EECS 295: Drones

Fall 2025

Build photos:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/ETcF2eafuDjfW49QA

Parameter file checklist (upload your parameter file to confirm checklist)

Professor & Class Schedule

Peter Burke

e-mail: pburke@uci.edu

 

Undergraduate tutors:

Aiden Michael Favish
Lucas Li
Jeffrey Liao
Pratik Reddy Palwai

Code:

15925

Lectures:

M/W 10:30-11:50 AM MTSB 124

Labs: 

W 2-6 PM ET 202

(Flexible time)

ET437 will be open (unsupervised) 9-5 M-F for use under the "buddy system".

Youtube tutorials for this course:

Drone avionics playlist:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMdLsDgspkNS3k7Mr50BD2Gm1fHcUkouBLinks to an external site.

And on Rumble:

https://rumble.com/c/c-6699371

Useful URLs:

https://canvas.eee.uci.edu/courses/72618/pages/drone-urls

Textbook:

Professor will provide online learning materials

You might find this article about the pedagogy used in this class interesting:

Peter J. Burke, Patrick Wei, M Fakih, Diane Burke
Drones from A to Z: Experiential Learning at Its Finest
https://doi.org/10.36227/techrxiv.175695608.82891552/v1

Enrollment/prerequisites:

Enrollment is restricted to Embedded and Cyber-Physical Systems (ECPS) students.

There is no course prerequisite.

Grading Components:

Grading rubric:

Team builds a drone but it does not fly : C

Team builds a drone and it flies in manual mode: B

Team builds a drone and completes a fully autonomous flight (Takeoff, waypoint, autoland): A

Team implements AI or internet connectivity: A+

Course overview

This will be a theory and hands on tutorial about how to build and fly drones/unmanned aerial vehicles from start to finish. It will cover all aspects including drone avionics, batteries, power, motors, airframes. At the end of the course students will have built and flown their own drone. The drone parts will be provided by the department (see lab fees below) and each week students will install a new component after a theory lecture on its operation. The drone will use Ardupilot (open source software already installed on over 1 million vehicles), and will be fully capable of autonomous, GPS guided way point missions, and will have wireless telemetry to a ground control station. Students will be expected to demonstrate fully flight capabilities for achieving a passing grade. The students will be expected to pass a short online FAA exam and follow all FAA and UC drone policies during the course.

The design is here: 

https://rotorbuilds.com/build/33054

Course Outline/topics

Week 1: Safety, FAA, UC regulations

Week 2: Flight controllers (overview of the brain of the drone; firmware programming and demonstration on actual hardware) Barometer, Micro controller, UART, PWM and other modulation techniques

Week 3: Radio control. Protocols, theory of RF remote control. Firmware installation and programming of radio receiver on drone and radio transmitter on the ground (using ESP32 ExpressLRS open protocol). Aileron, elevator, throttle, rudder, flight mode selection, arm/disarm, fail safe (lost link) behavior.

Week 4: Power, batteries, ESCS. Battery technology, safety, charging, storage, handling. Brushless motor function and electronic control with electronic speed controllers. 

Week 5: GPS + other positions aids (LIDAR, sonar, optical flow, etc): Theory of operation, accuracy. Connect and demonstrate GPS coordinates on flight controller.

Week 6: Video and heads up display. Analog and digital protocols. Install camera on drone with video transmitter, program heads up display overlay (GPS, speed, alt, etc). Demonstrate receive with video monitor.

Week 7: Flight modes, maiden flight in drone cage in manual flight mode.

Week 8: Telemetry to ground: RF modem, wifi, 4G /cell phone, Crossfire, etc. Demonstration with ESP32 based wifi transponder using DroneBridge. Ground control stations.

Week 9: AI and Autonomy. Companion computer (Raspberry Pi). Scripted flight (Python, PyMavlink). Image recognition. OpenCV. Tracking.

Week 10: Remote ID, Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM), network/cloud integration of drones, drone swarms. (Students will install a remote ID module on their drones this week).

Week 11: Final project due: Flight demonstration