Abstract The present work is aimed at analyzing and modelling the aerodynamic interactions of two small-scale tilted propellers operating at low Reynolds numbers near the ground. Two configurations of counter-rotating propellers found in fully-actuated multirotors are investigated: Face-to-Face, where the propeller flows are opposite and non-overlapping, and Back-to-Back, where the interaction between the rotor wakes occurs downstream. Moreover, an aerodynamic ground effect model is proposed for each non-planar rotor pair. To this end, CFD and test-bench experiments are used with different propellers and aerial platforms. Good agreement is found between the output of the proposed models and the numerical-experimental data. We demonstrated that the ground effect depends on rotor spacing, tilt angle, propeller radius, and rotor height, extending previous theories that do not consider these parameters. The results reveal that the near-ground aerodynamic effect for Face-to-Face propellers decreases with increasing inclination, but the opposite behaviour is observed for Back-to-Back propellers. Aerial robotics applications require a deep understanding of the effects of multirotors proximity to the environment to reliably and safely perform inspection and maintenance tasks in confined spaces or near infrastructure.


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    Title :

    Aerodynamic interactions of non-planar rotor pairs and model derivation in ground approach


    Contributors:


    Publication date :

    2023-10-10




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English




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