The thing I like most about students is their refusal to accept boundaries of any kind. While this may get them into scrapes that embarrass their parents, sometimes they do come up with remarkable ideas. Singapore University’s solar quadcopter made significant progress, while the rest of us were longing for better batteries for our drones.
An Amazingly Simple Idea
Traditional thinking holds we are being smart when we charge our drone batteries using solar power. How about we feed the solar energy directly to rotors? Engineering students at the Innovation and Design Program asked.
Associate Professor Aaron Danner from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering was up to the idea. So they assembled 148 mini solar panels into a sheet on a frame, that served as the support structure for the four rotors. “Our solar quadcopter is extremely lightweight for its size. It can fly as long as there is sunlight, even for hours,” Prof Daimler told The Drive.
Imagine How Useful Solar Quadcopters Could Be
The students have demonstrated the feasibility of a flying solar panel capable of operating entirely without batteries. At the moment it is somewhat floppy. Wind buffets it about like a giant sail, making it difficult to fly accurately in a particular direction.
However, it holds wonderful hope of taking energy autonomously to remote disaster areas and saving countless lives. It will still need batteries as emergency backup though, when there is no sunlight as it travels through clouds. The solar quadcopter tips the scales at 5.75 pounds despite having a surface area of 43 square feet.
It can land on any flat surface and fly out of the ground effect in a controlled way,” the Prof announced. “This also makes it suitable for practical implementation.”
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Preview Image: Solar Quadcopter Prepares to Take Flight at Singapore University
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