Abstract

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are among the most in-demand technologies of this era and are widely applied in surveillance and search and rescue operations. However, a popular iteration of it, the quadcopter, is not properly adapted for these tasks due to its short flight time. This paper proposes the design and development of a quadcopter with an extended flight duration. The primary objective of the research is to enhance quadcopter performance through optimization of the propeller, thereby enhancing efficiency of flight, reducing noise, and extending flight duration. It carries out a thorough literature review of propeller design, noise control techniques, and UAV technologies. The augmented quadcopter developed during this research achieved a 10.5% and 11.1% reduction in power consumption, respectively, during hovering and forward flight operations. These results demonstrate outstanding potential for UAV innovations, while also providing a clear rubric for developing next-generation quadcopters for diverse applications.

Key words: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Propeller Design, Aerodynamic Optimization, Computational Fluid Dynamics