EP2842613A1

EP2842613A1 - Control device and control method for remotely-controlled toy airplane

Info

Publication number: EP2842613A1
Application number: EP12875370.4A
Authority: EP
Inventors: Dongqing Cai
Original assignee: Guangzhou Alpha Culture Co Ltd; Guangdong Auldey Animation and Toys Co Ltd; Guangdong Alpha Animation and Culture Co Ltd
Current assignee: Guangzhou Alpha Culture Co Ltd; Guangdong Auldey Animation and Toys Co Ltd; Guangdong Alpha Animation and Culture Co Ltd
Priority date: 2012-04-26
Filing date: 2012-09-07
Publication date: 2015-03-04
Anticipated expiration: 2032-09-07
Also published as: EP2842613B1; EP2842613A4; CN102657941A; CN102657941B; WO2013159480A1

Abstract

The disclosure herein provides a control device for remote-controlled toy planes, including a power module, a main control module, and a flight control module, wherein a height detection module is also included, which is used to send a signal and receive the signal that are sent by itself and reflected back and a signal sent by a remote controller. The height control module is used to receive a height control signal after decoding and control a electric motor drive to adjust the flight height of the toy aircraft so as to realize automatic hovering of the toy aircraft and one-click take-off. It is easy and convenient to operate for toy aircraft lovers of different levels and is also widely applicable to model aircrafts or other unmanned aerial vehicles for aloftwork, which gives the control device a promising future.

Description

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates generally to a control device for toy aircraft, more particularly to a control device for remote-controlled toy aircraft and the control method thereof

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Toy aircrafts that are currently popular use control devices comprising a power module, a main control module, and a flight control module. Wireless signals are sent from a remote controller to the main control module, which in turn transmits the feedback signal to the flight control module, resulting in a flight of the toy aircraft. The operations of ascending, descending, and direction controls of such toy aircrafts are all achieved via manual control, which is difficult for toy aircraft lovers at beginners' level to operate, easily leading to mistakes and crushing of toy aircrafts on obstacles or the ground; in addition, controlling such toy aircrafts to hover at a given height requires outstanding control skills of a toy aircraft from toy aircraft lovers, such as propeller speed control and direction control.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In view of the above deficiencies of the prior art, it is an object of the present invention to provide is to provide a control device with an ingenious design and easy operation for remote-controlled toy aircraft and the control method thereof, which allows take-off to a set height by one click and automatic hovering.
To achieve the goal above, according to an aspect of the present invention, it provides a control device for a remote-controlled toy aircraft, including a power module, a main control module and a flight control module, wherein it also includes:

a height detection module, configured to receive a height-setting remote signal from a remote controller, to send a height detection signal, to receive the reflected height detection signal, and to analyze all signals received and transmit them to the main control module for decoding to generate a height control signal;
a height control module, configured to receive the height control signal after decoding and to control the rotational speed of an electric motor, so as to adjust the flight height of the toy aircraft;
wherein the height detection module includes a signal transmission circuit for sending a height-detecting infrared signal and a signal receiving circuit for receiving the height-setting remote signal from the remote controller and reflected height-detecting infrared signal sent by the transmission circuit to the ground; the transmission circuit and receiving circuit are connected respectively to the main control module.

Preferably, in order to clearly indicate the current control mode of the toy aircraft, the device of the present invention also includes a height-setting indication module; the height-setting indication module includes a height-setting light indicator circuit for indicating and distinguishing whether the toy aircraft is in the automatic or manual height-setting mode, wherein the height-setting light indicator circuit includes two LED lights, two resistors and an triode; the two LED lights are connected in parallel before connected in series to a resistor and the collector C of the triode, the emitter E of the triode being earthed and the base B of the triode connected to another resistor in series before connecting to the main control module.
Preferably, in order to achieve a more steady flight of the toy aircraft, the height control module comprises an electric motor drive circuit and a gyro sensor circuit; the electric motor drive circuit and gyro sensor circuit are independent and connected respectively to the main control module.
Preferably, in order to further enhance the function features of the toy aircraft, the device also includes a launch control module for controlling the missile device to launch toy missiles.
According to another aspect of the present invention, it provides a control method for setting the height of toy aircraft, the method comprising the following steps:

