Performance of Hybrid Composite Propellers for Drone
Publication: Journal of Aerospace Engineering
Volume 34, Issue 4
Abstract
In recent years, the use of drones has becomes more common in commercial applications as well as among hobbyists. However, the characteristic loud buzz emanating from their use has been an issue, causing a nuisance to the user and those in the vicinity of the drone. Thus, in this study, the effects of various prepregs and their combinations on the aeroacoustic performance of the propeller were investigated experimentally for the objective of designing a low-noise propeller for drones. It was found that a propeller that made from pure carbon prepreg generated the highest noise level and produced the highest thrust force, whereas a propeller made from pure flax prepreg generated the lowest noise level and produced the lowest thrust force. The noise levels generated by propellers made from hybridization of carbon and flax prepregs are lower than those of the pure carbon prepreg propeller but higher than those of a pure flax prepreg propeller. A similar phenomenon was observed for the result of thrust force. It can be concluded that in addition to its low-noise characteristic, the propeller made from flax prepreg has a short prepreg curing time and is light weight, and it is also the cheapest propeller among the four propellers that were investigated in the present study.
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Data Availability Statement
Some or all data, models, or code that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Acknowledgments
This research was funded by Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (2019A1515012223 and 2018A030313878) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (51908142).
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Published In
Journal of Aerospace Engineering
Volume 34 • Issue 4 • July 2021
Copyright
© 2021 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Sep 23, 2020
Accepted: Feb 3, 2021
Published online: Apr 24, 2021
Published in print: Jul 1, 2021
Discussion open until: Sep 24, 2021
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