While most of the world’s venture capital is off chasing anything with “AI” in the name in what many think looks increasingly like an inflated spherical film of soap molecules, in aviation all the hot money is betting on eVTOL: electric vertical take off and landing.
What if you want to get in on the eVTOL game but don’t have (or want) billionaire backing? Long-time contributor [spiritplumber] demonstrates how to do it on the cheap, with a low-cost quadcopter and a foam wing called Lift5.
Most eVTOL isn’t just quadcopters, after all — multirotors are great for playing with in the back yard, but their thrust-based lift makes for short range, and the engine-out options are all bad. Add a wing, and you can get that sweet, sweet dynamic lift. Add an extra, forward facing motor, and you can get thrust in the direction you need it most. That’s what [spiritplumber] is doing here: strapping a foam wing to a cheap quadcopter. Specifically, his custom frame for an Eiele F120 drone kit.You can see it in action in the demo video embedded below.
The wing and its forward thrust motor are equipped with its own speed controller, so the concept should be adaptable to just about any little drone. Quadcopter flight computers are mostly going to be able to compensate for the added lift and thrust automatically, which is neat, considering that these forces would require some bizarre headwind/updraft very unlikely to be found in nature.
Now the wing does add a lot of drag during the lift phase, to be sure, so [spiritplumber] is working on folding or tilting it out of the way, but that version is apparently inordinately fond of trees. Once the control issues are worked out you’ll likely see it on his site and YouTube channel Robots Everywhere.
[spiritplumber] has been contributing hacks here at least since 2009, when he showed us how to make a Macbook right click.
In the linked text… wow if only paragraphs hd been invented.
Yeah, work in progress. I don’t want to send it through an AI for cleanup.
Now this is drone technology really moving forward. Genius!
Good work. I built one using the same idea three years ago. Using the quad copter idea for evtol and the wing can extend the mileage coverage x3. Hope your work can move forward. Lots of wing designs to choose from.
Very cool! Thanks. What I’m trying to do specifically is something that is easy for people to build and that stays under 250 grams.
For me that video looks like the wing doesn’t really generate any lift. It doesn’t glide at all, just looks like normal quadcopter flying around.
That’s kinda the point. You can tell that it works because it stays in the air longer when used to go back and forth :) this mess, while adding weight, adds about 1/3rd to flight time.
The next version will have folding wings to hopefully do a little better than that.
You’d have to be deliberately faking it by using the elevation controls for it to rise when it’s accelerating forward, deliberately reversing slowly, etc to get that effect. Also, observe the coordinated turns. It’s not generating enough lift on its own, but it is generating a meaningful amount.
With my own experience designing model planes: the one with the white wing would probably fly without the quad rotors at all, if the horizontal motor was bigger. That’s a really tiny motor, it needs more thrust.
We tested your theory with version 2 (which we’ll put on thingiverse next week) and it turns out that it can do a horizontal takeoff on low battery when there’s not enough juice to do a vertical takeoff. We filmed it, too!
Would people appreciate updating the thingiverse download with the wing holder and source code?
Not aerodynamically stable in forward flight.
Suggestions:
Symmetric vertical airfoil on a centerline, then lean it over 90 degrees for forward flight.
Gonna need a tail.
CG in front of CP.
CG about 15-20% of chord back from front of wing.
Go out on the RC groups, surely a half dozen plans available.
Getting it back into quad mode is the bitch, 500 ft altitude makes FAA sad.
You won’t like the FAA when they’re sad.
I have the same idea, vertical wing and after start to turn quadcopter with propellers forward and wing will be horizontal to create lift. Maybe the tail will be not needed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-1vfaKUkVA We’ve done this, we’re just looking for a way to do it as cheaply and easily as possible. The idea is that it should be JUST barely unstable and let the quadcopter’s IMU do its thing, for maneuverability.
There are surely dozens of variations on this theme flying.
One problem with outrunner motors, they don’t freewheel well enough to operate in autogyro, unpowered mode while in forward flight.
Maneuverability is going to be less of a problem then terrible wind tolerance associated with low wing loading/speed.