a. turn on the power of the toy aircraft, all modules of the toy aircrafts standing by and the toy aircraft landing on the ground; choose the take-off mode using the remote controller: jump to step i if manual take-off is chosen, or to step b if automatic take-off is chosen.
b. the receiving circuit of the toy aircraft receives the height-setting remote signal, amplifies the signal and feeds it back to the main control module; the main control module examines the voltage of the power module and sending different PWM to the height control module accordingly; the electric motor is activated and lifts the toy aircraft off the ground.
c. the signal transmitting circuit of the height detection module activates, sending a height-detecting signal to the ground intermittently, which, after reflected back by the ground, is received by the receiving circuit, amplified by the amplifier circuit, and transmitted to the main control module for decoding to generates a height control signal.
d. the strength of the height control signal after decoding is determined, and step e is carried out if the signal is weak, or step f if the signal is strong, or step g if the signal is moderate.
e. the main control module sends PWM to the height control module, decreasing the motor speed so as to reduce the flight height of the toy aircraft, and then repeats step c.
f. the main control module sends PWM to the height control module, increasing the motor speed so as to increase the flight height of the toy aircraft, and then repeats step c.
g. the main control module examines the voltage of the power module and adjusts the motor speed accordingly so as to allow the toy aircraft to hover at a set height, accomplishing an automatic take-off to a set height; the toy aircraft is now controllable via the direction operating handle to fly forward, backward, left, or right, according to the operational signals fed back to the flight control module via the main control module.
h. when cancelling the automatic height-setting mode, the signal receiving circuit once again receives a height setting remote signal or manual height control signal from the remote controller and feeds it back to the main control module after amplification; the main control module controls the signal transmission circuit to stop working, and the toy aircraft enters a fully manual control mode.
i. by manually operating the lift lever on the remote controller, the main control module receives the corresponding ascending or descending control signal from the remote controller, feeds back to the height control module, so as to change the motor speed in turn, and to control the toy aircraft to ascend or descend.
j. when the signal receiving circuit receives a height-setting remote signal from the remote controller under the manual flight mode, turn to step c.

The disclosure herein adds a height detection module and a height control module to the prior design of control device of toy aircrafts, which are configured to receive height-setting remote control signals sent by a remote controller, to send height detection signals, and to receive the reflected height detection signals, further feed them back to the height control module via the main control module, so as to control the electric motor drive and adjust the flight height of the toy aircraft, thus realize automatic hovering and take-off by one-click of the toy aircrafts, allowing a toy aircraft to automatically ascending to a set height by lifting the toy aircraft with a signal and continuously adjusting the electric motor speed in the height control module under control of the height detection module with easy and convenient operation. The present invention not only allows toy aircraft lovers to control a toy aircraft with less efforts, master the operation skills of toy aircrafts faster, reduce the operational difficulty for beginners, and reduce the possibility of toy aircraft damage, but also allow the toy aircraft to be applied to projects that require aloft work at a given height, help the operators to work with more ease. Preferably, the present invention further includes a height-setting indicator light circuit, indicating and distinguishing the automatic or manual height-setting mode of the toy aircraft by the two constant or flashing LED light, which makes it even more convenient for a toy aircraft lover to distinguish and also allows easy locating of the toy aircraft when operating and playing under the night sky. The control device disclosed herein is simple to operate, suitable for toy aircraft lovers of different levels, and widely applicable to module aircrafts or other unmanned aerial vehicles for aloftwork, which gives it a promising future.
The present invention is described in further details below with drawings and embodiments.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Fig. 1 is a diagram showing a control device according to one embodiment of the present invention.
Fig. 2 is a diagram showing a control circuit according to one embodiment of the present invention.
Fig. 3 is a diagram showing a control method according to one embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

