Ultra-Light Micro Air Vehicles

Roland Piquepaille writes "Dutch engineers have built the third generation of the DelFly autonomous air vehicle. The DelFly Micro made its first public flight earlier today in Delft. This micro air vehicle weighs only 3 grams and has a wingspan of 10 centimeters. This very small remote-controlled aircraft carries a 0.4 gram camera. The DelFly Micro, which looks like a dragonfly, can fly for 3 minutes at a maximum speed of 5 meters/second. It could be used for observation flights in difficult-to-reach or dangerous areas."

Paging Danny Dunn...

[Anonymous Coward]

Danny Dunn [wikipedia.org] to the white courtesy phone, please ...

Re:Paging Danny Dunn...

[QuantumHack]

That's exactly what I was thinking! When I was 12, and I read Raymond Abrashkin's "Danny Dunn: Invisible Boy", I was mesmerized. And this mini UAV is essentially the plot device in the book, right down to the dragonfly appearance. Pretty good prediction for a book from the mid '70s.

Practicality?

[Scotteh]

I imagine that this thing is pretty difficult to fly. With it going that fast, the camera would be jumping around all over the place. How can this practically be used for observation flights? You'd have to analyze it frame-by-frame.

Why a dragonfly?

[Blice]

I don't understand why they're trying to shape it after a dragonfly- There are more efficient ways of getting around the air than flapping wings. I mean, yeah, I get that it would be cool to have one that actually looked like a dragonfly for spying and such, but for getting into dangerous or hard to reach places it shouldn't be designed this way.

I think a really good example is this guy's plane [youtube.com], he made it to be as light as possible and had to make his own motor for it. I think they should make one the size of this 'dragonfly' but with a propeller like the plane in the video.

Re:3 minutes?

[Rogerborg]

It doesn't looks as though they have overcome the twitchiness. Perhaps the idea is to buy them by the gross. You only need one to get through.

great for urban warfare

[Werrismys]

take a peek at who's around thecorner.. or who's lieing prone on the ceiling... heck, add 2 grams of explosive and use it as a diversion.

Insectothopter?

[rocketman768]

Insectothopter? [wikipedia.org] CIA had these back in the 70s...very hard to control in winds over 5 knots though.

micro uav

[TREETOP]

I've already built my own micro sized UAV. I used a Walkera 5G6 miniature RC helicopter ($80) and a wireless 2.4ghz ($25) camera with it's own (3x2032 coin cells!) power source. 100 meter range and 7 minute flight time. It's so quiet that at 20 meters away you cannot hear it and you can bareley see it at 50 meters. The inflight video is amazing, somewhat shaky but very watchable. And no, I will not post it. Google youtube for other examples done by other users. The Walkera tips the scales at about 90 grams loaded (3 ounces).

Re:One for the Christmas List

[TheLink]

After looking at it in action, I still prefer the toy helis I got.

They're 50% longer and wider (so not much bigger), but they are 5 times heavier - 15g.

They look like this:
http://www.airsport.com.hk/ShowProduct.asp?id=380
(I didn't buy it from there though - it's just a link I got from google).

Trouble is the quality control is not very good, so either you get it at a shop where you can test it first, or you'd have to risk getting a dud. And even if it seems to work, there's no guarantee it'll continue to work for more than a few days.

I've got three, and one is faulty (it still flies but the motor or something is not smooth- blades stop spinning nearly immediately when you cut the throttle). And some of my friends had helis that stopped working after a few days (that said, I don't know how well they treated their helis ;) ).

The ones that work are pretty good fun. 3-channel = up/down, turn left/right, forwards and backwards.

Of course, they're not going to fool someone into thinking they're some insect. But the delfly micro doesn't fly like a dragonfly either. The only insects I can think of that fly like that are some moths (the larger ones).

BTW the summary appears to be wrong - the delfly does not seem to be autonomous at all - it is controlled by some human.

When I think of it, it's quite amazing how behind we are in tech- dragonflies are smaller, fly faster (50kph), fly for longer, are more manueverable, and are genuinely autonomous - they find their own "fuel" and even reproduce.

Re:What happens...

[skraps]

Wasn't intended as a troll, I promise. :-) I was already aware that jets are tested with chickens, but chickens (bones included) are pretty soft compared to, say, batteries. And I think these could get pretty close to a jet on take-off or landing. Maybe you should re-read my comment and yours, and ask yourself which sounds more like a troll.

I laugh at 3 grams

[Anonymous Coward]

Radio control micro planes have been built here in the US by hobby people that weigh LESS than 1/2 gram

Re:What happens...

[danbert8]

Actually, the first tests they did were inconclusive. They revisited it and eventually did find that frozen chickens had more penetrating power than thawed ones. The final test that was conclusive was several sheets of glass, and the frozen chicken broke more panes than the thawed one.
 
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MythBusters_episodes:_Season_2#Episode_14_.E2.80.94_.22Myths_Revisited.22 [wikipedia.org]

Re:One for the Christmas List

[pushing-robot]

There's also this new one [thinkgeek.com], which is basically the same size as the DelFly Micro, can hover, and has double the flight time. It doesn't have a camera, though, but considering TFA claims the Micro's camera only weighs 0.5 grams it would be easy to add one.

Re:great for urban warfare

[MrSteveSD]

Or assassination. e.g. A poisonous needle attached to the front.