Development of Tools and Methods for Autonomous Fixed-wing UAV Research

Development of tools and methods to aid in the research of fixed-wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) is presented. A Remote-Controlled (RC) model aircraft is used as the target airframe. The flight simulator X-Plane 10 is used for the grey-box modelling and MATLAB/Simulink is used for the white-box modelling. XFLR5 is utilised to obtain crucial aerodynamic data. The process of constructing the flight model on X-Plane 10 via a set of software tools and the development of a 12-state, six-degrees-of-freedom MATLAB/Simulink based simulation are demonstrated. The method presented demonstrates useful applicability.