379results about "Convertible aircrafts" patented technology

A land to air vehicle with lower extendable wings and upper extendible wings, a body, a front hood fan, a rear fan and wheels. The wheels include wheel bases, exterior tires circumscribing the wheel bases, and a fan wheel assembly within each wheel base. The wheel assembly includes extendible fans, a rotor outer rim with teeth for holding a stator inner rim, a propeller shroud configured to house a variety of fan blades, at least one fan within the propeller shroud, a hinge fixedly attached to the outer rotor rim and the propeller shroud, a wheel motor platform and a wheel motor. The hinge is structured to allow the propeller shroud with fans to extend distally from the wheel base interior to navigate the land to air vehicle.

A bipedal robot having a legged assembly and an aerial assembly is described. The legged assembly includes two legs, each leg having a hip frontal joint, a hip sagittal joint, and a knee joint. The aerial assembly includes two thrusters mounted on a carbon fiber-aluminum composite mount. Actuators for the joints include 3D printed housings with embedded components. A controller generates walking trajectories and controls the thrusters to assist with stabilization and obstacle traversal. The robot is capable of dynamic multimodal locomotion, combining legged movement with thruster-assisted stabilization and jumping to navigate challenging terrain.

A quadrotor is proposed than can both fly and roll. The proposed robot employs passively reconfigurable structures to enable the rolling, tightly coupling the attitude of the robot to the rolling cage. The benefits are precise rolling and turning control as well as improved rolling efficiency. The passively reconfigurable structures are enabled by pre-stretched elastic springs to generate a nonlinear restoring torque. The robot leveraged the superior maneuverability in the rolling mode to take photos of the surroundings at different tilting and panning angles to construct a panoramic image. Besides, the results of the power measurements show a significant reduction in the cost of transport brought by at low speed, equating to a 15-fold extension in the operational range.

A hybrid system for drones and other modes of transport. A combustion engine provides range and / or lifting capacity for drones while electric motors / generators provide both control and maneuverability. One or more combustion engines, in conjunction with one or more electric motors / generators form a propulsion system whereby each is connected to and drives its own driving pinion in one or more planetary gear sets, and provide continuously variable transmission for driving propellers or driveshafts. The combustion engine may be connected directly to one of the planetary gear's driving pinions, or can drive one of the planetary gear's driving pinions. If the propellers are only driven by either a combustion engine, or an electric motor / generator, the other engine / motor will be kept at rest by a braking device for a combustion engine or a braking device for an electric motor / generator.

A convertible ducted fan engine and mounting system. The convertible ducted fan engine has a shroud encircling a mechanical fan. The convertible ducted fan engine includes a fluid-propulsion configuration in which the mechanical fan rotates freely with respect to the shroud to produce thrust through fluid flow, and a drive-wheel configuration in which the shroud rotates about the rotational axis.

Drones with propulsions systems supported in a housing are provided where the orientation of the housing is independent from the orientation of the propulsion system. Drones are provided where a propulsion system is rotatable about a first axis and a second axis that is perpendicular to the first axis, permitting the propulsion system to assume substantially any position with a sphere. Drones are provided where a bladeless inner tube is rotatable about a first axis and a second axis that is perpendicular to the first axis, permitting the inner tube to assume substantially any position within a sphere. Drone systems are provided with connectable unit drones. An unmanned land vehicle is provided having a wheel assembly that is rotatable about a first axis and a second axis that is perpendicular to the first axis, permitting the wheel assembly to assume substantially any position with a sphere.

A payload including a housing provided with one or more toothed guides or with one or more docking mechanisms, each of which is configured to detachably toothedly interact with an unmanned aircraft apparatus being docked so as to enable the movement of said docked unmanned aircraft apparatus with respect to the housing of the payload, wherein the housing of the payload is further configured to detachably toothedly interact with yet another (other) unmanned aircraft apparatus so as to enable the action of said yet another unmanned aircraft apparatus onto said docked unmanned aircraft apparatus for withdrawal of the latter from interaction with the housing of the payload. Furthermore, embodiments of an air transport system include two or more unmanned aircraft apparatuses and one of the payload.

