Simulating the Manipulation of Flexible Bodies Through Drones

Abstract

In this work, we present the model for manipulating a flexible body using two omnidirectional drones at its extremities. The drones are considered conventional rigid bodies while the flexible body is described as a Cosserat beam with its dynamics given through a strain-based parametrization approach. This allows us to find a low-dimensional, yet geometrically exact formulation of the aerial system. We cover the forward-in-time simulation of such this multibody rigid-flexible system with force inputs. Preliminary results proof the ability of spatial deformation of the flexible body through drones.