EGH450 Advanced Unmanned Aircraft Systems

Unit Outline: Semester 2 2025, Gardens Point, Internal

Overview

This unit further develops your knowledge, skills and application of aerospace concepts, building on aircraft systems and flight and Unmanned Aircraft systems (UAS) and Systems Engineering. The unit focuses on experimental design, integration and test of a UAS. You will also gain skills in setting design specifications and carrying out detailed design analysis to design, build and flight test a UAS.

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit you will be able to:

1. Apply principles and advanced knowledge of manned and unmanned aircraft systems to design, build and test innovative Unmanned Aerial Systems at a mastered level.
2. Make and justify decisions considering safety, risk management and sustainability using a process aligned with professional engineering practice, at a mastered level.
3. Incorporate social, cultural, environmental factors and sustainable engineering practice when designing your UAS, at a mastered level.
4. Compose a technical report on an aerospace systems engineering project including design calculations and simulations, at a mastered level

Content

Learning Approaches

This unit includes formal lectures from experienced professional aerospace engineers to give you insight into
professional engineering knowledge, skills and attributes

This is a highly team oriented unit and much emphasis is placed on simulating project conditions seen in the
aerospace workplace. 

The lectures will be based on industry practice and experience and these will be underpinned by demonstrations,
reading and the application of knowledge to solving problems.

Tutorial sessions will involve individual questioning as well as group work and student-centred learning rather than
guided problem solving, with feedback coming from the whole group. This will enhance the group nature of systems
design.

You will have opportunities for real world learning experiences through laboratory exercises and flight testing around
unmanned aircraft systems.

Feedback on Learning and Assessment

Formative feedback will be provided throughout the discussion and workshop sessions. Review of submitted assessment items will provide both summative and formative feedback. Feedback will also be provided through:

• Regular interaction with tutors and demonstrators in the weekly collaborative learning sessions
• Comments on summative assessment work in addition to criteria sheets
• Generic comments back to the cohort via QUT Canvas
• Feedback from peers within your collaborative learning sessions

You are encouraged to view your group as a learning community and to share and discuss emergent ideas in the design process.

Each assessment submission will be marked against criteria and standards which will be shared with you at the beginning of semester through Assessment Task Descriptions and Marking Rubrics.

Marked assessment will include feedback from markers, against the criteria.

Assessment

Overview

Assessment in this unit has been designed to give you the opportunity to show your learning against the unit learning outcomes.
The assessment for this unit is designed to measure your acquisition of key concepts and your ability to apply and implement theoretical developments to contextualized aerospace engineering problems. You will be working individually as well as in small teams solving problems using a variety of analytical, hardware and computer based techniques. A project based approach to assignment design will be utilized.

Unit Grading Scheme

7- point scale

Assessment Tasks

Assessment: Project (applied)

This assessment involves submission of the final prototype of your final design.

Assessment: Report

This task specifically ask to submit project documentation including design, test reports, validation and verification.

Assessment: Presentation (Oral or Group)

This consists of a series of weekly critical design reviews with the tutor and a more formal critical design review presentation in front of an industry and an academic panel in week 13.

Academic Integrity

Academic integrity is a commitment to undertaking academic work and assessment in a manner that is ethical, fair, honest, respectful and accountable.

The Academic Integrity Policy sets out the range of conduct that can be a failure to maintain the standards of academic integrity. This includes, cheating in exams, plagiarism, self-plagiarism, collusion and contract cheating. It also includes providing fraudulent or altered documentation in support of an academic concession application, for example an assignment extension or a deferred exam.

You are encouraged to make use of QUT’s learning support services, resources and tools to assure the academic integrity of your assessment. This includes the use of text matching software that may be available to assist with self-assessing your academic integrity as part of the assessment submission process.

Breaching QUT’s Academic Integrity Policy or engaging in conduct that may defeat or compromise the purpose of assessment can lead to a finding of student misconduct (Code of Conduct – Student) and result in the imposition of penalties under the Management of Student Misconduct Policy, ranging from a grade reduction to exclusion from QUT.

