Design and Validation of a Wireless Drone Docking Station

Drones are increasingly operating autonomously, and the need for extending drone power autonomy is rapidly increasing. One of the most promising solutions to extend drone power autonomy is the use of docking stations to support both landing and recharging of the drone. To this end, we introduce a novel wireless drone docking station with three commercial wireless charging modules. We have developed two independent units, both in mechanical and electrical aspects: the energy transmitting unit and the energy receiving unit. We have also studied the efficiency of wireless power transfer and demonstrated the advantages of connecting three receiver modules connected in series and parallel. We have achieved maximum output power of 96.5 W with a power transfer efficiency of 56.6% for the series connection of coils. Finally, we implemented the system in practice on a drone and tested both energy transfer and landing.

Serial Chain Hinge Support for Soft, Robust and Effective Grasp

This paper presents a serial chain hinge support, a rigid but flexible structure that improves the mechanical performance and robustness of soft-fingered grippers. Gravity can reduce the integrity of soft fingers in horizontal approach, resulting in lower maximum payload caused by a large deflection of fingers. To substantiate our claim we performed several experiments on payload and deflection of the SofIA gripper under both horizontal and vertical approach. In addition, we show that this reinforcement does not impede the original compliant behavior of the gripper, maintaining the original kinematic model functionality. We showcase the proprioceptive and exteroceptive capabilities (RGB-D camera and flex sensor) for two opposing manipulation problems: grasping small and large objects. Finally, we validated the improved SofIA gripper in agricultural and everyday activities.