With reference to Fig. 1 and Fig.2, a control device for remote-controlled toy aircraft includes a power module, a main control module, and a flight control module, wherein a height detection module is also included, which is configured to receive height-setting remote signals sent by a remote controller, to send height-detecting signals, to receive the reflected height-detecting signals, and to analyze the signals received before transmitting them to the main control module for decoding and generating height control signals. The height control module is configured to receive the decoded height control signals and to control the electric motor speed so as to adjust the flight height of the toy aircraft, and thus realize automatic hovering as well as take-off by one-click of the toy aircrafts, allowing a toy aircraft to automatically ascending to a given height by lifting the aircraft with a signal and continuously adjusting the electric motor speed in the height control module under the control of the height detection module with easy and convenient operation. The invention disclosed herein can not only allow toy aircraft lovers to control a toy aircraft with less efforts, master the operation skills of toy aircrafts faster, reduce the operational difficulty for beginners, and reduce the possibility of toy aircraft damage, but can also apply the toy aircraft to projects that require aloft work at a certain height, allowing the operators to work with more ease.
As demonstrated in Fig. 1, the height control module includes a signal transmission circuit for sending height-detecting infrared signals to the ground, and a signal receiving circuit for receiving height-setting signals sent by a remote controller and the reflected height-detecting infrared signals sent by the signal transmission circuit, wherein the signal transmission circuit and the signal receiving circuit are connected respectively to the main control module. The control device also includes a height-setting indication module; the height-setting indication module includes a height setting light indicator circuit to indicate and distinguish whether the toy aircraft is in the automatic or manual height setting mode, and therefore gives a clearer and more direct view of the current control mode of the toy aircraft. The control device of this embodiment also includes a launch control module for controlling the missile device to launch toy missiles, which allows installation of toy missile devices on the toy aircraft and controlling missile launch via the launch control module, further increasing the function features and entertainment value of the toy aircraft. The control device of this embodiment uses a power module comprising a DC power supply and a 3.3V voltage stabilizing circuit.
With reference to Fig.2, the main control module of this embodiment has a an IC chip U2 of model MK7A23P, with 14 pins in total. The signal transmission circuit of this embodiment has an infrared transmitting tube, or IR1, to send encoded infrared rays; the signal transmission circuit is activated at the take-off of the toy aircraft and the infrared transmitting tube IR1 intermittently sends encoded infrared rays to the ground; the transmission circuit above further comprises three resistors R3, R23, and R24; the infrared transmitting tube IR1 connects to R3 in series before connects to R23 in parallel, and then connects to R24 in series, wherein R3 and R23 are both dividers while R24 is a limiter. The receiving circuit includes a infrared receiver IR2, for receiving signals and an amplifying circuit, amp; the output end of the infrared receiver IR2 is connected to a resistor R26, and the amplifying circuit amp in series before connecting to U2, wherein R26 is a divider; the amplifying circuit in the embodiment above is consisted of an amplifier, a resistor R27, and a capacitor Q9, which are connected in parallel. In the embodiment above, the height-setting light indicator circuit includes two LED lights, two resistors R5 and R25, and a triode Q9; the two LED lights are connected in parallel before connecting to the resistor R5 and the collector C of the triode Q9 in series, the emitter E of the triode Q9 being earthed and the base B of the triode Q9 connected to the other resistor R25 in series before connecting to U2. During the height setting of a toy aircraft, U2 sends 3Hz square wave to R25, causing the triode Q9 to continuously switch between on- and off- states; when the triode Q9 is on, the current from the anode flows through the divider R5, a luminous diode LED1, and the triode Q9, to the earth, lighting up LED1; when the triode Q9 is off, LED1 goes out. In this way, LED1 will light up, go out, and light up again because of the continuous switching between the on- and off-states of the triode Q9, resulting in continuous flickering that indicates the automatic height-setting mode of the toy aircraft.
In the embodiment above, the height control module includes an electric motor drive circuit and a gyro sensor circuit; the electric motor drive circuit and gyro sensor circuit are independent and respectively connected to the main control module above. The electric motor drive circuit includes: two electric motors, or M1 and M2, which are the electric motors of the upper and lower propellers of the toy aircraft; two capacitors, or C4 and C5; two MOS tubes, or T1 and T2, controlling the rotation speed of the electric motors M1 and M2; and eight resistors, or R6, R7, R8, R9, R10, R11, R12, and R13. The two electric motors M1 and M2 must run in opposite directions to ensure steady flight of the toy aircraft, wherein the rotation speeds of M1 and M2 may be increased to lift the aircraft, or decreased to descend the aircraft; R8 and R9 form an anti-lock circuit for M1, while R10 and R11 form an anti-lock circuit for M2; R6 and R13 are dividers, while R7 and R12 are limiters. The gyro sensor circuit includes a gyro sensor, a resistor R14, and a capacitor C6, wherein the circuit examines the variation in the horizontal angular acceleration of the aircraft and feeds back the results to U2 as electronic signals.
In the power module U1 of the embodiment above, U1 is a stabilivolt IC with a constant output of 3V voltage; C2 and C3 are filter capacitors for removing A.C. clutter; R4 is a discharge resistor; R1 and D1 form a power indicator, wherein D1 is a common luminous diode for indicating the on or off state of the power supply.
In the flight control module of the embodiment above, Q1, Q2, Q3 and Q4 form a circuit for the forward and backward rotation of the motor to control the motor M3. At the higher potential of R18, the current from the anode of the power supply flows successively through the triode Q2, R16, the electric motor M3, the triode Q4, and then to the earth, and the electric motor rotates forward, driving the aircraft to go forward; at the higher potential of R17, the current from the anode of the power supply flows successively through the triode Q1, R15, the electric motor M3, the triode Q3, and then to the earth, and the electric motor M3 rotates backward, pulling the aircraft backward.
With reference to Fig. 3, the control method for setting the height of a toy aircraft includes the following steps:

