It requires huge battery capacity and produces a big and heavy plane... here look at this: ua-cam.com/video/8m4_NpTQn0E/v-deo.html This is 'Level 3' stuff...
Great work, indeed ! I built a 3,5 m solar plane (no buffer) during the 1990ies. Flew very well and is now on permanent display at "Flugwerft Schleissheim" (German Aerospace Museum).
I'm loving this series man, keep it up. Been watching since the first solar plane and loving the progress. Best of luck with the V4, but this V3 seems to be doing pretty well. 👍🏼
Long range FPV, you need directional antenna's, a lower frequency, looks like he is using 1.2Ghz band. 600mW+ transmitter, although you can get decent range by using decent antenna's. Bonus if you have a diversity receiver to utilize multiple antenna types. Tracking is even better. I can get 2KM with good signal on 5.8GHz with directional patch / helical antenna's and a 600mW transmitter with cloverleaf.
The way you were trying to measure efficiency at about 9:00 in the video is sorta problematic. You've got to measure both input and output. In other words, with the MPPT in the circuit, you need a power meter between the panels and MPPT, and another power meter between the MPPT and the battery. You would calculate efficiency as: output divided by input. For example: 100 watts coming out of the panels vs 93 watts coming out of the MPPT = 93% efficiency. You would then repeat that measurement for each different kind of controller (the two MMPTs and the PWM). That's the only way you're ever going to figure out which charger is the most efficient. Hope that helps, awesome vid.
MPPT's have their place in terrestrial solar power systems but they aren't the best solution here. They're useful when you have arbitrarily selected panel and battery voltages but for a custom system the elements can be selected to match so the controller is just extra weight on top of the small losses to thermal systems inside the electronics.
not enterly true. since the efficiency of the solar panals varry with both the amount of light and the resistance of the load (*spectrum of the light also matters). So the most efficient setting depends on these 2 variables. the amount of sunlight wont always be the same due too many obvious reasons. but the load resistance also varies. *eg: how full is the battery charged, what is the discarge rate, overall temperature potential out of spec solar panel. so aslong the efficiency/consistency gained from the controler is more that the power needed to lift the weight one should use it. wsc112782 for efficiency you indeed always NEED to mesure input and out put. otherwise you're just measuring raw power with unknown variables/changes. have said that. since thats said rctestflight might want to invest in a cheap LUX meter to make setup comparisons more easy and fair.
Hey, thats exacly why do you need MPPT, in direct sunlight , at perfect angle on a sunny day you will get probably 95+% of your panels potential if you connect it directly to power system, but on a clouudy or smoky day, or even when you fly so just part of panels is exposed to sun, the MPPT can boost your power up a lot, and i mean really alot. Also your power meter is avaraging reading when it displays it so its n its not a good way to measure power. MPPTs work with usually with more than 10kHz control loop so its catching all the liitle power spikes and pushes most of it into the battery no matter how many cells it has . Keep up the good work, one of the most interesting series on YT right now. cheers!
Try adding a substantial electrolytic capacitor in parallel with the solar array. I can act like a super charger by defeating voltage lag. I've had good success with this method on stationary systems. I generally see a net boost of 30% or more under heavy loads.
Google Mach Tuck. If the air going above your wing reaches your wings critical mach number, there will be a certain point to where the wind over your wing will be going faster than the sound barrier. In world war two, this phenomenon took the life of a pilot and crashed a P-38. Some symptoms of this may include the nose dive you were experiencing, Dutch rolls, and wing flutter. To alleviate this issue, the wings shape must be changed to alter the wings critical mach number. In history, this is where we first begin to see the shape of the wing change shape as well as observe the material research for constructing a more robust wing. If you sweep your wings back, your wing chord should improve. I am no expert entirely on the matter, but I remember writing a paper on it a while back. A Hershey bar wing is not designed to have high velocity wind traveling over its surface, and I must add that the wing is pretty long to allow for some flex. This would lead me to believe that you may encounter some vibrations. I learned the most about this from watching an old documentary when I typed in Mach Tuck in to UA-cam's search, but I also had literature to back this up in my paper from textbooks. Definately a good thing to look into if you have time : )
This plane is way too slow to encounter mach tuck. Even if you have a very low critical Mach number like the P-38 (which had a critical Mach of 0.68) that would correspond to a speed of 837 km/h at sea level.
There likely isn't a folding prop that will compare to the efficiency of the props he is running. He is running fairly low RPM with big props and low air speeds to get high efficiency. Typical folding props are designed to run at higher RPM and higher airspeed.
Exactly. The solar cells should be rewired into a panel whose useful voltage range is either always below or always above the battery voltage range, so that you can use a step up (boost) or step down (buck) MPPT, respectively. If the voltage ranges overlap (like they do now), you need a significantly more complex MPPT which can both increase or decrease the panel voltage to match the battery voltage.
As a 20 year veteran of UAS etc. I’m always pumped to see people testing ideas and theories of unmanned vehicles but I have to ask did you get it TFR or COA from FAA or what?
What's the law say about how high model aircraft can fly? I want to go above 400 feet and have a spot to fly that I've never seen any traffic an fly with spotters
In the UK, if it's less than 7kg then the limit is as high as you can see and control the model (and get out of the way of manned aircraft if you spot one). If it's more than 7kg then more restrictions apply including the 400ft limit. If you're flying FPV with any aircraft you'll need a spotter.
