Part 1 -- Tailsitter

 My first attempt on making a portable, low cost UAV that serves as “an eye in the sky”.  

Due to hardware limitations, for fast iterations, the whole structures were made out of plastic drinking straws and cardboards. 

 

This UAV initially was planned to use a single STM32F103C8T6 as its main Flight Controller, programmed in Arduino and C++, with MPU6050 packed in GY-521 module as its Inertial Measurement Unit. For the Command & Control links, the initial plan was to use LoRa due to its transmission range of up to 10km.

However, it is learnt that LoRa’s bandwidth is too low to actually establish a proper command & control link to the aircraft. This leads to a change, in which the next iteration will use an ESP32 instead to establish a more proper command & control link.

It is also found out that the propeller, which uses two standard RC toy propellers, creates an inadequate lift for the aircraft to actually lift off, with a maximum Thrust-to-Weight ratio of only one.