the result is
shown in Fig. 18.
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a) UAV1 (black curve): Manually take off and switch to
“Auto” mode at “Start” point and fly the reference route (red
line), set as “Leader”, set “Ground Speed” 20m/s, set flight
“Height” 200m, search “Formation Sphere” of radius 500m.
b) UAV2 (blue curve): “Auto” mode and “Circling” at
“Step2” point with radius 500m (red circle), set “Ground
Speed” 20m/s, set circling “Height” 150m, automatically form
formation when the leader flyby, search “Formation Sphere”
of radius 500m.
c) UAV3 (green curve): “Auto” mode and “Circling” at
“Step3” point with radius 500m (red circle), set “Ground
Speed” 20m/s, set circling “Height” 250m, automatically join
in formation when the two-aircraft-group flyby, search
“Formation Sphere” of radius 500m.
Figure 17. UAV models with hardware platform
Figure 18. Gound monitoring of formation flight of 3 UAVs
V. CONCLUSION
Firstly, the physical multi-UAV system successfully
validated the effectiveness and feasibility of wireless Ad Hoc
data link and formation flight control system. Secondly, it
partly demonstrated and validated autonomous formation and
cooperative guidance strategies. Finally, the system establishes
a physical platform for future research and verification.
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