1311results about "Ornithopters" patented technology

An apparatus comprises a base vehicle, a takeoff and landing system, a rack system, a refueling system associated with the base vehicle, and a controller. The rack system comprises a group of racks with slots in which the slots receive unmanned aerial vehicles, provide refueling connections that facilitate refueling of the unmanned aerial vehicles located in the slots, and provide data connections that facilitate data transmission with the unmanned aerial vehicles located in the slots. The refueling system refuels an unmanned aerial vehicle located in a slot using a refueling connection in the refueling connections. The controller communicates with the unmanned aerial vehicle using a data connection and control the refueling of the unmanned aerial vehicles by the refueling system while the unmanned aerial vehicle is in the slot, enabling exchanging data with the unmanned aerial vehicle and the refueling of the unmanned aerial vehicle simultaneously.

Devices for navigating in a fluid medium having a solid boundary include a vehicle body and a fin attached to the vehicle body. The fin is configured to oscillate relative to the body such that interaction between the fin and the fluid medium produces propulsive forces that propel the vehicle body in a desired direction in the fluid medium. The fin is also configured to rotate relative to the body along a transverse axis such that engagement between the fin and the solid boundary propels the vehicle body in a desired direction on the solid boundary.

Multi-wing hovering and gliding flapping Micro Air Vehicles (“MAV”) are disclosed. The MAV can have independent wing control to provide enhance energy efficiency and high maneuverability. Power to each wing can be controlled separately by varying the amplitude of the wing flapping, the frequency of the wing flapping, or both. The flapping frequency can be controlled such that it is at or near the natural frequency of the wings for improved energy efficiency. The wings can be controlled by a gear train, coil-magnet arrangement or many other actuation systems that enable variable frequency flapping, variable amplitude flapping, or a combination of both. The gear train mechanism provides gyroscopic stability during flight. The wing flapping can include a rotation, or feathering motion, for improved efficiency. The wings can be transitioned between flapping flight and fixed wing flight to enable gliding and hovering in a single configuration.

A vehicle with wings and a mechanism for causing a flapping motion in wings. Each wing structure comprises a wing and a wing spar coupled to a follower via a resilient member. Each wing carrier is pivotally connected to the body and is configured to restrain lateral movement and permit rotation of the wing spar about a feathering axis. A biasing member provides torsional bias to each wing spar. A linkage, driven by an actuator, transmits cyclic motion that rotates the wing carrier about a flapping axis, which moves the follower along a follower path. A guide attached to the vehicle body lies in the path of each follower, and the follower and guide are shaped such that each wing spar has a first rotational position about its axis along a first portion of the follower path and a second rotational position along a second portion of the follower path.

The invention relates to a double-wing type miniature bionic ornithopter, which comprises a driving mechanism, a double-flapping-wing system, a spoiler mechanism and a principal arm, wherein the driving mechanism is just connected to the front end of the main arm, the double-flapping-wing system is positioned above the principal arm, and the spoiler mechanism is connected to the rear end of the principal arm. The driving mechanism comprises a diamond rack, a miniature direct current motor, a gear reducing mechanism and two crank-link mechanisms, the double-flapping-wing system comprises two symmetrical flapping wing racks, four flapping wing installation rods, an upper layer of flapping wing and a lower layer of flapping wing, and the spoiler mechanism comprises an electromagnetic rubber, a spoiler and a swing wing. The miniature direct current motor pulls two flapping wing racks to move up and down through the gear reducing mechanism and the crank-link mechanisms, so that the bionic flapping wings can be realized. The electromagnetic rubber in the spoiler mechanism can control the swing wing to swing from side to side by changing the current direction, so that the fly direction of the ornithopter can be controlled.

The invention described here offers a more effective method of ornithopter flight control. To accomplish this, the ornithopter has dual microprocessor-controlled drive systems for flapping the wings independently of each other. Various wing movements can cause the ornithopter to turn, roll, or pitch up or down. Weight and complexity are reduced by eliminating the need for servo-controlled tail surfaces.

Devices employing electroactive polymer actuators are disclosed. Acrylic dielectric material based actuators are optionally provided in which architectures are presented that allow for improved power output as compared with other known acrylic dielectric material based transducers. Such technology may be applied in motor-driven applications, lightweight flight applications and lighting applications among others.

