Understanding Flight Modes and Mission Planning

Previously in this book, we explored various Ground Control Station (GCS) operations and functions, as well as how they help to command and control a drone in real time. We also saw how a GCS is used to configure a drone and its various peripheral devices through its numerous interfaces. In previous chapters, we learned how to configure a drone so that it can use different flight modes that have already been configured by the respective developers from ArduPilot and PX4. In this chapter, we will see what those flight modes are, how they help a pilot fly the drone, and what sensors they use. This chapter will help you to understand the different kinds of flight modes under which a drone flies and how these flight modes are activated using a remote control or GCS. This will, in turn, help you understand more about flying a drone using a remote control or GCS.

In this chapter, we are going to cover the following topics as they will help...

Technical requirements

For this chapter, you will need to understand the working principles of IMU sensors and how they work. You will also require knowledge of basic physics and gadget-handling skills. Apart from this, you will need to go through the documentation for pre-existing flight stacks such as ArduPilot and PX4 since we’ll discuss the basics which are developed in these two flight stacks.

Flight modes and types

Flight modes are predefined settings that govern how an autopilot system dictates the drone’s behavior during the flight. They also define which sensors are to be used and how much manual intervention is allowed by the pilot. In summary, flight mode is a set of instructions that help the autopilot system behave in a predefined manner while flying.

We can set flight mode using a GCS or directly via a remote control; thus, it’s easy for the pilot to switch between two flight modes depending on the situation.

In general terms, we can say that flight modes assist the pilot in flying the drone more easily. They allow certain parameters to be controlled, such as altitude and position, which help the pilot to fly the drone smoothly since autopilot takes control of the drone based on its sensor readings, as well as the response the pilot provides as input. The term flight mode is common in various unmanned vehicles, such as multi-copters, fixed-wing...

Assigning flight modes via remote control

So far, we’ve learned that the remote controller is a key element of flying drones in manual mode, where the pilot controls them. As we have seen, a remote controller typically consists of many switches and potentiometers, all of which help us control and configure the peripherals that are attached to the drone. With the help of these switches and potentiometers, a pilot has full control of the drone and can switch from one mode to others with the help of switches. In this section, while using a remote controller, we will use the same MAVLink protocol on different channels to configure the various flight modes.

In a remote controller, a channel is an independent communication pathway between the transmitter and the receiver on the drone. Each channel is assigned to a specific function or control, such as throttle, pitch, roll, or yaw, allowing the pilot to manipulate different aspects of the drone’s movement and features.

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Assigning and changing flight modes in a GCS

In this section, we’ll take a deeper dive into step 3 from the previous section. Here, we’ll assign the three different flight modes to the switch that we configured previously. As we know, a GCS is the prime source of configuration for a drone, so we’ll use this knowledge to configure the flight mode that we want to put on this switch so that we can change it while it’s flying.

Flight mode configuration is also a key requirement that is of utmost importance before flying the drone and without which the drone could not be flown with the help of a remote controller. Here, we will see how we can configure flight mode in the GCS and how we can change the flight mode through the GCS.

Configuring the flight modes of the remote controller switch

When we open AeroGCS, we’ll see that the various flight modes are controlled through the radio (via a transmitter switch) or using commands from AeroGCS. Select...

Planning and executing an autonomous waypoint mission

Previously, we looked at different kinds of flight modes, one of the most important of which was autonomous mode. Flying in autonomous mode requires creating a mission plan, something that’s done in the GCS software and then uploaded to the flight controller through a data link. Let’s see how can we plan a mission, upload it to the drone, and execute it.

1. Logging in to your profile : Use your email and password to log in to your AeroGCS account. Note that not every GCS requires this step; some will take you to the dashboard. However, in this case, the GCS has been customized so that each user can handle their own projects:

Figure 8.8 – Login window of AeroGCS

2. Connecting the GCS to the drone: Before we do anything else, we must connect the device. Click on Yes and connect the device using the option given in the second window:

Figure...

Summary

In this chapter, we learned about the most important part of a flight – flight modes. This chapter has helped you understand how a simple drone can be flown in different ways and how flight modes help us execute many commercial applications that use drones. We also learned how to use different platforms to execute different projects. Finally, we saw how the manual and autonomous modes work when it comes to flying and how to program a drone so that it can fly in autonomous mode.

In the next chapter, we’ll learn how to tune different parameters of the drone so that we know what final checks must be done before a flight.