Drones

World's largest quadcopter drone takes flight

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The University of Manchester team with its Giant Foamboard Quadcopter
University of Manchester
The University of Manchester team with its Giant Foamboard Quadcopter
University of Manchester
It flies... But has little other practical use
University of Manchester

University of Manchester engineers set themselves the task of building and flying the biggest quadcopter drone in history, and to keep things legal with aviation authorities, they made some interesting materials choices.

The UK Civil Aviation Authority allows UAVs with a takeoff weight under 25 kg (55 lb) to fly without special dispensations, so the Manchester team came up with a design that weighed 24.5 kg (54 lb) to sneak under the limit.

The giant quad project started as "a curiosity-driven venture to inspire students’ creativity in design by utilizing a suitable alternative low-cost material for lightweight aerospace structures that is more environmentally friendly than the usual carbon fiber."

With strong, lightweight carbon off the table, the students settled on a hollow box-frame design built from 5-mm (0.2-in) thick foamboard, which consists of a foam core with paper skin. Sheets of foamboard were laser-cut and hot-glued together to build the frame.

It flies... But has little other practical use
University of Manchester

“Foamboard is an interesting material to work with," said research engineer Dan Koning, design and build team leader. "Used in the right way, we can create complex aerospace structures where every component is designed to be only as strong as it needs to be – there is no room for over-engineering here. Thanks to this design discipline and after extensive background research, we can say with confidence that we have built the largest quadcopter drone in the world.”

Corner to corner, the drone measured an enormous 6.4 meters (21 ft). "There is no record of a purpose-built uncrewed quadcopter (four rotors) of any weight class which is larger than the Manchester vehicle as of the time of writing," reads a University of Manchester press release.

Of course, there are electric VTOL aircraft prototypes much larger – but those use more than four propellers. The team's self-imposed no-carbon restriction means there's presumably a reasonably easy path to a world record available to anyone that feels like putting in the time! Watch this big bird take off in the video below.

Source: University of Manchester

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4 comments
WB
Just because you can doesn't mean you should!
🤦‍♀️
Towerman
Sayyyy i can stick something like this together in my backyard in half a day...
Looks like fun !

Next...put a santa seat in the middle hop on and stream it to us live ! !
Aermaco
The fact that the nacelles are so clumsily design built as big boxes vs streamlined low frontal area shapes it makes a much higher drag on the props wash thus lowering pay-load or even dead-load that could have had a wider bigger size, [for what ever reason] the attempt of this feat is undertaken.
TpPa
One fart would blow it off course