First flight 2013 | ||
SEU UAV is a Chinese UAV developed by Southeast University (SEU), and has entered service with Nanjing and other Chinese governmental establishments.
Traffic UAV
SEU Traffic UAV is a micro air vehicle (MAV) developed by a team of undergraduate students of School of Transportation of Southeast University (东南大学交通学院) led by a junior Mr. Liu Shan-Wen (刘善文), with Professor Guo Xiu-Cheng (过秀成) providing guidance. Traffic UAV is specifically designed to gather traffic data for urban development and planning. Currently, such information is gathered via video cameras or specially designed vehicles, but such methods are highly expensive. Gathering traffic data by means of UAV provides a much cheaper alternative with the same or even better result, so the idea of Traffic UAV was borne. One of the main cost of UAV based system is the cost of aerial platform, so to reduce the cost of the aerial platform as much as possible, it was decided to utilize commercial off-the-shelf system (COTS) whenever it is possible. Model airplanes were selected as the base of the UAV, with significant modification by incorporating additional modules that must be included to perform intended function, resulting in the production cost of only ¥ 15000. The complete name of the system is (Model Airplane Assisted Road Traffic Target Coordinate Track Gathering Technology and System Software and Hardware Development System (Hang-Mo Fu-Zhu Dao-Lu Jiao-Tong Mu-Biao Gui-Ji Ti-QÜ Ji-Shu Ji Xi-Tong Ruan-Ying-Jian Kai-Fa Xi-Tong, 航模辅助道路交通目标坐标轨迹提取技术及系统软硬件开发系统), and the reason model airplane appeared in the name is because the UAV is based on a heavily modified model airplane first purchased as COTS.
The entire system can be operated by a single person, thus greatly reducing the personnel cost, with overall unit price of ¥ 20000. The system has won three hardware patents and a software patent, and has been used in two Nanjing municipal projects: Traffic Effect Analysis Project of Hua-Hong Section at the Southern Section of Wu-Tang Square in Nanjing (南京市五塘广场南侧华宏地块交通影响评价项目), and Nanjing Municipal Public Bus Comprehensive Performance Inspection Corporation Traffic Effect Analysis (南京交运汽车综合性能检测有限公司交通影响分析). Traffic UAV system is designed to gather traffic data in the designated area and provide the information in real time to ground stations, and provide traffic analysis within an hour. To achieve this, GPS navigation is adopted, and the traffic coordinates and tracks processing software is based on Microsoft Foundation Class Library and OpenCV platforms. Traffic UAV is capable of autonomously fly to the designated area and carry out the mission, and after the mission is completed, the UAV would automatically fly back and land. Specification: