By Graham Cook

Team Guardian’s unmanned air vehicle places second with a $1,000 budget

Unmanned Systems Canada held their 2012 Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) Competition from May 4–6 at the Southport Aerospace Centre in Manitoba. The event challenged university teams to use their auto-piloted radio controlled planes to complete a series of tasks. This year, SFU’s squad of engineering students, Team Guardian, came just shy of victory with a second place finish.

Team VAMUdes from Université de Sherbrooke in Quebec took first place, finishing ahead of SFU’s squad and Team Blackbird from Carleton University. Also competing was Team UAARG of the University of Alberta and Team Uvic Aero of the University of Victoria. Team Four Winds from UBC-Okanagan was scheduled to participate but was forced to drop out for unknown reasons.

Team Guardian consists of 11 members including Bryan Pattison, Ginelle Nazareth, Irene Tong, James Allnutt, Kevin Young, Luke Routley, Ben Tuline, Jessica Peare, Miguel Cruz, Project Manager Tim Gjernes, and Operations Manager Matthew Keeler. They range from first- to fourth-year students with the more experienced students taking more senior roles.

Team member James Allnutt spoke with The Peak about the makeup of the competition. Each team used their UAV to complete tasks that simulated a forest fire scenario, a civil application that he contrasted against the military aspect of similar events in the United States. Basic colour coded shapes, such as squares, circles, and triangles, were arranged as far as three kilometres away. These targets were each labelled with QR codes that had to be automatically identified by the aircraft and reported back to ground station. Allnut explained that the biggest setback for their creation was not spotting the codes, but the poor quality of their camera.

James Allnutt, who described himself as a “two-and-a-half-year student,” told The Peak that Team Guardian began in Fall of 2010 as a fourth-year capstone project. A capstone project is a large, yearlong endeavour that completes a mechatronics degree. He described how it evolved from there, with lower-level students being recruited every year,while fourth-year students continue to use it as their capstone project. The plane, he said, is a simple off-the-shelf remote control plane that they worked together to extensively modify. He described the plane as a constant work in progress with custom parts being continually added.

Allnut also explained that the team was almost unable to attend the competition as their auto-piloted plane struck a tree during a test flight just one week before competition.

Another continuing factor deterring the students is a lack of funding. While some schools were able to spend upwards of $25,000, Team Guardian spent just under $1,000 on their plane and were forced to pay for transportation, totalling over $500, out of their own pockets. Allnut stated that this did not place them at too large of a disadvantage at the actual competition; Team UAARG’s heavily funded UAV nearly took out Sherbrooke’s ground station upon take off. The near miss apparently required a kick from one of Sherbrooke’s team members in order to protect their aircraft.

The team currently has several sponsors which include the Faculty of Applied Science, the Engineering Student Society, and Associate Professor Dr John Jones, among others. Despite the quantity of supporters, Allnut stated that the team is in nearly constant need of funds.

Allnut concluded by touching on the makeup of the competition, stating that while Sherbrooke continued to dominate the field, no team was able to fully complete the task put before them. The Quebec university has won every year that the competition has been held. But Allnut described his team as the favourites to finally defeat them.

To watch Team Guardian in action, check out www.the-peak.ca/multimedia