Resources

Resource Materials

Recommended text(s)

Austin, RegUnmanned aircraft systems: UAVs design, development and deployment

Fahlstrom, Paul Gerin and Gleason, Thomas J , Introduction to UAV systems, 2012, 4th ed.,ISBN 1119978661, xxv, 280

Reference book(s)

Angelov, Plamen, Human Factors in UAV

Eskandarian, Azim Handbook of intelligent vehicles

Macke, David C; Watkins, Steve E; Rehmeier, Thomas, Creative Interdisciplinary UAV Design

Maza, Iva´n and Ollero, A Multiple heterogeneous unmanned aerial vehicles

Risk Assessment Statement

You will be required to undertake practical sessions in the computer lab under the supervision of the lecturer/tutor/technical staff of the School. The School's occupational health and safety policies and procedures will apply to these sessions.

You will undergo a health and safety induction and will be issued with a safety induction card. If you do not have a safety induction card, you will be denied access to laboratories.

In any laboratory practical you will be advised of requirements of safe and responsible behaviour and will be required to wear appropriate protective items (e.g. closed shoes or steel capped shoes).

Students will also need to develop a risk management plan for their project.

Standards/Competencies

This unit is designed to support your development of the following standards\competencies.

Engineers Australia Stage 1 Competency Standard for Professional Engineer

1: Knowledge and Skill Base

1. 
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report
2. 
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report
3. 
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)

2: Engineering Application Ability

1. 
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
2. 
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)

3: Professional and Personal Attributes

1. 
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
2. 
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)

Course Learning Outcomes

EN01 Bachelor of Engineering (Honours)

1. Make decisions ethically within the social, cultural, and organisational contexts of professional engineering practice.
   Relates to: ULO3, Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
2. Engage stakeholders professionally and communicate the outcomes of your work effectively to expert and non-expert audiences using appropriate modes.
   Relates to: ULO4, Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
3. Engage with and apply regulatory requirements relating to safety, risk management, and sustainability in professional engineering practice.
   Relates to: ULO2, Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
4. Demonstrate coherent knowledge and skills of physical, mathematical, statistical, computer, and information sciences that are fundamental to professional engineering practice.
   Relates to: ULO1, Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)

EN55 Master of Professional Engineering

1. Apply advanced and specialist knowledge, concepts and practices in engineering design, analysis management and sustainability.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
2. Critically analyse and evaluate complex engineering problems to achieve research informed solutions.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
3. Communicate complex information effectively and succinctly, presenting high level reports, arguments and justifications in oral, written and visual forms to professional and non specialist audiences.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
4. Organise and manage time, tasks and projects independently, and collaboratively demonstrating the values and principles that shape engineering decision making and professional accountability.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)

EN60 Graduate Certificate in Communication for Engineering

1. Demonstrate and apply specialised knowledge and technical skills in at least one Engineering discipline.
   Relates to: Project (applied)
2. Critically investigate real world engineering issues and solve complex problems drawing on specialised creative skills, analysis, evaluation and synthesis of discipline knowledge, theory and practice.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report
3. Employ effective written and oral professional communication skills across social, cultural and discipline domains.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
4. Exercise responsibility and accountability in applying knowledge and skills for own learning and effective practice including working independently, ethically and collaboratively.
   Relates to: Project (applied)

EV01 Bachelor of Engineering (Honours)

1. Make decisions ethically within the social, cultural, and organisational contexts of professional engineering practice.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
2. Engage stakeholders professionally and communicate the outcomes of your work effectively to expert and non-expert audiences using appropriate modes.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
3. Engage with and apply regulatory requirements relating to safety, risk management, and sustainability in professional engineering practice.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)
4. Demonstrate coherent knowledge and skills of physical, mathematical, statistical, computer, and information sciences that are fundamental to professional engineering practice.
   Relates to: Project (applied), Report, Presentation (Oral or Group)