Conceptual design of long-endurance small solar-powered unmanned aerial vehicle with multiple tilts and hovers

This paper presents an overall scheme of a long-endurance small solar-powered convertible unmanned aerial vehicle (CUAV) that operates tilt-rotor for multiple hover tasks. First, a solar/battery hybrid energy strategy was proposed to comprehensively meet the requirements of CUAVs with long endurance and multiple hovers. The particular ability of the solar-powered fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), pure battery-powered CUAV, and the proposed long-endurance solar-powered CUAV with multiple cruises and hovers were comparatively analyzed from an energy standpoint. Second, a suitable conceptual design method and process for small solar-powered CUAV was given, and the robustness of the designed CUAV was using three performance metrics under nominal conditions. The approach was then applied to design a 6.5 kg CUAV, which was initially tested in flight. Finally, the performance and application potential of the designed CUAV was evaluated with operating conditions, mission requirements, energy input, and perpetual flight capability.