Static Test Procedure for Electromechanical Actuators for UAV Applications

This paper discusses a test approach for evaluating the steady-state performance of small to medium sized actuators for UAV applications. The used test system is the Iron Bird Test Facility available at the Chair of Aircraft Design at the Technical University of Munich. This test facility allows for testing servo actuators in a precise and versatile way for comparing the presented measurement approaches. The paper gives an overview of the used test setup and describes the approach used to derive the performance parameters of an actuator. Different load cases are presented. These load cases are formulated using so-called output lists, which contain position and load values which are applied to the actuator. Three different actuators are subjected to the described test procedure. The results of one actuator are used to show the analysis procedure to extract the performance parameters. The differences of the used load cases are presented and the validity of the initial steady-state assumptions are discussed. The paper concludes with a comparison of the data sheet values of the tested actuators to the test results and discusses possible reasons for the deviations.