The Effects of UAV Quadcopter Propeller Tilt Angle on Flight Stability

Abstract

Unmanned Aerial vehicles (UAVs) have captivated the interest of many researchers in recent years and are currently used in a wide range of applications such as: geographic mapping, weather forecasting, aerial photography, law enforcement, and search and rescue. Many of these applications require a multirotor UAV in order to maintain a stationary position in mid-air, and thus UAVs must be designed to be as stable as possible to reduce the need for excessive flight controller corrections and positioning errors, particularly under windy conditions. This research focuses on performing an empirical study on the effects of adding an inward propeller tilt angle, a design feature commonly used to improve stability in fixed-wing aircraft, on the flight stability of a quadrotor UAV. A ready-to-fly quadrotor UAV kit was assembled, and its propellers were tilted inward at various fixed angles of 0o, 5o and 10o, and the planar motion of the UAV was computed using object visual tracking software. The results demonstrate that adding a propeller tilt angle improves quadrotor UAV flight stability.