Impact of wind on battery performance in a small electric UAV using hardware-in-the-loop simulation

Small UAVs are most commonly electrically driven with energy supplied by a lightweight lithium polymer battery. The small size of these UAVs inherently results in a disproportionately large impact of adverse flight conditions such as wind gusts compared to larger unmanned and manned aircraft. These gusts are expected to have an impact on the lithium battery performance compared to operation in calm conditions. Therefore, to design an appropriate energy management system involving only batteries or a hybrid system as well as to choose an appropriate battery pack, the impact of gusts on battery performance needs to be understood. This study explores the impact of gusts on three different Li-Po batteries in terms of performance.