Explorer Post 1010: UAS 2016 Project

Explorer Post 1010
Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) 2016

Our Team

In December 2015, Explorer Post 1010 signed up to have a team in the 2016 UAS4STEM (Unmanned Aircraft System) competition. It looked like something we could do well and have fun. We had experience in flying quadcopters, and had a great mentor in Tom May.

UAS4STEM requires the students to build and fly a mid-size quad-copter through a competition course in a limited time. A team is limited to 8 members, who must complete an on-line training session. The regional tournament is in spring, and if selected, the national competition is in August.

To start, every member needs to be a member in the Academy of Model Aeronautics (AMA). A free youth membership is available at https://www.modelaircraft.org/joinrenew.aspx.

During the winter, we completed the on-line training and built the quadcopter. In the spring we practiced at the King Farm farmstead. Here is a map to the test site.

Our Team

Alex Parris
Alex Yu
Eric Rong
Gamitha Wijekoon

Kathleen Arnett
Matthew McCallum
Ragini Balachandran
Vivek Uppoor

Project Documents
    Rule Book for UAS4STEM 2016
    2016 Introduction Flyer
    2016 Quadcopter Specification (Quadzilla)

Meet Quadzilla Built Quadzille

On Sunday, April 24, 2016, our "Quad Squad" traveled to the Patuxent Navel Air Station for the regional competition. It was a long drive and it was a long day, but we completed the competition and had fun. Our team came in third out of 11 teams and were hoping to get invited to the national competition on August 22 in Indiana. Unfortunately, we just missed getting an invite (maybe next year).

Slideshow Competition Videos: Takeoff Landing Team (80MB each)

With Tom May as our adult mentor, we plan to have another team compete in the spring of 2017. We will work hard to get to the national competition. We will need to review our lessons learned from 2016.