Description:

Multirotor drones usually employ fixed-pitch propellers as their main means of flying. Simple, lightweight and reliable, these propellers suffer aerodynamically when used outside of their expected operational point. Furthermore, the system response is limited by the inertia of the motor-propeller combination, as force changes can only be made through changing the motor speed.

Variable Pitch offers a solution to this problem, being able to adapt to the incident wind and desired loading, while providing a faster change in force output. Used on helicopters and conventional aircraft, the aerodynamic loads of variable-pitch propellers and their transient response has not yet been studied for drone-sized aircraft.

This project will experimentally assess the steady and transient forces produced by a variable-pitch propeller in the presence of wind. This work will be conducted in the Boundary Layer Wind Tunnel, building on from prior research in the Drone Technology Research Group.

Type:

Undergraduate

Outcome:

By the end of this project, you will be able to:

• Control a variable pitch propeller in a means suitable for bandwidth analysis.
• Perform wind tunnel tests on the rotor assembly, to determine how this bandwidth and performance changes in the presence of wind at various inflow angles.
• Suggest ways of improving the performance of the aircraft employing these propellers

Prerequisites

MECHENG712, MECHENG724 and MECHENG722 may be useful for this project

Specialisations

• Mechanical Engineering
• Mechatronics Engineering

Categories

• Aero-Fluid-Hydrodynamics
• Dynamics and Control
• Mechatronics

Supervisor

• Nicholas Kay

Team

• Ruby Chen
• Hongyang Zhao

Lab

Aerodynamics Lab (Newmarket 901 Lvl5, Lab)