A Meter-scale Ornithopter Capable of Jumping Take-off

Abstract

Flapping wing air vehicles(FWAV) or ornithopters are bio-inspired aerial robots that mimic the flying principles of insects and birds. Autonomous take-off is an important capability for FWAV to enhance its performance and extend its working time, which is equipped by almost every kind of bird. As a common method of take-off for birds, jumping take-off has a great ability to adapt to different terrain and high energy efficiency compared with running and rotor-based take-off. Despite recent research, there is no FWAV capable of jumping take-off to this day. In this paper, we present a process to realize the jumping take-off of a meter-scale FWAV from flat ground. To lower the mechanical complexity, we eliminate the design of traditional robotic legs. Instead, we realize steady standing through a tripod-like structure that consists of two wings and a jumping mechanism. Two flapping wings are directly driven by two independent servos. Three carbon fiber springs are employed to build a lightweight jumping module with high elastic energy. We build the dynamic model to analyze the aerodynamic effect during the jumping phase and realize a stable transition to flapping flight. This work lays the foundation for outdoor flight without human assistance.