Design of a contact-mode controller for applying a notable force on a surface using an aerial manipulator

One of the main tasks in research towards aerial robotics is to en- able the use of multirotor UAVs for dynamic aerial interaction and air- borne maintenance tasks. This work presents a novel control algorithm for stabilizing multirotor-UAVs applying high physical contact forces on the environment. By combining state feedback on the roll and yaw an- gle, and making use of the dynamics of physical contact, an integrated controller is designed and tuned using the LQR method. Experiments have been performed using this controller, during which a contact force of more than 15 N was exerted against a vertical surface for several minutes, demonstrating the effectiveness of the algorithm.