Design Competition For High School Students

A Drone Design Competition for Aspiring Aviation & Aerospace High School Upperclassmen

Competition Principles

Advanced High School Team Competition

Sportsmanship Emphasized

Drone Delivery Challenge

Autonomous and Teleoperation Challenges

Low Cost Entrance

Engineering Design Competition

Community Supported Open Source Drone

Authentic Outdoor Challenges Utilizing GPS, Compass, etc.

Realistic Lift Capacity For Delivery of 10 oz Payload

Rules of Engagement

Drone Hardware

  1. Compatible flight controller (FC) that supports the PX4 or Ardupilot firmware
  2. Drone frame size (400mm – 600mm diagonal from motor shaft to motor shaft)
  3. Max of 4 propellers
  4. Arm and Pre-arm switches mandatory
  5. Battery range 3s (11.1V) or 4s (14.8V)
  6. FPV Cameras and monitor
    • Forward facing
    • Downward facing
    • Multi-camer configuration
    • Gimbals, if applicable
  7. Transmitters
    • Remote control with at least 8 channels – 2.4 GHz
    • Radio telemetry – 915 Mhz
    • Video Transmitter (VTX) – 5.8 GHz
  8. Drones must be able to delivery several payloads and remain in the air for the maximum mission duration of five (5) minutes

Recommended Hardware Vendors and Stock Kits

  1. onPoynt Drone Solutions – onpoynt.com
  2. HolyBro – www.holybro.com
  3. NXP – www.nxp.com

Ground Control Stations (GCS)

  1. QGroundControl – qgroundcontrol.com/
    • Windows, Mac, Linux
  2. MissionPlanner – ardupilot.org/planner/
    • Windows Only

Safety Precautions

  1. Lipo battery storage bags
  2. Propellers removed when working on the drone
  3. Safety goggles recommended when working with the drone
  4. Gloves should be on hand, if needed
  5. Return-to-land & Flight termination
    • UAV must have either autonomous return to home/land (RTH . RTL) enabled for flight termination
    • These must be configured with the location specified in the Mission Flight Boundard appendix
    • Both must be activated by a safety pilot and the ground station
    • After 30 seconds of communication loss, the aircraft must automatically RTH / RTL
  6. Geofence activated on all missions and flights
  7. Pilot-In-Charge (PIC) with Part 107 certification
    • If a team does not have a licensed Part 107 PIC, anyone at the competition with a Part 107 can act as the team PIC, if willing to do so

See Full Document For Missions & Awards

Competition Regions

Midwest
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