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Design Requirements

The document provides design specifications and requirements for building a drone. It estimates the drone's weight and thrust needs, selects propellers and motors based on these estimates, and chooses a battery and electronic speed controller (ESC) to maximize flight time within weight limits. It discusses choosing propellers with sufficient thrust capacity and a battery with high capacity and discharge rating to meet current draw needs. The document also notes design steps are written for complete beginners and provides physics concepts and terminology relevant to understanding drone design.

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tayybahaseeb18
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58 views7 pages

Design Requirements

The document provides design specifications and requirements for building a drone. It estimates the drone's weight and thrust needs, selects propellers and motors based on these estimates, and chooses a battery and electronic speed controller (ESC) to maximize flight time within weight limits. It discusses choosing propellers with sufficient thrust capacity and a battery with high capacity and discharge rating to meet current draw needs. The document also notes design steps are written for complete beginners and provides physics concepts and terminology relevant to understanding drone design.

Uploaded by

tayybahaseeb18
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Design requirements

This is how we begin with our design

Design specification

1-Estimate weight and thurst

2-Select propellers

3-Select motor an ESC

4-Select battery and estimate flight time

1-Weight

 Motors (4): 148 g


 Propellers (4): 13.5 g
 Battery (1): 155 g
 Other components (camera, frame, ESC, etc.): 460.5 g

Flight Time
Our goal is to maximize our drone’s flight time so that it can hover as long as possible. In our
previous article, we modelled the flight time of our drone with varying battery capacity .
We presumed our design would include a Turnigy nano-tech 1300 mAh 4S battery and included
its mass in our overall calculations. The battery’s capacity is just over 19.2 Wh (14.8 V * 1.3 Ah
= 19.2 Wh), which occurs within the growth phase of the graph and gives us only about 4.5
minutes of flight time.
If we increased the battery capacity, we could also increase our flight time, but the trade off
would be increased weight. This is where the design loop begins, as we swap components to try
and build the drone that best meets our needs.

Properllers
Choosing New Propeller and Motor Candidates

Our frame limits us to propellers that are 6” or less in diameter, but we


can still experiment with our pitch, material, and brand. We will use
the drone component database to filter for propellers that are 6” in
diameter and produce at least 6.2 N (0.63 kgf) of force. This search
provided several good options, but for simplicity we will narrow it down
to three candidates that produce the most thrust:
 Propeller 1 → diameter: 6”, pitch: 4”, mass: 3.38 g, material:
plastic
 Propeller 2 → diameter: 6”, pitch: 4”, mass: 4.32 g, material: nylon
 Propeller 3 → diameter: 6”, pitch: 4.5”, mass: 6.78 g, material:
carbon fiber (CF)
 Propeller 3 → diameter: 6”, pitch: 4.5”, mass: 6.78 g, material:
carbon fiber (CF)

Choosing a New Battery for Maximum Flight Time That Fits Our New
Design

Now is a good time to summarize the mass of our components since the mass of our propellers
and motors has changed as well as our hover thrust. Here is the new breakdown:

 Motors (4): 129.5 g


 Propellers (4): 17.3 g
 Other components (camera, frame, ESC, etc.): 460.5 g
 Pre battery mass: 607.3 g
 Max mass: ~ 2,000 g
Based on these new values, we have 1392.7 g of mass available for our battery.

Since we also have our motor and propeller picked out, we can also determine our discharge (C
rating) needs, which will also be a consideration for picking out the battery. We want to be sure
that our motor will not draw more current than our battery can provide, or else the battery could
rapidly degrade or overheat. The formula for determining current draw for a battery is: Current
(A) = C rating * Capacity (Ah).

The Turnigy High Capacity 16000 mAh 4S 12C Lipo Pack has the highest capacity in Wh of all
the batteries in our weight range, giving us 4 * 3.7 * 16 = 236.8 Wh. It weighs 1,366 g, has a 12
C discharge rating and 16 Ah of capacity, so it can handle a current draw of 192 A, which is
more than we need.

