Multicopters are increasingly becoming popular for hobby and commercial applications. A variety of quadcopter, hexacopter, and octocopter configurations have emerged, yet few publications carefully investigate their performance. This paper contributes results from a series of dynamometer, wind-tunnel, and autonomous flight tests over different propeller configurations, flight speeds, and angles of attack. A modular small hexacopter platform providing propulsion unit redundancy is tested in the standard tractor configuration and a less common pusher configuration. Static thrust as a function of propeller, motor revolutions per minute, and motor current was determined from dynamometer tests. The hexacopter was mounted on a load cell test stand, and data were collected in the University of Michigan’s 5 × 7    ft wind tunnel over different freestream flow speeds, motor thrust percentages, and hexacopter angles of attack. To validate wind-tunnel performance findings, outdoor autonomous flight tests were conducted. Results show the pusher configuration generates approximately 15% more thrust (lift) than do tractor propellers; however, they exhibit a relatively poor lift-to-drag ratio. These results suggests that a pusher configuration hexacopter will have higher efficiency for local-area surveillance applications requiring hover and slow flight, whereas a tractor configuration is more efficient for payload transport applications that require forward flight at appreciable velocities.


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    Title :

    Experimental Investigation of Tractor and Pusher Hexacopter Performance


    Contributors:

    Published in:

    Journal of Aircraft ; 56 , 5 ; 1920-1934


    Publication date :

    2019-09-01




    Type of media :

    Conference paper , Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English





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