This paper presents a comparison of design methods for fuel cell powered unmanned aerial vehicles. Previous studies of fuel cell powered aircraft have used design methods that contain intrinsic assumptions regarding the design of fuel cell powerplant and regarding the interactions between the powerplant and aircraft application. This study seeks to understand the effects of these design assumptions on the powerplant structure and the aircraft performance of fuel cell powered aircraft. A comparison is constructed by developing a multidisciplinary modeling and design environment that does not contain the assumption suggested in previous studies. The design assumptions from previous studies can then be imposed on the more complete design method to determine the performance costs and morphological changes caused by the design assumptions. In the first design study, results show that designing fuel cell powered aircraft using automotive-type fuel cell subsystem design rules leads to a low efficiency powerplant and a low performance aircraft in long-endurance and long-range UAV applications. The second design study shows that designing the long endurance aircraft powerplant towards maximum specific energy leads to suboptimal aircraft performance, especially for long-endurance UAV applications.
Design studies for hydrogen fuel cell powered unmanned aerial vehicles
Entwurfsstudie für unbemannte Luftfahrzeuge mit Wasserstoff-Brennstoffzellenantrieb
AIAA Applied Aerodynamics Conference, 26 ; 2008/6413-2008/16
2008
16 Seiten, 33 Quellen
Conference paper
English
Design Studies for Hydrogen Fuel Cell Powered Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
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