KRTI is an annual competition organized by Ministry of Research, Technology, and Higher Education since 2013. Every year, Aksantara ITB routinely send their representatives to compete in KRTI. This year, Aksantara send one team for each category, Racing Plane (RP), Fixed Wing (FW), Vertical Take-off and Landing (VTOL), and Technology Development (TD).

Nathan, Pramadithya Herdian, and Naufal Alifyari who are the head of Aksantara, Technology Development, and Fixed Wing of Aksantara respectively explained about the systematic of competition for each division.

Fixed wing team have to conduct two missions, monitoring and mapping. “To support this mission, we brought a lot of devices. We bring antenna tracker for remote transmission, gimbal monitoring for plantation monitoring, launcher, and the vehicle (plane) itself,” explained Naufal.

In monitoring mission, participants has to record the plantation area from above using live streaming and redisplay it after the plane lands. The assessment is based on the quality of video’s transmission data. In mapping mission, the plane flew back and forth and took several photos. After landing, the photos are combined. “Assessment for mapping is based on the quality of the photos. Fixed wing team from ITB got good assessment score in mapping mission,” he added.

In technology development, Prama explained that they are different from the other teams. They did not have any mission to do unlike fixed wing team. “We are free to create any innovation in technology that can make Indonesia more independent in unmanned aerial vehicle,” said Rama.

The technology development team carried a plane called Tube Launched Folding Wing UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle). The construction began in March 2018. As the name suggest, the wings of the plane are foldable and makes the plane portable so that it does not require reassembling on the field. This UAV, Prama said, aims to help in disaster mitigation and to revive network whenever damages happen to communication tower.

“The plane is designed to enable it entering the tube we use as launcher. The launcher and the plane are connected to a particular app on a gadget, hence the launching needs only a touch on the button on the app,” he said.

The preparation was done for 8 months since March 2018. The registration, however, was a bit of a challenge because all divisions have to submit reports consisting two phases. The first phase is the conceptual design to conduct the mission and the second phase is the final design and video progress to convince the jury that Aksantara is well-prepared to compete in KRTI 2018.

The overall champion of the competition was achieved by Gemaforce from Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM).

Reporter: Qinthara Silmi