Unmanned aircraft systems and methods of assembly

• US 10,467,376 B2
• Filed: 03/23/2017
• Issued: 11/05/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 03/25/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Walmart Apollo, LLC (WalMart Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Walmart Apollo, LLC (WalMart Inc.)
• Inventors: Thompson, John P., High, Donald R., Jones, Nathan G.
• Primary Examiner(s): Hann, Jay
• Application Number:
  US15/467,783
• Publication Number:
  US 20170277825A1
• Time in Patent Office: 957 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2111/20 Configuration CAD, e.g. designing by assembling or positioning modules selected from libraries of predesigned modules
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 30/15 Vehicle, aircraft or watercraft design
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0621 Item configuration or customization
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/18504 Aircraft used as relay or high altitude atmospheric platform

Abstract

Some embodiments provide a system to design an unmanned aircraft system (UAS) based on an intended task, comprising: UAS component database and a design control circuit configured to: obtain a first set of multiple task parameters corresponding to a requested task that the UAS is being designed to perform; identify at least one primary type of UAS component to be included in the UAS being designed; identify a first set of one or more secondary types of UAS components to support the primary type of UAS component while implementing the task; and provide a design plan of the designed UAS designed to be utilized to implement the task.

Claims

1. A method of designing an unmanned aircraft system (UAS) based on an intended task, comprising:

by a design control circuit;

obtaining a first set of multiple task parameters specified by a first customer and corresponding to a requested first task that the first customer is requesting a UAS be designed to perform;

identifying, from a UAS component database storing UAS component identifiers and corresponding UAS attributes for each of numerous UAS components, at least one primary type of UAS component to be included in the UAS being designed based on a correlation between the task parameters and the UAS component attributes of the UAS components;

identifying, from the UAS component database, a first set of one or more secondary types of UAS components to be included in the designed UAS to support the at least one primary type of UAS component while implementing the first task; and

providing a design plan of the designed UAS designed to be utilized to implement the first task, wherein the design plan specifies at least a first primary UAS component that corresponds to the primary type of UAS component, and secondary UAS components that each correspond to at least one of the secondary types of UAS components, wherein the first primary UAS component and the secondary UAS components are configured to cooperate in assembling the designed UAS intended to implement the first task;

controlling, through a transport controller of the first primary UAS component, a transport system of the first primary UAS component to autonomously cause the first primary UAS component to move toward one of the secondary UAS components and couple with the one of the secondary UAS components; and

wherein the providing the design plan comprises accessing the UAS component database, extracting from the UAS component database the UAS component attributes of each of the secondary UAS components and the UAS component attributes of the first primary UAS component, and confirming, in accordance with the UAS component attributes accessed from the UAS component database, that each of the secondary UAS components are physically and electrically configured to cooperate with at least one of the first primary UAS component and another one of the secondary UAS components.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the identifying the first set of the one or more secondary types of UAS components comprises identifying the secondary types of UAS components that ensure the designed UAS is capable of flight while employing the first primary UAS component in performing the first task.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

distributing user interface information over a computer network to a plurality of geographically distributed and unassociated customers, wherein the user interface information causes a population, with respect to each of the plurality of customers, of a request user interface corresponding to at least one of multiple different predefined tasks for which a UAS can be designed.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

communicating the user interface information to customer computer systems associated with each of the plurality of customers and configured to populate at each customer computer system the request user interface comprising predefined fields to receive task parameters corresponding to one of the multiple predefined tasks; and

receiving, from each of the plurality of customer computer systems through the request user interface, sets of task parameters corresponding to one of the multiple predefined tasks for which a UAS is being designed.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

distributing user interface information over a computer network to a first customer computer system associated with the first customer and causing a user interface to populate; and

receiving through the user interface a selection of the first primary UAS component from a plurality of potential primary UAS components that correspond to the primary type of UAS components.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

distributing user interface information over a computer network to a first customer computer system associated with the first customer and enabling the first customer to simulate flight of the designed UAS in accordance with predefined flight characteristics corresponding to the first primary UAS component and the secondary UAS components.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the distributing the user interface information comprises distributing the user interface information to the first customer computer system and enabling the first customer to control a simulated UAS corresponding to the designed UAS through at least a first certification simulation.

