Ducted Fan Quadcopter

Testing ducted fan quad, flies great.  My intention was to build a tricopter but just had to see how a quad would fly with 90mm EDF's.  Also tested as a "V-Tail" in the quad configeration, it flies with a 15 degree rear facing angle and is more sensitive to inputs. 

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  • I am working on a custom drone using edf fan blades.  I would love to talk to you. Call me 308-641-6515 or respond with email please. timbobpilkin@yahoo.com

  • here is a good read on testing done by NASA on EDF's, while it is a much larger scale, it is very good test information for this type of setup. http://halfdome.arc.nasa.gov/publications/files/Abrego2_AHS02.pdf

  • Just settings, on the low side.

  • so did you have to change anything in coding or just the setting of the gui ???

  • Why not a standard quadrotor with a single EDF mounted on it for speed.

  • Ok, so if the rotor is spinning CW the craft will tend to spin CCW due to counter-torque. The axis about which the craft will spin runs parallel to the line of thrust and intersects the metacenter of the craft (i.e. down through the center if the craft is symmetric about the center axis and all motor torques are equal). You will want to angle the thrust of the rotor so it will tend to rotate the craft CW. This angle introduces a horizontal component of thrust acting opposite the induced rotation. Too much angle, the craft will spin the other way (CW). Here’s where it gets interesting: With multi-rotor craft each rotor generates its own counter torque. If all rotors were spinning the same direction, a huge (additive) counter-torque would be generated tending to spin the craft a lot. Instead of angling the thrust vector to counter this torque, we may simply reverse the direction of half the rotors to balance the torques. Wikipedia has a fairly simple treatment on the subject here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadcopter#Flight_control

    I hope this helps,

    Enjoy!

  • Hi I admire your work.  I am very new to any type of flight.  I'm working on an EE project involving EDF.  I'm sure you have explained the CW CCW torque spin effect, but I still do not get what you mean by angling the fan the opposite way of the spin.  Let's say that when I run my EDF and I look down on it from a top view, I see the whole body of the fan rotating CW, what would I do to make sure that my quad don't spin CW?  Do I angle it into the center, off one side, or outwards?  Again I've read your explanations many times, and I'd greatly appreciate if you can explain a little more on the process of neutralizing spin.  Thanks. I've also tried to PM you, but the site makes me add you as a friend first.

  • wow man !!! this is big !!!! i thought my carboncore h950 was big but this dwarfs it !!!

  • 3692931689?profile=originalHere is a photo of the air frame

  • Hi Joe,

    Thanks for the interest, I have been too busy with other projects and haven't had time to build another EDF.  I worked on Lady Gaga's flying dress which occupied a lot of my time last year, also been busy with my CNC router, 3D printer, CADCAM software.  I now have the tools, ability and resources to create much better projects and some outside interest to support my EDF projects.

    I may give the cw and ccw rotation EDFs a try but I think more can be gained with better motors and ESC's which have improved in the last year. 

    I am still flying my two EDFs which is a blast, throttle range isn't a problem, at full throttle they take off like a rocket.  My first experiment with an EDF trycopter had Eflight motors and EDFs, it was flyable but under powered and difficult to control when the battery got a little low.

    Thanks, Ed

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