Inverted Docking Station: A Conceptual Design for a Battery-Swapping Platform for Quadrotor UAVs

“Flight Time” and the “Scope of the mission” play major roles in using UAVs as they affect most industrial activities. Once the battery has depleted, the UAV has to land on the ground and human interaction is needed to change the battery with a fully charged one. Nowadays, several automatic battery swapping systems are catching interest in research. This research presents the novel concept of an Inverted Docking Station that allows a quadrotor UAV to attach to the ceiling during the automatic battery-swapping process. The proposed design consist of a docking station, a positioning system and gripper mechanisms. The proposed design allows the quadrotor to carry the load under the quadrotor and remain attached throughout the servicing period. A mathematical model and design guideline have been proposed, and a Finite Element Analysis (FEA) was performed to check that the developed platform is strong enough to withstand the above task. A ‘DJI TELLO’ small-scale quadrotor was chosen as a case study to demonstrate the proposed research. Finally the advantages and the limitations of the system are discussed.