AeroThrow: An Autonomous Aerial Throwing System for Precise Payload Delivery

TL;DR

AeroThrow introduces an autonomous aerial system with active error compensation and advanced control strategies to improve payload delivery accuracy in complex environments.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel aerial manipulator-based airdrop system with active error correction and trajectory optimization for precise payload delivery.

Findings

Enhanced delivery accuracy demonstrated in simulations.

Real-world tests show improved agility and precision.

Active error compensation reduces payload landing errors.

Abstract

Autonomous aerial systems play an increasingly vital role in a wide range of applications, particularly for transport and delivery tasks in complex environments. In airdrop missions, these platforms face the dual challenges of abrupt control mode switching and inherent system delays along with control errors. To address these issues, this paper presents an autonomous airdrop system based on an aerial manipulator (AM). The introduction of additional actuated degrees of freedom enables active compensation for UAV tracking errors. By imposing smooth and continuous constraints on the parabolic landing point, the proposed approach generates aerial throwing trajectories that are less sensitive to the timing of payload release. A hierarchical disturbance compensation strategy is incorporated into the Nonlinear Model Predictive Control (NMPC) framework to mitigate the effects of sudden changes in system parameters, while the predictive capabilities of NMPC are further exploited to improve the precision of aerial throwing. Both simulation and real-world experimental results demonstrate that the proposed system achieves greater agility and precision in airdrop missions.