Case Study AlphaLink Engineering: Hardware-in-the-Loop Simulator for UAS with Pixhawk FCS

2021-05-03

AlphaLink Engineering GmbH is a spin-off from Technische Universität Berlin. AlphaLink is specialized in the development and implementation of mechatronic systems. The focus is on the system design of mechatronic systems in aviation, which includes the modeling and control of the entire aircraft, but also of its individual components. With the "Flying Lab" and the "Virtual Flight Test Environment", AlphaLink offers two products in the field of Flight Control for Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS).

AlphaLink used CANoe to establish a Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) simulator for the Pixhawk flight computer that is used in unmanned aircraft systems. With the possbilities of CANoe a high-quality HIL-simulator could be implemented that offers 

• a digital twin of the UAS with all its components such as flight dynamics, sensor models, and actuator models, and 
• a bridge between the digital world and the real existing flight control system (FCS) with all its components, such as data link and remote control.