Flight Testing of a Wing-in-Propeller-Slipstream Mini Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

A prototype tail-sitter mini unmanned aerial vehicle (SkyEyeV) was developed and tested in a wind tunnel and by remotely controlled flight. A tail-sitter is an aircraft that takes off and lands on its tail section with its fuselage pointing upward. The prototype is powered by twin electric motors, and has a 1.05 m wingspan and a takeoff weight of 2.4 kg. A key feature of the prototype is leading edge slats, which are designed to avoid stall during high angle of attack transitional flight. Through wind tunnel testing, the slats were confirmed to increase the stall angle of attack not only in a non-powered condition (without propeller) but also in a powered condition (wing in propeller slipstream). The remotely piloted flight tests verified the vehicle’s designed flight capability, transition and hovering, and several useful insights were obtained. I