The Flying Computer
This is the text version of the interactive 3D documentary. 한국어
Contents · Chapter 5 The flying computer
A gust of wind
Sensors notice the tilt, and the low side’s motors speed up to fix it
Notice it, then fix it
A strong gust blows in from the left, and the right side dips (up to about 9°). A tiny chip inside the drone notices the tilt, and the computer speeds up the two right motors to about 123%. In about 0.4 seconds the drone is level again. This is shown 4 times slower.
Why?There are two chips. A gyro sensor measures how fast the drone is turning. An accelerometer tells which way is down. The computer combines them to know the tilt right now, then pushes back by how much it is tilted and how fast it is tilting.
Go furtherThis calculation also sets the motor pushes 1,000 times a second. Correcting by both the tilt and how fast it is changing is called PID control. The sideways drift from the wind is not fixed in this scene. That would need a separate position sensor such as GPS.
View in 3D →Read more: Wikipedia: Gyroscope · Wikipedia: Accelerometer · Wikipedia: PID controller