The invention discloses a flapping wing device for achieving active torsion of flapping wings and wing planes of an aerofoil, and belongs to the field of bionics flapping wing flight driving devices. The flapping wing device comprises a flapping wing swing rod, two spherical hinge pins, an aerofoil torsion connecting rod, a driven conical gear, an aerofoil torsion crank, a right side flapping wing connecting rod, a right side flapping wing crank, a right side flapping wing straight gear, a left side flapping wing straight gear, a left side flapping wing crank, a left side flapping wing connecting rod, a speed reduction gear, a motor output gear, an electromotor, two aerofoil frameworks, two rotary pairs and two moving pairs. A flapping flight vehicle by adopting the flapping wing device can achieve wing plane flapping and torsion flight of wings at the same time without installing an additional torsion driving motor and a matched drive device thereof for the wings on two sides, and the driving device is integrally simple to design and is light in weight, so that the flapping flight vehicle can obtain great lifting force and push force; and the maneuverability of the flight vehicle is improved to a certain degree.

The invention relates to a micro dragonfly-imitating dual-flapping wing aircraft which mainly consists of a rack, a front flapping wing system and a rear flapping wing system. A pinion (17) and a large gear (16) are in meshing transmission; the large gear (16) is fixedly connected with a runner (14) through a transmission shaft (15) at an adjustable angle (36); the large gear (16), a connection rod a (23), a front right rocker (24) with a sector gear, a Y-shaped front bracket (18), a runner (14), a connection rod b (34), a rear right rocker (33) with sector gear and a Y-shaped rear bracket (20) form a crank rocker mechanism respectively; and the front and rear flapping wing systems are in meshing transmission through the sector gears to realize symmetric flapping. Compared with the prior art, the micro dragonfly-imitating dual-flapping wing aircraft provided by the invention has the advantages that: the two flapping wings are driven by a single motor in a simple and compact structure,the flapping of the front and rear flapping wing systems is completely symmetric, the flapping phase difference of the front and rear flapping wing systems can be adjusted as necessary to as to perfectly imitate the flexible flapping flying of dragonfly, and the like.

The invention relates to an aileron rotary folding and unfolding type flapping wing device, which includes aileron rotary folding and unfolding type flapping wings and a related drive device, wherein the wings are divided into main wings and ailerons along the wingspan direction, exterior edges of the main wings and exterior edges of the ailerons which are connected via butt hinge can relatively rotate on the wings plane with the butt hinge as an axis, and the aileron plane can be folded under the main wings plane, the drive device comprises a main wings drive device and an aileron drive device which are driven to be connected via a main drive shaft, the main wings drive device is positioned in the head section, and composed of two symmetrical crank rocker mechanisms which respectively drive the left wing and the right wing, and the aileron drive device is positioned in the middle-rear portion of the wings chordwise direction. The aileron rotary folding and unfolding type flapping wing device employs a bevel gear pair to realize rotation shaft changes, thereby multi-degree-of-freedom motion can be driven by single power, approximately saving one main drive shaft and related motors, and greatly reducing weight.

A drive mechanism for the wings of miniature ornithopter is composed of a worm-gear speed reducer and two sets of 4-connection-rod unit consisting of crank with one end fixed to the axle of worm gear, connection rod with one end linked to crank, and rocker arm linked between rocker arm and wing.

The invention discloses a flapping wing driving mechanism of two-level parallel gear reduction. The mechanism comprises a rack, a motor, a two-level parallel gear reducer and a four-bar mechanism, wherein a micro motor is fixed on the rack, which drives the two-level parallel gear reducer and the two rocker arms of the four-bar mechanism and converts the high-speed rotation of the micro motor into the up-down flapping of the rocker arm of the four-bar mechanism at proper frequency. The flapping wing driving mechanism disclosed by the invention has the advantages of simple structure, light weight, small space, high reliability, long service life and the like, and is suitable for micro flapping wing aircraft.

