Building your life or a drone, you will always need proper materials!
Every time we hear about a new machine making a way in the world of technology, the first thing we do is Google everything about it. It tends to get confusing, given that so many sources give so much to this tiny brain of ours. It becomes difficult to process and analyze every small detail. So it becomes very important that we list out the details we need and the materials we want. It essentially becomes the factor determining the success of the machine. Same is the case with a quad-copter (yes that is another name of a drone). The selection of materials becomes a determining factor when building a drone. This factor decides the durability & the success of a drone.
Like in the last blog, we ventured into the technicalities of the drone. We read about the types of batteries, and the other parts of it. In this one, let us dive into the outer shells of a drone.
There are a lot of options when building the frame of a drone and here is a good enough list to help you decide.
1. CARBON FIBER
If you can afford it, I would highly recommend building your frame out of carbon fiber. It has high strength to weight ratio.
2. PLASTIC
Most commercial RC drones that you buy today come with plastic frames. 3-D printed or moulded plastic frames have become incredibly popular among DIY drone enthusiasts. Generally, using a 3-D printer to create a perfectly shaped plastic frame is something that only works on smaller drones. When using plastic sheets, you can strategically use them on your landing gear or for the cover of your drone.
3. FIBER GLASS REINFORCED PLASTIC (FPR)
Epoxy-Laminate G10 is a variation of fiberglass that’s often used as a less expensive alternative to carbon fiber. They vary slightly in their basic properties. You can purchase G10 in sheet format. As far as pricing is concerned, it costs less than carbon fiber but is still more expensive than wood, aluminium, or plastic.
4. ALUMINIUM
Aluminium can also be used when building your frame. It’s lightweight (though not as lightweight as carbon fiber) and is relatively easy to work with. You can use aluminium to build the entire frame, or simply use the material to supplement certain parts of the frame (arms, landing gear, etc.). Another benefit to aluminium frames is that this type of material is both inexpensive as well as readily accessible.
PART BY PART BREAKDOWN
Here is a detailed list of materials that can be used in individual parts:
1. The frame — Carbon fibre reinforced composites because they are high strength, low density and high stiffness material.
2. Landing gear — Plastics manufacturer says that its short glass fibre reinforced Durethan polyamide material is suitable to be used in drones. These are light weight due to which longer flight time can be achieved. Durethan material can also improve impact resistance and reduce any interference of metal materials with radio signals.
Another important aspect of building a drone is its configuration. Configuration essentially is how the parts of something, or a group of things, are arranged. Here are the configurations used in a drone. The red arrow shows the flight direction
There are two possible configurations for most of quad-copter designs “+” and “×”.
- Quad-copter X
The X configuration is very popular. All our quad-copters in the trick videos are using this configuration. An X-configuration quad-copter is considered to be more stable compared to + configuration, which is a more acrobatic configuration. Propellers 1 and 3 rotates counterclockwise (CW), 2 and 4 rotates counter-counter clockwise (CCW). So that, the quadcopter can maintain forward (backward) motion by increasing (decreasing) speed of front (rear) rotors speed while decreasing (increasing) rear (front) rotor speed simultaneously, which means changing the pitch angle.
2. Quad-copter +
The plus configuration feels very similar to the X configuration. When you are performing a normal front or backflip it is a cross-axis roll like on the x configuration.
3. Quad-copter Y4
Looks more like a tri-copter but it is a quad-copter. Way less performance than the X or + configuration. It is easy to see through the Y like shape. The configuration uses a single large fixed-pitch rotor at the centre of the craft to provide the majority of the lift. Three smaller rotors spaced around the central point on booms, each slightly canted sideways at a fixed angle, provide lateral thrust
4. Quad-copter V-Tail
A little less performance than the X or + configuration but easier to see through the new shape.
So, now that you have read and hopefully learned about the crux of the materials used in the outer structure of the drone and the configurations, you are ready to learn about designing the frame itself and more in detail about landing gears. So Gear Up (sorry for the pun) for the next in this series.
