ROBO-FLY

ROBO-FLY

ABSTRACT

Bioinspired technology is the branch of engineering, which deals with

development of Micro Air Vehicles (MAV) and there control. The effort to design and build a micro
air vehicle with insect like flapping wings has led to a surprising new development in flight control.
The term, Micro Air Vehicle, may be somewhat misleading if interpreted too literally. We tend to
think of flying model aircraft as "miniature", so the term "micro" now alludes to a class of
significantly smaller vehicles. But MAVs are not small versions of larger aircraft. They are
affordable, fully functional, militarily capable, small flight vehicles in a class of their own. It has a
size less than 15 cm (about 6 inches) in length, width or height. This physical size puts this class of
vehicle at least an order of magnitude smaller than any missionized UAV developed to date.
MAVs should be thought of as aerial robots, as six-degree-of-freedom machines whose mobility can
deploy a useful micro payload to a remote or otherwise hazardous location where it may perform
any of a variety of missions, including reconnaissance and surveillance, targeting, tagging and bio-
chemical sensing.

Why "micro"? Why not something larger? The answer lies in the applications envisioned for
MAVs.. This hand-held, autonomous flying vehicle is motivated by a need for intelligent
reconnaissance robots capable of discreetly penetrating confined spaces and maneuvering in them
without the assistance of a human pilot. Agile flight inside buildings, stairwells, caves, and tunnels is
of significant military and civilian value.

 Miniature Helicopters with small

rotating blades.

MICRO AIR VEHICLE

There are three types of Micro air vehicles
 Miniature airplanes with fixed wings.
 Robo-Fly
ROBO-FLY
It is an MAV designed to mimic the flying
motions of certain insects, including flies, bees and
dragon flies. The size varies from 0.9-6 inches in length

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and width, travels up to 10-20kms with a speed of 30-75

kms/hr and weighs 20-80 gms.The body of the Robo-fly
is mainly built with material which will be having high
surface to volume ratio, high lift to drag ratio. The wings
are made up of thin layer of film usually Mylar films.
These are designed so that, they should have large wing
area to weight ratio.

These Robo-flies are usually based on Micro

Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS).Embedded with
communication systems, processors power supply,
sensors, cameras and propulsion systems. All these are
connected to each other through data, control and power
lines. The main advantage of the Robo-fly is first
of all it is very small not visible easily to the enemies or
Fig: Basic Parts of Entomopter
the satellites. It can walk, crawl on the land, it can take-
off from anywhere and can easily be landed. It flies
silently without making much noise. So coming through
all these features it can perfectly act like Spy- fly.  Wings - There are two wings, front and rear,
which are pivotally coupled to the fuselage in
an X configuration. These wings are made
out of a thin film. Stiff but flexible veins are
External Architecture and Working
attached to the wings at the fuselage junction
Principle
to give the wings the curve they need to
generate lift on both the upstroke and the
Let's look at the basic parts of the
down stroke.
Entomopter (Robo-fly)
 Reciprocating Chemical Muscle (RCM) -
A compact, non combustive engine is
attached to the wings to create a flapping
motion.
 Sensors - There are sensors for looking
forward, downward and sideways.

 Camera - The prototype lacks a mini-

camera, but the final version could carry a

camera or an olfactory sensor. This sensor

would detect odors, and the Entomopter
would track the odors to their point of origin.

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 Surface steering mechanism - This aids in
navigation when the Entomopter is used in
ground missions.
 Legs/feet - Also called surface locomotors,
these parts provide anti-roll inertia and
auxiliary fuel storage.
One of the experiments involved
building up of an Entomopter (Robo-fly)
which will be using solar cell as a power
source, pair of 10-inch (25-cm) robotic
wings, which was made of Plexiglass and
modeled after the wings of a fruit fly.
Fig: Entomopter with solar cells
The wings were immersed in a tank of mineral
oil, which forces them to react like smaller, 1-
millimeter-long fruit-fly wings beating rapidly in the
air. Six motors -- three on each wing -- moved the
wings back and forth, up and down and in a rotary
motion. Sensors were attached to measure the force of
the wings.
Although the robot does not yet fly, it's been
reported that approximately 90% of the force required
for lift has been achieved experimentally with a fully
S.G.Balekundri Institute of Technology, Belgaum.
ROBO-FLY
operational, two-wing structure. The next step will be
to add a flight-control unit and communication unit
for remote control. The researchers say that they are
working on enabling controlled hovering by way of
optical sensing and an onboard gyroscope.
FLIGHT CONTROL
Flight control is the single technological area which
harbors the largest numbers of unknowns for the MAV
designer. Platform stabilization and guidance will require
rapid, highly autonomous control systems.
One common trend in aircraft and in nature is that
smaller flyers travel slower and tend to have a higher ratio
of wing area to vehicle weight. Given the limited
wingspan available, MAVs cope with fully three-
dimensional aerodynamics.. MAVs will experience highly
unsteady flows due to the natural gustiness (turbulence) of
the atmosphere. Interestingly, nature’s flyers of the same
scale use another source of unsteady aerodynamics,
flapping wings, to create both lift and propulsive thrust.
For some applications, MAVs may ultimately have to do
the same.
APPLICATIONS
1. Military Applications
Micro Air Vehicles will be capable of a wide
range of useful military missions. It is capable of real
time day/night imagery. In contrast, some surveillance
applications may require less range - payload
performance. In these instances, the MAV would
relocate to a suitable vantage point and serve as a
fixed, unattended surface sensor with capabilities
ranging from imagery to seismic detection.
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Fig: Urban Operations Missions for the

MAV
Fig: The "Over-The-Hill Reconnaissance"
Mission for the MAV 4. Exploring Systems

2. Urban operations Robotic flies could also be well-suited as a new

generation of interplanetary explorers. Their ability to
In urban operations MAVs, acting in small, crawl and fly also gives them an advantage in exploring
cooperative groups, will enable reconnaissance and other planets. Most likely, NASA would send dozens of
surveillance of inner city areas, and may serve as these surveillance vehicles to explore other planets.
communication relays. They may also enable
observations through windows, and sensor placement Other Applications
on vertical and elevated surfaces.
 Natural disasters & navigation
 Real-estate aerial photography
 Traffic Monitoring

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 In Forestry and Wildlife

 Power line Inspection

Future Enhancement
Robotic flies could also be well-suited as a new
generation of interplanetary explorers. The Georgia Tech
Research Institute (GTRI) has received funding from
the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC) to
An artist's concept of a team of Entomopters
study the idea using the Entomopter as a flying Mars.
exploring Mars
surveyor.

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Conclusion

Spy flies are yet another example of how technology is

aiding humans in performing dangerous tasks, allowing
the humans to stay out of harm's way. Military
reconnaissance, searching for earthquake victims and

traveling to other worlds are all hazardous activities --

flying micro robots would allow us to accomplish these
tasks without actually being there.

REFERENCES:

 IEEE computer magazine Sept 2004

 DARPA (Defense Advance Research Projects Agency)
 NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC)
 Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI)
 www.wikipedia.com

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