Correlation between design characteristics of a fully-actuated unmanned aerial vehicle and closed-loop wind disturbance rejection

Abstract The ability of multirotor unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to perform accurately in windy environments is crucial for extended use in outdoor applications. To design UAVs to operate in these environments, most studies have focused on static performance metrics such as thrust-to-weight ratio and endurance, without directly considering closed-loop control performance. This work develops a simplified metric that serves as a predictor for achievable disturbance rejection performance, enabling efficient UAV design selection without requiring full-scale nonlinear simulations. A reduced-order model is introduced to capture key aerodynamic and actuation characteristics, allowing for rapid evaluation of UAV configurations. The metric is validated against high-fidelity nonlinear simulations, demonstrating strong correlation with actual control performance. By bridging the gap between UAV structural optimization and closed-loop control behavior, this approach provides a practical tool for integrating disturbance rejection capabilities into UAV design processes. The practical utility of this metric is supported by experimental findings from related wind tunnel studies of fully-actuated UAVs, which demonstrate that actual disturbance rejection performance aligns with the trends predicted by the simplified correlation function.