Choosing an ESC

The main consideration for choosing an ESC is that it can deliver the
motor’s peak current. In our case we do not expect our motor to
exceed 42 A, so an ESC like the HobbyKing 60A ESC 4A SBEC will
work great. It can deliver a constant current up to 60 A and a burst
current up to 80 A, while providing 4 A to the BEC. This gives us a bit
of a safety margin, so this ESC will be a good choice for our drone.

Design steps

ome parts are written as if a complete beginner was


reading it:

- Steps 1-2: Physics and About Quadcopters

- Steps 3-6: Frame Design/Construction

- Steps 7-12: Power Electronics


- Steps 13-15: Control Electronics

- Steps 16-24: Wiring the Quadcopter

- Steps 25-31: Code, Calibration, Setup, and Theory

- Steps 32-34: PID Tuning and Maiden Flight-ish

- Steps 35: Summary, Future Upgrades/Add-Ons, Final


Remarks

Note: Though this drone is made of cardboard, this is no


slouch when it comes to flying. Fully loaded with the
battery, the all up weight (AUW) is just above 800g, and
with each motor pushing out up to 740g of thrust.
Theoretically, this drone has a thrust-to-weight ratio
about 4:1. In practically, a DJI Phantom has a thrust to
weight ratio of about 2:1.

Step 1: Physics

Newton's 3 Laws of Motion

First Law: What is at rest will stay at rest and what is in


motion will stay in motion, unless there is an external
force acting on it.

Second Law: The force required to accelerate an object


to a certain velocity depends on the mass (F=ma)

Third Law: For every action there is an equal and


opposite reaction
Based off of the first law, a drone will stay on the
unless you decide to move it. A drone will move if you
move it.

Based off of the second law, it is clear if you have a


lighter drone, you will have longer flight times (less
force required to accelerate it), quicker reaction time (if
you decide to put more force, the drone will accelerate
faster), and better maneuverability.

Based off of the third law, drone propellers throw air


down with a certain force, the air molecules will push up
on the propellers with the same force, therefore the
drone moves up. There is another aspect to this law
however, and is the fact that anything rotating will
generate a small spinning force in the opposite
direction, called torque. Just like how a person needs to
"push off" against the ground in order to walk forwards,
the motor needs to continuously "push off" against
something in order to rotate. That is why if helicopters
only have the main rotor, the torque generated by the
main propeller will send the body of the helicopter
spinning in the opposite direction, and it needs a small
rotor on the tail to prevent that.

Add TipAsk QuestionCommentDownload

Step 2: What Is a Quadcopter?

It's a helicopter with 4 propellers.

In order to explain what makes a quadcopter stand out


from the rest of the flying contraptions will take a lot
more than 6 words. But before we go into that, we need
to define some key terms I will be using to describe
movement.

- X-axis: the axis that points left/right or west/east

- Y-axis: the axis that points forwards/backwards or


north/south

- Z-axis: the axis that points up/down

- Roll: when the aerial vehicle tilts left/right; rotates


about the y axis

- Pitch: when the aerial vehicle tilts


forwards/backwards; rotates about the x axis

- Yaw: when the aerial vehicle spins in place left or


right; rotates about the z axis

- Degrees of Freedom (DOF): the number of independent


factors that can be assessed (I'll explain this term in
better detail later, with an example)

Step 3: Frame Selection

The frame makes up around 90% of a quadcopter....so


it's kinda important. The first thing you have to consider
is the size of the frame you want. Note, the number
represents the approximate diagonal arm span of the
drone and is measured in millimeters (so if I say I have a
250 frame, the frame is about 250 mm diagonally from
arm tip to arm tip). The size of the drone you make
depends on your use case, but the general rule of thumb
is that the smaller the frame, the more agile and
maneuverable the drone is, but it will be less stable. A
larger frame will be less agile and maneuverable, but it
will be much more stable. In this instructable, I plan to
make a size 550 quadcopter.

Step 4: Frame Material

There are a lot of different materials you can use to


build a quadcopter, each with their own advantages and
disadvantages. Here are some of the most popular
materials:

 Carbon Fiber (strongest and lightest, but expensive)

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