Laser charged mini multicopter

R!f@@

Joined Apr 2, 2009
9,918
Wht's the use of laser powering it, when the laser it self is on board.

Has this anything to do with batteries. laser and photovoltaic combined generates more power than a standard battery.

Is this the main concept
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
The laser is on the ground beaming the power to solar cells on the bird. I knew the gentleman who invented the flying machine that was based off of, his name was Ron Palmer. He brought the prototype to the combat robotics meetings. He sold the rights, moved to California, and died of a heart attack. He was a professional roboticist.
 

R!f@@

Joined Apr 2, 2009
9,918
U mean to say tht chopper has no power source but a photo voltaic cell.
Power is generated by aiming lasers on to the cell.
 

Thread Starter

bertus

Joined Apr 5, 2008
22,270
Hello,

The multicopter has some small batteries on board that are charged with the laser pointing at the voltaic cell.
The small batteries are needed for when contact with the laser is not possible.

Bertus
 

R!f@@

Joined Apr 2, 2009
9,918
So how is the laser aimed at it, I mean the chopper will be flying, right, it would pretty difficult to lock on to the cell
 

t06afre

Joined May 11, 2009
5,934
I think it would have been more easy to mount a propeller on the back. And connected the propeller to a generator charging the battery.
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
An extra fan would use more power, which is tight as it is on this design.

The design is pretty elegant. It uses an RC hobbyist gyroscope to balance/hover along with a PIC. To move in any direction you slow down one of the fans, causing it to tilt, which creates movement. One of the fans was painted a different color in the original design for reference. It is much easier to fly than an RC helicopter. More modern designs could use a simple electronic compass, to make it even easier.

A simple low power LED would provide an aiming reference. While they are thinking military, I suspect the payload of this gadget is pretty low.
 

tom66

Joined May 9, 2009
2,595
An extra fan would use more power, which is tight as it is on this design.

The design is pretty elegant. It uses an RC hobbyist gyroscope to balance/hover along with a PIC. To move in any direction you slow down one of the fans, causing it to tilt, which creates movement. One of the fans was painted a different color in the original design for reference. It is much easier to fly than an RC helicopter. More modern designs could use a simple electronic compass, to make it even easier.

A simple low power LED would provide an aiming reference. While they are thinking military, I suspect the payload of this gadget is pretty low.
It's not unique. I have a board which does this that was sent to me by a kind friend so I can integrate it with my Super OSD project. It's called a KKmulticopter board, and it manages gyros to keep the copter stable.
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
Same design, like I said, Ron invented it around 2002. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I've seen the configuration quite few times since

Ron was a good man, he is missed.
 

Markd77

Joined Sep 7, 2009
2,806
So how is the laser aimed at it, I mean the chopper will be flying, right, it would pretty difficult to lock on to the cell
I'm not sure how they do it but assuming there is communication between the 'copter and the ground station, there could be a ring of sensors around the solar cell and the 'copter could tell the ground station how to aim.
 
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