The invention relates to a multi-freedom degree bird-like flapping wing air vehicle. The multi-freedom degree bird-like flapping wing air vehicle comprises a driving mechanism, two twisting mechanisms, an empennage mechanism, two flexible joint structures and a machine frame. The multi-freedom degree bird-like flapping wing air vehicle is simple and compact in structure, and fully-symmetrical flapping wing movement can be realized. Two rubber flexible grooved mechanisms are arranged, so that the flapping wing air vehicle can fly like a bird; flapping wings are curved and folded, so that when the flapping wings flap upwards, a stressed area is reduced, and the resistance is reduced; when the flapping wings flap downwards, the wing extending area is the largest; besides, outer wings can also be passively bent in a flight direction by air resistance, so that great lifting force and great thrust are generated; steering engines are adopted to control inner wing rods so as to change the elevation angle of the flapping wings, the multi-freedom degree bird-like flapping wing air vehicle conforms to the effect that upward flapping resistance is less than downward flapping lifting force in aerodynamics, and the aerodynamic efficiency is improved; the two steering engines are utilized to control the deflection of the empennage, so that operating and controlling of the flight attitude of the flapping wing air vehicle are facilitated. The multi-freedom degree bird-like flapping wing air vehicle disclosed by the invention can be used in the fields of models, aerial photography monitoring, information collecting, disaster searching and rescuing, airport bird expelling and the like.

The present invention relates to flapping wing aircraft, and is especially an improved flapping wing unit of flapping wing aircraft. The motors on the base respectively drive the two symmetrical steering engine drivers to rotated through a speed reducer, the motor of the steering engine driver is hinged through crank-link rod mechanism to lever driving shaft with a first bearing seat in the end, the roll on the lever driving shaft is fitted to the slipway inside the shell of the steering engine driver, the rotation shaft with bearings and second bearing seats is mounted on the casing, the lever driving shaft has the other end hinged to link rod hinged to wing handle, and the wing handle has one end with mounted wing and the other end hinged to the support arm of the rotation shaft. The present invention makes the flapping wing aircraft possess great lifting power, propelling power and stable flying state.

The invention discloses a cylindrical cam flapping wing driving mechanism. A motor is fixed on a rack and drives a driving gear of a gear speed reduction device; a driven gear of the gear speed reduction device is coaxially and fixedly connected with a transmission shaft; the rack is fixedly connected with a guide rail which is parallel with a transmission shaft; the guide rail is internally provided with a connecting rod which can slide; one end of the connecting rod is articulated with a sliding plate, and the other end of the connecting rod is fixedly connected with a strut; a cylindrical cam is coaxially and fixedly connected at the outer side of the transmission shaft; one or more cycles of periodic curves are wound on the circumference of a cam slot; the sliding pate can slide in the cam slot; a swinging rod mechanism comprises two swinging arms, the middle part of each swinging arm is articulated with swinging arm shafts which are fixedly connected at two sides of the guide rail; one end of each swinging arm is provided with a sliding chute; the strut can slide in a reciprocating mode along the slide chute, and the other end of each swinging arm is connected with a flappingwing beam. By utilizing the mechanism provided by the invention, the complex plane flapping type can be realized, the structure is simple, the weight is light, the reliability is high, complex control is not required, and the mechanism is applicable to a micro flapping aircraft.

The invention provides a method for driving flapping wings to rotate by thrust produced by the flap of the flapping wings instead of driving by an electric motor, and the method combines with flapping wing and rotary wing technology. An aircraft designed by the method of the invention comprises the flapping wings, an electromagnetic driving mechanism, a connecting shaft, a roller bearing, a power supply, useful load, an electric steering engine, control surfaces, an undercarriage, a controller, an aircraft shell, a slip ring and an electric brush, wherein the electromagnetic driving mechanism drives a pair of flapping wings to flap up and down. The aircraft shell is connected with a rotary connecting shaft through the roller bearing, three control surfaces are evenly distributed at the lower part of the aircraft shell, and simultaneously the control surfaces have the function of the undercarriage of the aircraft. The flapping rotary wings of the invention have high pneumatic efficiency and can satisfy the mission and requirements of vertical takeoff and landing and hovering stopping of the aircraft. Simultaneously, the rotation of the flapping wings of the aircraft is a self-driven rotation, and the rotation is not offset by a torsion resisting mechanism which is added additionally. The aircraft has the advantages of simple design structure, light weight and high flight efficiency and is suitable for miniaturization aircraft design requirements.