a. Turn on the power of the toy aircraft, with all modules of the toy aircraft standing by and the toy aircraft landing on the ground; choose a take-off mode using the remote controller, and jump to step i if manual take-off is chosen, or to step b if automatic take-off is chosen.
b. The signal receiving circuit of the toy aircraft receives the height-setting remote signal and feeds it back to the main control module after signal amplification; the main control module examines the voltage of the power module and sends different PWM to the height control module accordingly; the electric motor is activated and lifts the toy aircraft off the ground.
c. The signal transmission circuit of the height detection module activates, sending height detection signals to the ground intermittently, which, after reflected back by the ground, are received by the signal receiving circuit, amplified by the amplifier circuit, and transmitted to the main control module for decoding and generating height control signals.
d. The strength of the height control signals is determined, and step e is carried out if the signals are weak, or step f if the signals are strong, or step g if the signals are moderate.
e. The main control module sends PWM to the height control module, decreasing the motor speed so as to reduce the flight height of the toy aircraft, and then repeats step c.
f. The main control module sends PWM to the height control module, increasing the motor speed so as to increase the flight height of the toy aircraft, and then repeats step c.
g. The main control module examines the voltage of the power module and adjusts the motor speed accordingly so as to allow the toy aircraft to hover at a set height, accomplishing an automatic take-off to a set height; the toy aircraft is now controllable via the direction operating handle to fly forward, backward, left, or right, according to the operational signals fed back to the flight control module via the main control module.
h. When cancelling the automatic height-setting mode, the signal receiving circuit receives once again the height-setting remote signal or manual height control signal from the remote controller, and feeds it back to the main control module after amplification; the main control module controls the transmission circuit to stop working, and the toy aircraft enters a complete manual control mode.
i. When manually operating the lift lever on the remote controller, the main control module receives the corresponding ascending or descending control signals from the remote controller and feeds them back to the height control module, so as to change the motor speed in turn, and control the toy aircraft to ascend or descend.
j. When receiving a height-setting remote signal from the remote controller under the manual flight mode, the toy aircraft turns to step c.

The toy aircraft as disclosed herein can mainly be played in two ways:

1) Take-off by one-click:

The toy aircraft is placed on the ground; when pressing the take-off button on the remote controller, the toy aircraft will automatically take off, slowly ascending to a pre-set height, and hovering at that height; in the meantime, the toy aircraft can be controlled using the remote controller to move forward, backward, left, or right, while staying at the pre-set height. If the operator wants to control the aircraft by her/himself, he/she will just need to push the trigger of the controller or press the take-off button one more time, and the toy aircraft will end the automatic mode and enter the manual mode, or in other words, it becomes controllable the same way as a conventional toy aircraft.

2) Height setting during a flight:

When controlling a flight of the toy aircraft using the manual mode, if the an automatic flight mode of the toy aircraft is desired, the operator will just need to press the take-off button on the controller when the toy aircraft is in a steady status, and the toy aircraft will automatically fly to the pre-set height and hovering; the toy aircraft can be controlled using the remote controller to move forward, backward, left, or right, while the toy aircraft remaining the pre-set height constantly. If the operator wants to end the automatic mode, again, just gently push the trigger of the controller or press the take-off button one more time and the toy aircraft will end the automatic mode.
Although the disclosure has described herein in terms of specific embodiments, such description should not mean any limitation to our disclosure. Based on the description of this disclosure, those skilled in the art will recognize that the present invention can be practiced in other variations within the spirit and scope of the claims.

