Aerodynamic Performance of a Hovering Quadcopter Using the Unsteady Vortex Lattice Method

Quadcopters are one of the most used configurations to develop unmanned aerial vehicles for civil and military applications. The flow dynamics developed by the four rotors of a quadcopter is complex due to the interaction between the rotor wakes and the quadcopter fuselage. In the present study, the flow simulations of three cases were conducted: a single operating rotor, four operating rotors (no fuselage), and a simplified quadcopter operating at hover, in order to better understand the flow dynamics and to estimate the quadcopter aerodynamic performance. The simulations were based on the unsteady vortex lattice method (UVLM) with a viscous correction. In particular, the simulation of the simplified quadcopter and rotor tip phasing showed an asymmetrical pressure coefficient distribution on the rotor blades. With this configuration, the [Formula: see text] distribution depends on the blade position with respect to the fuselage. Computational results of the quadcopter aerodynamics performance were compared with experimental measurements from the bench (single rotor) and flight tests (complete quadcopter). A good agreement was observed between the numerical and experimental results for the thrust, whereas the torque was underestimated.