A quadrotor is proposed than can both fly and roll. The proposed robot employs passively reconfigurable structures to enable the rolling, tightly coupling the attitude of the robot to the rolling cage. The benefits are precise rolling and turning control as well as improved rolling efficiency. The passively reconfigurable structures are enabled by pre-stretched elastic springs to generate a nonlinear restoring torque. The robot leveraged the superior maneuverability in the rolling mode to take photos of the surroundings at different tilting and panning angles to construct a panoramic image. Besides, the results of the power measurements show a significant reduction in the cost of transport brought by at low speed, equating to a 15-fold extension in the operational range.

The invention discloses a functional gradient buffer structure suitable for a high-speed water entry process of a cross-medium navigation body, and aims to effectively improve the structural safety and integrity of the navigation body when the navigation body bears a high impact load. The structure mainly comprises a pointed arch-cylinder combined housing, a functional gradient buffer layer and a locking device. Wherein the functional gradient buffer layer is formed by sequentially and tightly attaching high-density (200kg / m < 3 >) rigid polyurethane foam, medium-density (100kg / m < 3 >) rigid polyurethane foam and low-density (50kg / m < 3 >) rigid polyurethane foam, a filling structure with gradually-decreased density is formed in the axial direction, the functional gradient buffer layer is arranged in a cavity between the housing and the navigation body, and the low-density layer is close to the head of the navigation body. The locking device achieves axial limiting and anti-falling fixing of the housing through an annular structure. Under the condition of 100 m / s vertical entry water impact, numerical simulation analysis shows that the structure can reduce the peak value of the impact load coefficient borne by the navigation body to 0.88, and compared with a single-layer buffer structure with the same volume density (100 kg / m < 3 >), the impact load coefficient of the structure is reduced by 27.3%.

An aircraft has a boom, a propulsion assembly coupled to a first end of the boom, and a first wing coupled to a second end of the boom. The propulsion assembly is coupled to the boom by a rotating joint. A second wing is optionally coupled to the rotating joint. The first wing is coupled to the boom by a rotating joint. The first wing is coupled to the rotating joint by a hinge. A vehicle with roll, pitch, and yaw maneuverability able to mirror the aircraft movements may be coupled to the second end of the boom. The vehicle body may be picked up with a vehicle chassis disconnected from the vehicle body. The boom houses an energy source to power the propulsion assembly. A rudder is coupled to the second end of the boom. A paddle is disposed between the propulsion assembly and the boom.

A supply glider is disclosed herein. The supply glider includes a body having a first end and a second end, the body being configured to be coupled to a host aircraft, a container disposed between the first end and the second end of the body, wings coupled to the body between the first end and the second end, and stabilators coupled to the body adjacent the second end.

A drone with railway driving capabilities has a drone body and at propeller arms. Each propeller arm has a propeller assembly having a propeller driven by a motor assembly. The propeller assembly of at least one propeller arm has a rotatably mounted propeller guard placed coaxially with the propeller. The propeller guard is shaped as a train wheel and is driven by the motor assembly. The propeller arm has an actuated joint for providing the propeller assembly with at least one rotation degree of freedom so that the propeller can be rotated between a flight mode and a driving mode and back. The flight mode involves a more horizontal orientation of the propeller assembly for providing an upwardly directed thrust force to the drone, in operational use, and the driving mode involves a more vertical orientation of the propeller assembly for allowing the respective propeller guard to drive on the railway track.

In some embodiments, a multi-modal robot can be capable of aerial mobility and ground mobility, and can switch between configuration. The multi-modal robot can include a chassis, and a leg attached to the chassis. The leg can include a frontal hip joint. The frontal hip joint can rotate around a frontal hip axis of rotation. The frontal hip axis of rotation can be parallel to a longitudinal axis of the chassis. The leg can further include a sagittal hip joint, wherein the sagittal hip joint is coupled to the first distal end of a first link. The sagittal hip joint can rotate around a sagittal hip axis of rotation. The leg can include a wheel. The wheel can be configured to rotate around a wheel axis of rotation. The leg can further include a propeller. The propeller can be co-axial with the wheel.

