System design for a rapid response autonomous aerial surveillance vehicle

Abstract

The MIT/Draper Technology Development Partnership Project was conceived as a collaborative design and development program between MIT and Draper Laboratory. The overall aims of the two year project were to strengthen ties between the two institutions, to provide students with an opportunity to develop a first-of-a-kind system, and to foster a sense of entrepreneurship in the students working on the project. This first design team consisted of a mix of Master of Engineering and Master of Science students, along with undergraduate research assistants. The team began its work by reviewing the needs of the nation and the capabilities possessed by MIT and Draper which could be leveraged to address those needs. Candidate projects were then developed, and several were further refined through brief market assessments. Based on these assessments, a final project was chosen. The selected project, the Wide Area Surveillance Projectile (WASP), called for the development of a small, unmanned aerial vehicle which could be launched from an artillery gun to provide a rapid-response, time-critical reconnaissance capability for small military units or selected civilian applications. This thesis reviews the first year of work completed on the project. A systems view is used throughout, describing the top-level trades which were made to develop a product which would meet all of the user's needs. Specific attention is given to the interactions between the various subsystems and how these interactions contributed to the design solution developed by the team. In addition to this chronological description of the project, management lessons learned from the author's experience as project manager are presented, along with recommended approaches for future projects of a similar nature. These lessons may also find applications in the broader realm of rapid-prototyping engineering projects, as well as future projects undertaken as part of the MIT/Draper Technology Development Partnership Project.