A flying wing rotation mechanism of a micro air vehicle is driven under a control of a power module and a detent member. The flying wing rotation mechanism of a micro air vehicle includes a flapping arm and a flying wing. The flapping arm is connected to the detent member, and swings as the power module drives the detent member. An end of the flying wing is pivoted to the flapping arm. When the flapping arm swings, the flying wing swings with the flapping arm in sync. When swing direction of the flapping arm changes, the flying wing rotates relative to an axial direction of the flapping arm.

A method of controlling wing position and velocity for a flapping wing air vehicle provides six-degrees-of-freedom movement for the aircraft through a split-cycle constant-period frequency modulation with wing bias method that generates time-varying upstroke and downstroke wing position commands for wing planforms to produce nonharmonic wing flapping trajectories that generate non-zero, cycle averaged wing drag and alter the location of the cycle-averaged center of pressure of the wings relative to the center of gravity of the aircraft to cause horizontal translation forces, rolling moments and pitching moments of the aircraft.

The invention discloses a bionic wing-flapping and bouncing multi-mode movement robot which comprises a rack, a bouncing mechanism, a wing-flapping mechanism and a driving mechanism, wherein the bouncing mechanism, the wing-flapping mechanism and the driving mechanism are arranged on the rack. The bouncing mechanism comprises feet, a folding mechanism, a torsional spring frame and a winch wheel. The wing-flapping mechanism comprises two wing mechanisms and two tail wing mechanisms, wherein the two wing mechanisms and the two tail wing mechanisms are respectively symmetrical in a left-right mode. The driving mechanism comprises a driving motor, a gear transmission mechanism and a ratchet mechanism. The gear transmission mechanism comprises an input gear and an output gear meshed with the input gear. The output gear comprises a tooth-incomplete gear, a crank gear connected with a crank, and a winch wheel gear connected with the winch wheel. The crank gear is meshed with the half side, with complete teeth, of the tooth-incomplete gear, and the winch wheel gear is meshed with the half side, with incomplete teeth, of the tooth-incomplete gear. The driving mechanism with the single motor drives the wing mechanisms and the bouncing mechanism to work, the complexity and the whole mass of the robot are effectively reduced, and the feasibility of the multi-mode movement robot is improved.

An improved drone with 4 flat wings reciprocating up and down, complete with motor and electronics. Appendages on each wing's surface allow air to pass across it during the up-motion, and block it in the down-motion; this creates lift and permits flight and manoeuvres. The drone resembles either a flying bird or an insect, depending on wing motion and on passive attachments appropriate for the respective resemblance, making for inconspicuousness. The drone can execute complex work, either as solitary or in a team, either in flight or at rest in various places, after approaching and adhering expertly.

The invention provides a high-frequency flapping-wing bionic insect aircraft with controllable passive torsion. The high-frequency flapping-wing bionic insect aircraft comprises an aircraft body framework, and a hollow cup power motor, a crank rocker transmission mechanism, a speed reduction gear group, bionic flapping wings, a controllable passive torsion mechanism and a ball bearing group which are arranged on the aircraft body framework, wherein the crank rocker transmission mechanism converts rotation of an output shaft of the hollow cup power motor into reciprocating flapping motion of the two flapping wings, to simulate flying of insects; the speed reduction gear group is used for lowering the rotating speed of the output shaft of the hollow cup power motor, so that the flapping action of the flapping wings finally keeps in a range; the controllable passive torsion mechanism ensures that the flapping wings can be twisted around rotating shafts, to generate uplifting force; meanwhile, repelling force between a limiter and an electromagnet makes the flapping wings return to the vertical positions. By the adoption of the ball bearing group, the crank rocker transmission mechanism and the controllable passive torsion mechanism, the aims of greatly reducing the transmission friction and effectively converting the power into lift force of the aircraft are fulfilled.