8. A system to design an unmanned aircraft system based on an intended task, comprising:

an unmanned aircraft system (UAS) component database storing UAS component identifiers and corresponding UAS attributes for each of numerous UAS components; and

a design control circuit coupled with the UAS component database and configured to;

obtain a first set of multiple task parameters specified by a first customer and corresponding to a requested first task that the first customer is requesting a UAS be designed to perform;

identify, from the UAS component database, at least one primary type of UAS component to be included in the UAS being designed based on a correlation between the task parameters and the UAS component attributes of the UAS components;

identify, from the UAS component database, a first set of one or more secondary types of UAS components to be included in the designed UAS to support the at least one primary type of UAS component while implementing the first task; and

provide a design plan of the designed UAS designed to be utilized to implement the first task, wherein the design plan specifies at least a first primary UAS component that corresponds to the primary type of UAS component, and secondary UAS components that each correspond to at least one of the secondary types of UAS components, wherein the first primary UAS component and the secondary UAS components are configured to cooperate in assembling the designed UAS intended to implement the first task;

wherein the first primary UAS component comprises a transport controller and a transport system communicatively coupled with the transport controller, wherein the transport controller is configured to execute one or more computer programs to control the transport system to autonomously cause the first primary UAS component to move toward one of the secondary UAS components and couple with the one of the secondary UAS components; and

wherein the design control circuit in identifying, from the UAS component database, the first set of one or more secondary types of UAS components is configured to access the UAS component database, extract from the UAS component database the UAS component attributes of each of the secondary UAS components and the UAS component attributes of the first primary UAS component, and confirm, in accordance with the UAS component attributes accessed from the UAS component database, that each of the secondary UAS components are physically and electrically configured to cooperate with at least one of the first primary UAS component and another one of the secondary UAS components.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the design control circuit in identifying the first set of the one or more secondary types of UAS components is configured to identify the secondary types of UAS components that ensure the designed UAS is capable of flight while employing the first primary UAS component in performing the first task.

10. The system of claim 8, further comprising:

an interface system configured to distribute user interface information over a computer network to a plurality of geographically distributed and unassociated customers, wherein the user interface information is configured to populate, with respect to each of the plurality of customers, a request user interface corresponding to at least one of multiple different predefined tasks for which a UAS can be designed.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the interface system further comprises an interface control circuit coupled with interface memory storing computer instructions that when executed by the interface control circuit cause the interface control circuit to:

communicate the user interface information to customer computer systems associated with each of the plurality of customers and configured to populate at each customer computer system the request user interface comprising predefined fields to receive task parameters corresponding to one of the multiple predefined tasks; and

receive, from each of the plurality of customer computer systems through the request user interface, sets of task parameters corresponding to one of the multiple predefined tasks for which a UAS is being designed.

12. The system of claim 8, further comprising:

an interface system configured to distribute user interface information over a computer network to a first customer computer system associated with the first customer to populate a user interface, and to receive through the user interface a selection of the first primary UAS component from a plurality of potential primary UAS components that correspond to the primary type of UAS components.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the design control circuit

wherein the interface system, in distributing the user interface information, is configured to provide, in addition to a listing of a plurality of potential components, a set of selectable attributes, receive a selection of one of the selectable attributes and cause a sorting of the displayed listing of the plurality of potential components based on the selected attribute.

14. The system of claim 8, further comprising:

a simulation circuit configured to distribute user interface information over a computer network to a first customer computer system associated with the first customer to enable the first customer to simulate flight of the designed UAS in accordance with predefined flight characteristics corresponding to the first primary UAS component and the secondary UAS components.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the simulation circuit is further configured to distribute the user interface information to the first customer computer system and enabling the first customer to control a simulated UAS corresponding to the designed UAS through at least a first certification simulation.

16. The system of claim 8, wherein the design control circuit in obtaining the first set of multiple task parameters specified by the first customer is configured to provide the first customer with options corresponding to the first task specified by the first customer, wherein each of the options corresponds to one or more attributes, of multiple different UAS components, intended to be utilized to implement the first task.

17. The system of claim 8, wherein the design control circuit in providing at least one of the primary component and a first secondary component of the one or more secondary component is configured to identify multiple different alternative components for the at least one of the primary component and the first secondary component, cause information to be communicated to a customer computer system to render through a user interface of the customer computer system an option for each of the multiple different alternative components and information about each of the multiple different alternative components, and receive based on a selection by the customer through the user interface a selected component of the multiple different alternative components, and incorporate the selected component into the design plan.