Analyzing the flight of a quadcopter using a smartphone

Remotely-controlled helicopters and planes have been used as toys for decades. However, only recently, advances in sensor technologies have made possible to easily flight and control theses devices at an affordable price. Along with their increasing availability the educational opportunities are also proliferating. Here, a simple experiment in which a smartphone is mounted on a quadcopter is proposed to investigate the basics of a flight. Thanks to the smartphone's built-in accelerometer and gyroscope, take off, landing and yaw are analyzed.