Currently, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) development in Indonesia has limited Hardwarein-
the-loop Simulations (HILS) testing, while many research facilities in other countries have
completed them. For instance, the Aviation Technology Research Center – National Research
and Innovation Agency (BRIN) is still concentrating on software-level simulation. It is common
for researchers in Indonesia to undertake flight tests without first going through the HILS testing
process. The results from simulations are frequently not supported by experiments. This can be
a contributing factor to the inefficiency of the UAV development process. To address this, the
study proposes the implementation of HILS testing for UAV control systems as a bridge
between simulation and experimental results. The HILS framework used in this research
integrates hardware (PIXHAWK Cube Orange), software (MATLAB and QGroundControl),
and a serial interface. The developed control system is a pitch attitude hold with a cascade
control loop scheme. HILS testing revealed that the pitch response follows commands with
inner loop gains KP = -0.3 and KI = -0.06, and outer loop gain KP = 3.87. The damping ratio
decreased compared to software-only simulations but still met the required criteria, as did the
steady-state error. These results indicate that the control system tested within the HILS
framework effectively bridges between simulation and flight testing, supporting more efficient
UAV development in Indonesia.