Fuel powered quadcopter, 60 minute flight time, 5kg payload. Sign me up.

Joined
Dec 28, 2014
Messages
575
Reaction score
157
Location
Canberra Australia
4 nitro engines???

Messy, NOISY, stinky, vibrations... ridiculous.
 
Cool. But think of the noise. Takes me back to my fixed wing days in the 80s.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Ezookiel
Yeah, but put a decent ground station onto this, and with an hour flight time, image where you could send it!!! And with 5kg payload, imagine what you could send it there with!!

And yes, it would be noisy, and probably messy, but I can hear my quad at 300m anyway, and one bird strike and she goes into the drink.
It will be a brave bird that takes this on, and if they can't hit the props, they can't do quite so much to bring it down.
 
I assume each engine has a starter. I wonder if they are using gas or glo fuel. I also think having to adjust mixture setting each time the weather changes would be a real pain. There may be a place for something like this. Just can't thing of any now. For the guy that just wants to go out and fly, it seems to be a bit much. Trying to keep four engines tuned to each other would be a chore
 
They look like glow engines! Having 4 of them is a big mistake. One only has to be off tune and you have a problem. Glow engines can be so unreliable too. The best idea I've seen is one glow engine with 4 variable pitch props done by Curtis young blood. With that you could technically auto rotate if the engine fails.
 
Clever idea... standard 2 stroke fuel apparently. Each engine has an electric motor connected to the shaft so if a motor fails it can land itself... and it recharges the onboard battery during flight.

With all the noise though there would be no chance of creeping up on someone! lol
 
I just saw this kickstarter.

Honestly what's the use case here? Under what circumstances would you safely fly a quad at 100km/h? More correctly this sort of thing IN THE CONSUMER MARKET is a recipe for disaster!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Trumple
Not much to add to that bird you guys covered it .
Now KS got a little story for ya been in a dozen or so projects over the years . All have been good but 1 so far this person took the money played games for a year and just walked with are money . Now KS will not do anything to cover this Scam Starter is the new name I will never use them agin . Anyone can come up with a BS idea take the money and just run so watch what you back or if you don't care about the money then all good .
 
I just saw this kickstarter.

Honestly what's the use case here? Under what circumstances would you safely fly a quad at 100km/h? More correctly this sort of thing IN THE CONSUMER MARKET is a recipe for disaster!

I can see a few uses for 100km/h drones, especially, but not necessarily, in airspace integrated with air traffic control.
  • delivering a life preserver from a cruise or cargo ship to a man overboard
  • search and rescue is much more effective at 100km/h
  • pre-programmed routes and patterns for checking crops, rail lines, freeway traffic
  • delivery of a bottle opener to a castaway on a deserted island with a cold bottle of beer and no means to open it before it gets warm. Every second counts.
I agree this would be disastrous in a free-for-all consumer market. Drones with a 5kg payload at these speeds could cause serious injury, death and major catastrophes if they collide with commercial aviation.
 
I was quick to poo-poo it based on how I use my quad due the noise and other fuel-powered headaches.

But there are times when the drawbacks are inconsequential.

The flight time for extended searches where sound and vibration are not so critical is one as C707 eluded to.

Not sure this is the best design for incorporating a hybrid power source though I have none better at this time.
 
They look like glow engines! Having 4 of them is a big mistake. One only has to be off tune and you have a problem. Glow engines can be so unreliable too. The best idea I've seen is one glow engine with 4 variable pitch props done by Curtis young blood. With that you could technically auto rotate if the engine fails.

Having collective pitch rotor blades like a Helicopter, on a Quadcopter just seems so wrong to me. And dangerous if not concealed.

RedHotPoker
 
Nice concept. instead of having one generator per prop, design it for redundancy. As mentioned if one motor fails then you have catastrophic issues. If it can be designed on a 2N, or 2N+ redundancy to overcome this issue.

I don't know if one DC generator can be small enough and light enough to provide the needs all four motors, or have each gas motor power a DC bus network to the electric motors so that in the event of a gas motor failure there is still enough power from the other three (maybe two) gas motors to generate the electrical load to power all the electric motors.

But having the longer flight times and the ability to refuel in seconds is a nice idea.
 
Over a year ago I proposed this idea on this board.
I think I'll sue this guy for having stolen my idea!
Ok, so maybe I'll settle for having him send me one or two.
But my idea, is to use larger motors.
Like those found in a large scale R/C plane.
 

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
143,066
Messages
1,467,355
Members
104,934
Latest member
jody.paugh@fullerandsons.