The invention relates to a self-adaptive energy-absorbing conformal head cap of an air-water cross-medium aircraft, which is mainly applied to aircrafts capable of switching motion between two media of air and water. The head cap comprises a top cover, a skin combination, an energy absorption mechanism, a shape preserving mechanism and a modular adaptive interface, wherein the skin combination comprises an outer-layer skin and an inner-layer skin; the energy absorption mechanism is arranged in the inner-layer skin; the conformal structure is arranged between the inner-layer skin and the outer-layer skin; the modular adaptive interface comprises a base and a switching section, the base is connected with one end of the inner-layer skin, and the switching section is connected with the aircraft body; and the top cover is connected with the other end of the inner-layer skin. Stable hydrodynamic performance and low underwater resistance can be provided under different water entry speeds and angles, head appearance damage caused in the deformation process of a traditional energy absorption structure is effectively avoided, and the key technical problems in design of the air-water cross-medium aircraft are solved.

A transport vehicle that transports packages includes: a first arm; a second arm; a first wheel connected to the first arm; a second wheel connected to the second arm; at least one actuator; and a controller (control processor). When the transport vehicle is slidably hung from the first rail via the first wheel and the second wheel, the controller controls the at least one actuator (arm actuator, roller actuation motor) to disengage the first wheel from the first rail and place the first wheel on the second rail, and disengage the second wheel from the first rail and place the second wheel on the second rail.

A vehicle for travelling on a road and in the air is provided, comprising a fuselage extending from a forward to a rear end along a horizontal longitudinal roll axis, a pair of main wings mounted on the rear end of the fuselage, a pair of canard wings mounted to the fuselage forward of the main wings, a plurality of wheels configured to facilitate travelling on the road, and a rotor system comprising a plurality of rotors. Each of the main and canard wings extend from the fuselage in deployed positions, and are configured to be shifted to a stowed position in which it overlies the fuselage. The rotor system comprises a pair of tiltable main rotors mounted a main wing and configured to tilt through a plurality of positions between a forward position parallel with the roll axis, and an upward position parallel with the yaw axis.

A device has a rotor module comprising a motor generator, rotor blades, and a rotary-wing kinematic system for the rotor blades connected to the motor generator. The rotor blades are each divided into a plurality of longitudinal sections, each for receiving at least one actuator integrated in a longitudinal member or transverse member of the rotor blade, and have a variable, asymmetrical airfoil which, in one revolution of the rotor blade on a diameter of the circular path, the diameter being freely orientable within an adjustment range and having turning points, can be adjusted in at least one longitudinal section of the rotor blade with a length in such a way that the suction surface and the pressure surface of the asymmetrical airfoil change at the turning points from the outside to the inside of the circular path, or vice versa.

A flying vehicle with folding wings that drives well on the ground and flies well in the air; controlled from inside, it changes from automotive to aircraft configuration without the operator needing to get out of the vehicle. The balance point of the vehicle is located midway between the front and back wheels, providing good handling on the road. In the aircraft configuration with wings unfolded, there is a front wing and a back wing. The incidence of the front wing is controllable, enabling the craft to rotate and take off with a center of gravity located well ahead of the rear wheels. The back wing is fitted with foldable vertical stabilizers near its wing tips. In automobile configuration the wings are folded on top of the body; the wings resemble a roof rack with large surfboards on it. Driven wheels provide motive power on the ground; ducted fans provide thrust for air travel. An autopilot system provides stability and navigation aid, particularly in bad weather or poor visibility. In the roadable configuration, filling water ballast tanks provides additional crosswind stability and crash protection. Also in a roadable configuration, the present invention may be licensed as a three-wheeled motorcycle towing a two-wheeled trailer. In its flying configuration, the invention can be licensed as a Light Sport Aircraft.

An aircraft designed for vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) and fixed wing flight. The aircraft's structure includes a streamlined fuselage, forward swept wing and a canard, featuring a configuration of propulsors symmetrically embedded along the aircraft's longitudinal center of gravity and tilting propellers on the forward swept wingtips. Additionally, the fuselage includes doors to the propulsor ducts that can be opened for vertical flight and closed for forward flight.