Claims

A control device for a remote-controlled toy aircraft, comprising:
a power module,

a main control module, and

a flight control module,

characterized in that the control device further comprises:
a height detection module, configured to receive a height-setting remote signal from a remote controller, to send a height detection signal and receive the reflected height detection signal, and to analyze all the received signals and transmit them to the main control module for decoding to generate a height control signal;

a height control module, configured to receive the height control signal after decoding and to control the rotational speed of an electric motor, so as to adjust the flight height of the toy aircraft.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 1, characterized in that the height detection module comprises a signal transmission circuit for sending a height-detecting infrared signal to the ground, and a signal receiving circuit for receiving the height-setting remote signal sent by the remote controller and the height-detecting infrared signal sent by the transmission circuit and reflected back by the ground; the signal transmission circuit and the signal receiving circuit are connected to the main control module respectively.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 2, characterized in that the signal transmission circuit has an infrared transmitting tube for transmitting an encoded infrared ray; the signal transmission circuit is activated at the take-off of the toy aircraft and the infrared transmitting tube intermittently sends the encoded infrared ray to the ground.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 2, characterized in that the receiving circuit comprises an infrared receiver for signal reception and an amplifier that is connected to the main control module.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 1, characterized by further comprising a height-setting indication module, wherein the height setting indication module comprises a height setting light indicator circuit to indicate and distinguish between the automatic and manual height-setting modes of the toy aircraft.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 5, characterized in that the height setting light indicator circuit comprises two LED lights, two resistors, and a triode; the two LED lights are connected in parallel before connecting in series to a resistor and the collector C of the triode, the emitter E of the triode being earthed, the base B of the triode being connected to another resistor in series before connecting to the main control module.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 1, characterized in that the main control module comprises an IC chip of model MK7A23P.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 1, characterized in that the height control module comprises an electric motor drive circuit and a gyro sensor circuit; the electric motor drive circuit and gyro sensor circuit are independent and connected to the main control module respectively.
The control device of the remote-controlled toy aircraft of claim 1, characterized by further comprising a launch control module for controlling a missile device to launch toy missiles.
A control method for setting the height of a toy aircraft, characterized by comprising the following steps:
a. turn on the power of the toy aircraft, all modules of the toy aircrafts standing by and the toy aircraft landing on the ground; choose the take-off mode using the remote controller and jump to step i if manual take-off is chosen, or to step b if automatic take-off is chosen;

b. the receiving circuit of the toy aircraft receives a height-setting remote signal and feeding back to the main control module after signal amplification; the main control module examines the voltage of the power module and sending different PWM to the height control module accordingly; the electric motor is activated and lifts the toy aircraft off the ground;

c. the receiving circuit of the height detection module activates, sending a height-detecting signal to the ground intermittently, which, after reflected back by the ground, is received by the receiving circuit, amplified by the amplifier circuit, and transmitted to the main control module for decoding to generate a height control signal;

d. the strength of the height control signal is determined, and step e is carried out if the signal is weak, or step f if the signal is strong, or step g if the signal is moderate;

e. the main control module sends PWM to the height control module, decreasing the rotational speed of a motor so as to reduce the flight height of the toy aircraft, and then repeats step c;

f. the main control module sends PWM to the height control module, increasing the motor speed so as to increase the flight height of the toy aircraft, and then repeats step c;

g. the main control module examines the voltage of the power module and adjusts the motor speed accordingly so as to allow the toy aircraft to hover at a set height, accomplishing an automatic take-off to a set height; the toy aircraft is now controllable via the direction operating handle to fly forward, backward, left, or right, according to the operational signals fed back to the flight control module via the main control module;

h. when cancelling the automatic height-setting mode, the receiving circuit receives a height-setting remote signal or manual height control signal from the remote controller and feeds it back to the main control module after amplification; the main control module controls the transmission circuit to stop working, and the toy aircraft enters a fully manual control mode;

i. when manually operating the lift lever on the remote controller, the main control module receives the corresponding signal from the remote controller, changes the motor speed in turn, and controls the toy aircraft to ascend or descend;

j. when receiving a height-setting remote signal from the remote controller under the manual flight mode, the toy aircraft turns to step c.