The derivation of the nonlinear dynamics of flapping wing micro air vehicles is presented. Simulation results investigate differences in the position and orientation of the body due to differing wing masses and aerodynamic modeling choices. The flapping wing micro air vehicle is modeled as a system of three rigid bodies: a body and two wings. Themass of the wings, and their associatedmass and i...

Insect wings are flexible. For rigid wings lift enhancing unsteady aerodynamics mechanisms, such as delayed stall via leading-edge vortices (LEVs), wake-capture, and rotational forces, characterize the lift generation of a hovering insect. We have uncovered a novel mechanism that fruit fly size insects can utilize to further increase the lift by adjusting its wing shape passively: A pair of a L...

Flapping Wing Micro Air Vehicles (FWMAV) are highly manoeuvrable, bio-inspired drones that can assist in surveys and rescue missions. wings generate various unsteady lift enhancement mechanisms challenging the derivation of reduced models to predict instantaneous aerodynamic performance. In this work, we propose a robust CFD data-driven, quasi-steady (QS) Reduced Order Model (ROM) drag coeffici...

As one of the most important components of a flapping-wing micro air vehicle (FWMAV), the design of an energy-efficient flapping-wing has been a research interest recently. Research on insect flight from different perspectives has been carried out, mainly with regard to wing morphology, flapping kinematics, and unsteady aerodynamics. However, the link between the wing morphology and kinematics ...

Recent years have seen an increasing interest in micro aerial vehicles (MAVs) and flapping flight in connection to that. The Delft University of Technology has developed a flapping wing MAV, “DelFly II”, which relies on a flapping bi-plane wing configuration for thrust and lift. The ultimate aim of the present research is to improve the flight performance of the DelFly II from both an aerodynam...

The power required by flapping and fixed wing vehicles in level flight is determined and compared. Based on a new modelling approach, the effects of flapping on the induced drag in flapping wing vehicles are mathematically described. It is shown that flapping causes a significant increase in the induced drag when compared with a non-flapping, fixed wing vehicle. There are two effects for that i...

The three-dimensional unsteady computations of fish swimming with oscillating and deforming fins of varying rigidity were carried out. The objective of these variable rigidity computations was to investigate the importance of fin deformation on the fluid dynamics of force production. An unstructured grid-based unsteady Navier-Stokes solver with automatic adaptive remeshing was used to compute t...

Analysis and Control of Flapping Flight: from Biological to Robotic Insects by Luca Schenato Doctor of Philosophy in Engineering Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences University of California at Berkeley Professor Shankar S. Sastry, Chair This dissertation explores flapping flight as an effective form of locomotion for unmanned micro aerial vehicles (MAVs). Flapping flight is analyzed fr...

Flexible deformation of the insect wing has been proven to be beneficial lift generation and power consumption. There is great potential for shared research between natural insects bio-inspired Flapping Micro Aerial Vehicles (FWMAVs) performance enhancement. However, aerodynamic characteristics process flexible flapping wing, especially influenced by membrane material, are still lacking in-dept...