The invention discloses a fuel cell-turbofan engine hybrid power system for a cross-medium aircraft, and relates to the technical field of aero-engines, the system comprises a solid oxide fuel cell, a turbofan engine, a lithium battery, an energy management module, a motor, a propeller, a reforming hydrogen production device and a medium self-adaptive oxidant supply subsystem. In an air flight mode, the system adopts autothermal reforming hydrogen production, a fuel cell and a turbofan engine to cooperatively work, a high-efficiency low-oil-consumption low-speed cruise and high-thrust acceleration mode is provided, and meanwhile, a lithium battery is charged. In the underwater submerging and water surface sailing mode, a turbofan engine flow channel is closed, steam reforming hydrogen production is adopted, a hybrid power system composed of a fuel cell and a lithium battery is used for driving a propeller, the fuel cell provides stable power, and the lithium battery meets the instantaneous high-power requirement. The system solves the problems that a traditional power system is low in efficiency, poor in cruising ability, single in working mode and the like.

The invention relates to a hovercar, a vehicle and an aircraft. The hovercar comprises the vehicle and the aircraft. The vehicle comprises a vehicle body and the separation and combination device, the vehicle body is fixedly provided with a land-running cabin, and the separation and combination device is arranged on the vehicle body; the aircraft comprises an aircraft body and a plurality of foldable rotors, and the aircraft body is fixedly provided with a flight cabin; the plurality of foldable rotors are arranged on the aircraft body; the aircraft can vertically take off and land on the ground, and the separation and combination device is used for pulling the aircraft to be in coupling connection with the vehicle when the aircraft is in a state of stopping on the ground. In the embodiment, the aircraft does not need to be precisely positioned with the bearing platform on the vehicle body and can rapidly and vertically stop and descend on the ground, then the separation and combination device of the vehicle is connected with the aircraft and drags the aircraft to the bearing platform, and the control difficulty of coupling of the aircraft and the vehicle is relatively low.

An aerial and preferably marine vehicle intended to operate in its principal mode near the surface of water or land employing the Wing-in-Ground Effect (WIG) and capable to take-off and land vertically (VTOL) by means of thrust vectoring, which vehicle has a wing arranged at the lowermost part of the fuselage, propulsion units comprising four rotatable pylons extending transversely in pairs on both sides of the upper part of the fuselage, four elongated nacelles mounted on the outer tips of said pylons, which nacelles contain electric motors (E) and provided with propellers at their extremities, so that the rotation of the pylons results in turning the nacelles and thrust of propellers from substantially vertical, ensuring take-off and landing, to substantially horizontal providing a flight mode, retractable hydroskis for emergency landing on water, while said propulsion units and said wing are spaced apart vertically and horizontally and do not overlap.

A payload including a housing provided with one or more toothed guides or with one or more docking mechanisms, each of which is configured to detachably toothedly interact with an unmanned aircraft apparatus being docked so as to enable the movement of said docked unmanned aircraft apparatus with respect to the housing of the payload, wherein the housing of the payload is further configured to detachably toothedly interact with yet another (other) unmanned aircraft apparatus so as to enable the action of said yet another unmanned aircraft apparatus onto said docked unmanned aircraft apparatus for withdrawal of the latter from interaction with the housing of the payload. Furthermore, embodiments of an air transport system include two or more unmanned aircraft apparatuses and one of the payload.

The invention discloses an operation type water-air cross-domain rope-driven bionic robot and a using method thereof. The robot comprises an aircraft body, a rotor wing arm installed on the aircraft body, an underwater propelling structure and a mechanical arm assembly installed at the bottom of the aircraft body. The rotorcraft arm comprises a rotating device and a rotor assembly, and the rotating device is used for driving the rotor assembly to rotate; the mechanical arm assembly comprises a driving device, a mechanical arm, a driving rope and a mechanical claw installed at the tail end of the mechanical arm, and the driving device is installed at the bottom of the aircraft body and used for driving the tensioning degree of the driving rope; the mechanical arm comprises a plurality of joint sections, and the overall shape of the mechanical arm is changed by adjusting the tensioning degree of the driving rope. According to the mechanical arm, the design of the multiple joint sections is adopted, a flexible bendable structure is formed, the mechanical arm is controlled to be bent and deformed on multiple degrees of freedom through the driving rope, the overall bending flexibility of the mechanical arm is improved, and the mechanical arm can adapt to the complex or narrow working environment.

