- 05 June 2008 -
Composite bird

ROBOSWIFT, A micro aircraft fitted with movable wings inspired by the common swift, has been made with carbon composites by a student team from Technische Universiteit (TU) Delft, together with the Department of Experimental Zoology of Wageningen University in the Netherlands. The first flight was in March.

The RoboSwift can fold its feathers backwards changing its wing area, sweep, slenderness and chamber, just like the common swift - one of nature’s most efficient flyers. The adjustable wings make the RoboSwift efficient in both low and high speed regions, and in order to make it look like a swift, the tail planes are transparent.

It has a wing span of 50 cm and is 25 cm long. The 100g structure has a range of 1 km and endurance of up to 20 min. The composite swift will carry three mini-cameras – two in front, and one in the fuselage looking towards the ground. It can be used for bioresearch and ground surveillance.

The team participated at MAV08 in March, a competition for demonstrating state-of-the-art unmanned Micro Aerial Vehicle (MAV) and Unmanned Ground Vehicle (UGV) technology in Agra, India.

RoboSwift; www.roboswift.nl

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