A Modular Experimental Flight Management and 4D Trajectory Generation System for Unmanned Multicopter, Urban Air Mobility Vehicles and Other VTOL Vehicles

This paper describes a modular flight management system for unmanned multicopters, small unmanned fixed wing vehicles, vehicles used in Urban Air Mobility concepts, helicopters and other VTOL vehicles. With the expected growth in traffic of these types of vehicles especially in the urban environment it is necessary to generate reliable precalculated 4D trajectories for these vehicles. Furthermore, some of these vehicles need additional guidance to keep them on the precalculated path. The second central use case for this system is the fast trajectory calculation for fast and real time traffic simulations with a broad variety of vehicles, especially vehicles which are not covered by conventional flight management and trajectory generation systems. To solve these requirements, the system precalculates precise 4D trajectories for classic and experimental mission designs. These trajectories are tested for safety and continuity by a separate module and could then be executed on the corresponding vehicle (or a simulation) with the use of a guidance module. To calculate this huge variety of vehicles with different means of propulsion, the vehicle performance is kept in a separate module. This allows the system to not only work with different vehicle types, but also to switch between different vehicle configurations with considerable changes in the vehicle's performance and behavior. Some of the targeted vehicles only exist in an earlier design stage or do not provide details performance information. Thus, the performance module is able to work with very simple performance modules based on early design conditions as well as detailed performance models based on exhaustive knowledge of the vehicle's physical behavior. As the flight behaviors could change between the vehicles and their corresponding performance types, not all vehicles could use the same flight phases. Different parts of the trajectory are designed by different modules which specialize in the design of a specific flight phase. The performance module holds the information which flight phase could be applied on the vehicle and the corresponding boundaries. The system includes conventional flight phase modules for takeoff, cruise and landing and the transition between these phases as well as some specific flight phases, such as following waypoints relative to a moving target. The central trajectory management module then coordinates the different flight phases and ensures a continuous trajectory. This module also adds flight phases where required to guaranty a smooth transition between the different phases. Finally, this paper will show some example implementation of this system into traffic simulations and vehicle simulations.