The invention relates to the technical field of aircrafts, and discloses a cross-medium aircraft which comprises a functional module, a power module, a control module, a comprehensive module and a submerging module, the power module is divided into a front power mechanism and a rear power mechanism, the control module is arranged between the front power mechanism and the rear power mechanism and used for controlling the lift force directions of the front power mechanism and the rear power mechanism so as to control the flight attitude of the aircraft, and the front power mechanism and the rear power mechanism are in the structural form of hinge-free rotors. Lift force is provided for the aircraft; the other side of the front power mechanism is connected with the functional module, and the functional module is used for carrying functional equipment for working of the aircraft and can carry different modules such as a reconnaissance photoelectric ball, a high-energy explosive and a relay communication cabin according to the requirements of task execution. Through modular design, the structure of an aircraft and the structure of an underwater vehicle are integrated, and the problems that a cross-medium flight structure is complex and huge, and the function is single are solved.

The invention relates to a cross-medium aircraft variant nose cone with dynamically adjustable surface wettability, and belongs to the field of cross-medium aircrafts. Comprising a variant skeleton and a flexible skin. Under the heating condition, the variant framework can drive the flexible skin to deform, the flexible skin keeps the deformed state after normal temperature is recovered, and therefore curvature distribution and section characteristics of the nose cone structure are changed. The surface of the flexible skin is covered with a wettability intelligent response coating. After the wettability intelligent response coating is irradiated by ultraviolet rays, the surface wettability can be converted into a super-hydrophilic state, and the wettability intelligent response coating can be recovered into a super-hydrophobic state after being heated. The head configuration and the surface wettability layout of the cross-medium aircraft are adjusted according to the specific water entry working condition, the hydrodynamic force and the hydrodynamic moment borne by the aircraft in the water entry process are changed through the influence effect of the configuration and the surface wettability on water entry cavitation evolution, the impact load is reduced as needed, and the attitude and trajectory stability is improved; the purposes of being compatible with various launching platforms and guaranteeing the water entry efficiency and safety are achieved.

The invention discloses a cross-medium aircraft and belongs to the technical field of aircrafts. Comprising a power propulsion system which provides a power hybrid control system for an aircraft body and is used for realizing data acquisition and operation and accurate control of the power propulsion system, a navigation system and a sinking and floating system; the navigation system is used for providing navigation support for the vehicle body; the gradient skin is composed of multiple gradient materials and covers the outer surface of the aircraft body, and the sinking and floating system is used for controlling floating and diving of the aircraft body. According to the invention, the vehicle can obtain the optimal pneumatic / hydrodynamic performance in the air and seawater medium navigation state; according to the power propulsion system, the requirements of high speed, long distance and high thrust of the aircraft are met; a distributed network and a visual navigation system meet the navigation requirements of the cross-medium aircraft in the air, on the water surface and under the water and the combined combat; the hybrid control system is used for accurately controlling the aircraft; the aircraft application material can complete deformation adaptive to the changed environment.

The invention discloses an aerocar wing and rotor wing hybrid folding and unfolding system and an aerocar. The aerocar wing and rotor wing hybrid folding and unfolding system comprises a car body, wings on the two sides, wing rotating mechanisms, rotor wing supports, rotor wing support rotating mechanisms and rotor wing assemblies. The wings are movably connected to the vehicle body; the wings and the wing rotating mechanisms are symmetrically arranged on the two sides of the vehicle body, and the wing rotating mechanisms drive the wings to rotate and unfold to the two sides of the vehicle body or reversely rotate and retract to the inner side of the vehicle body and do not exceed the edges of the wings, so that conversion between the vehicle working state and the flying working state of the wings can be completed. The rotor support is movably connected to the wing, and the rotor support is rotated by starting the rotor support rotating mechanism, so that the rotation of the rotor support on the wing surface is realized. According to the invention, ultra-short-distance take-off and landing and stable flight in the air of the aerocar can be realized. In addition, when the vehicle runs on the ground, the wings and the rotors can be rotationally folded and placed on the inner side of the vehicle body, space is saved, the appearance is attractive, and the ground vehicle use requirements are met.