The present invention relates to a high-performance computer vision system and method for measuring the wings deformation of insects with high flapping-frequency, large stroke-amplitude and excellent mobility during free-flight. A geometrical optic unit composed of a polyhedral reflector with four reflection-planes and four planar reflectors is used to image one high-speed CMOS camera to four virtual cameras, combined with double laser-sheet sources, multiple virtual stereo and structured-light sensors are available to observe the free-flight of insect at different viewpoints simultaneously. In addition, an optoelectronic guiding equipment is included to lead the free-flight of insect and trigger the camera to capture the image sequences of insect-flight automatically. The deformation of insect-wings can be reconstructed by the spatial coordinates of wing-edges and the distorted light-lines projected on the surface of wings.

A micro aviation vehicle is provided which includes a body, a first wing set, a second wing set, an actuator and a power module. The first wing set and the second wing set are disposed on the left and right sides of the body respectively, and are connected with one end of the actuator. A first angle controller and a second angle controller are used to control the swing angle of the first wing set and the swing angle of the second wing set, respectively. The power module draws the actuator through the rotation of a driving gear, and then the first wing set together with the second wing set are associated with the actuator to flap back-and-forth.

A biomimetic pitching and flapping mechanism including a support member, at least two blade joints for holding blades and operatively connected to the support member. An outer shaft member is concentric with the support member, and an inner shaft member is concentric with the outer shaft member. The mechanism allows the blades of a small-scale rotor to be actuated in the flap and pitch degrees of freedom. The pitching and the flapping are completely independent from and uncoupled to each other. As such, the rotor can independently flap, or independently pitch, or flap and pitch simultaneously with different amplitudes and / or frequencies. The mechanism can also be used in a non-rotary wing configuration, such as an ornithopter, in which case the rotational degree of freedom would be suppressed.

The invention discloses a bionic aircraft. Series parallelogram telescopic main wings (2, 3) are symmetrically assembled on the left and the right above a body (1), bidirectional parallel parallelogram telescopic flat tail wings (4) are assembled in back of the body (1), undercarriage shock absorbers (40, 41, 42) arranged in three points are assembled below the body (1), undercarriage wheels (5, 6, 7) are assembled at one end of each of the shock absorbers (40, 41, 42) respectively, a driving cabin (8) and a safety umbrella cabin (9) are assembled above the body (1), the driving cabin (8) is positioned in front of the safety umbrella cabin (9), a solid rocket jato (10) is assembled at the lower gravity center position of the body (1), and the central axis of the solid rocket jato (10) and the central axis of the body (1) form an included angle of 10 to 15 degrees downwards. A nozzle faces to the lower rear part, a nose (11) is assembled in front of the body (1), and a power transmission mechanism and an operating system are assembled in the body (1). Because of the adoption of a bionic technology, the aircraft can simulate various flying postures of birds; the amplitude and frequency modulation transmission mechanism is favorable for rising, landing and flying of the aircraft; by adopting human-machine hybrid power, the aircraft has no pollution; because of good folding property of main rings, the aircraft is convenient for transportation; and the aircraft can be used for sports, escape, downhill race, patrol and the like.

The invention provides a flapping-wing aircraft belonging to the technical field of aircrafts. The flapping-wing aircraft comprises an airframe, a stationary shaft, a reversing frame, a half-rotating swing blade, a pin gear, a steering cam, a gearwheel, a driven gear, a driving gear, a control motor and the like, wherein the stationary shaft and the airframe are fixed, and the reversing frame is fixedly linked with the driven gear; the driving gear and the driven gear are meshed to form a main transmission mechanism of the aircraft to drive the reversing frame and the half-rotating wing blade to rotate to generate propelling force required by the aircraft; and the control motor is driven by a first-stage gear, the cam and the pin gear to form a maneuverable control mechanism of the aircraft, and the initial position of the half-rotating wing blade is changed, so that the direction of the propelling force is changed. The flapping-wing aircraft provided by the invention is flexible in adjusting the direction of the propelling force, stronger in maneuverability and beneficial to the control for taking off, landing and flying in a complex flying space; and the main transmission mechanism and the maneuverable control mechanism are simple, high in reliability and low in manufacturing cost.

A drive assembly for a wing of a micromechanical flying insect. The drive assembly comprises a honey comb structure. A method for flying a micromechanical flying insect comprising moving a wing with a drive assembly having a stiffness to weight ratio greater than about 16×1019 N / mKg.