Thinks the fire smoke came from mid Utah or Idaho... lmfao... bro there was over 500,000 acres on fire in California when you taped this... that’s where it is from
O look people another person who wants to kill the hobby. flying 18000 feet really .So um what happens when you find an air liner flying at 18000 feet and u hit it then the hobby is ruined for all of us
This airplane you made is so awesome. It has seemingly unlimited fly time and can fly itself and can go several thousand feet high. I need to learn how to make a plane like that myself some time!
I would support you just for some sanity. Too much YT for me recently while researching and I can relax while you do your video content. Must look into the V3
Make some tests with the MPPT ans some load on the power system! That's where the mppt make difference. At least that's what the science is teelling right now. Mabe the real vs. ideial efficiency of an mppt doesn't make that difference on a real application, that would be cool to see
You should make it your goal to design a solar plane that can cross the ocean or circle the world without stopping! Not sure how you'd track it outside of cellular networks (Iridium connection?).
Don't you think flying wing shape would be better to do such flights? Flying wing has less drag (wings angled backwards) and large wing area. It means lower cruise throttle and more space to put solar cells. But it would be difficult to transport. You are creative so you would find out some clever way to do it.
If make it from insulation foam - yes, it would be too heavy. But what about carbon and covering film? It would be fragile, difficult to make and expensive. But I don't think that heavy. It's just an idea.
As I understand it, perfectly designed flying wings very slightly outperform perfectly designed conventional planes with the same wing area. If your design isn't perfect (inevitable), the conventional plane will probably be superior. The exception is if you want to build a stealth plane- in that case, the flying wing design is better due to lower RCS.
Nice video again Daniel, thanks. On my planes I'm using BLHeli ESC's and I have the props set to lock when the motors are shut down and have found noticeably better glide times, something you might want to try. I appreciate you sharing your info with us. Billy in Canada
Those look like ~5.0Amp @ 0.6 volt cells, and most definitely need to have the sun Ray normal to the surface of the solar cell, to maximize power output of the cells.
What is your low voltage cut-off set to? My understanding is the li-pos peak to 4.2V/cell but operate at a nominal 3.7V/cell w/ 3V lvc. Look up discharge graphs for li-po. 5s = 18.5V nominal Edit. Lvc more like 3.2v/cell
Advice from a scientist in atmospheric physics: In case you will meet haze, etc. during future flights: Climb as fast fast you can, since these haze particles (aerosols) are confined in the so-called planetary boundary layer (not exceeding height of thermals). Just climb and climb and your plane will gain performance, once out of this hazy stuff. And get rid of this heavy Lipo. There are numerous RC planes around with PURE solar cell operation !
Neet airplane, but do you really need that much strength in the wing ribs? As wings go, there is very little force compressing the top and bottom surfaces of the wing together; your wing ribs look heavy. I would bet that wing ribs made from 1/8" Balsa wood and 1/64" plywood laminated together, even without lightening holes, would be much lighter.
For what it's worth, I have one of those cheap CMP12 PWM charge controllers on my boat (a very bare bones boat with 2 x 20W panels) and it's more efficient than any MPPT controller I've tried so far over the course of a day, with the sun and boat moving around. I plan to test a few more, but it's by no means a certainty that MPPT is best. It's certainly not super important for my application.
Quick question how are you legally flying in Utah to 1800 feet?.. Excuse me. 6000+ FT. I believe this is the reason why the FAA wants to have all of our rigs chipped so that they can know where we are
i know the charge rate in watts is important. but if you charge without voltage protection the max voltage of the cells must be the max charging voltage. another thing is if the solar voltage is lower as you battery you wont charge. ok this is obvious but what i wil say is, your mttp charger might be able to boost charge so it could use a lower voltage as input to get a higher voltage output so you get still power. unfortunaly most mttp are buck converter type charger and they go in a pwm mode if the input voltage is to low and stops about 2v difference. what you need is a boost-buck converter with mttp tracking
What if you put a small battery in it, and a bigger one, then after climbing high enough, make the bigger one go down with a parachute. Then glide with solar assist for as long as you can. Maybe the weight difference would help to sustain a flight with the voltage not dropping at all :?
What type of solar cells do you use whats the size off them ,because 50 watt of solar energy is not enough for charging fast a high capacity battery or mentaining the engine at least at half power,on the market i saw solar cells size 6*6 high graded 5 wats each,
Why doesn't the level line on the monitor change angle when you bank left or right for a period of time? The horizon curves down to left and down to the right when you turn left or right...and now the horizon for you is at a different angle....Just saying.
Avoid using a charge controller, it reduces efficiency and adds weight. Even if the generated solar voltage is much higher than the battery, the internal resistance of the battery will prevent the voltage from rising higher than the current state of charge. As long as you don't exceed the max charge rate or charge over 4.2V per cell, the direct connection will be your most efficient. If you are using a diode to block voltage, consider Schottky diodes to reduce drop. If you can find a small FOC based motor drive, it should also gain efficiency.
Usually when a plane tucks and speeds up in a dive, it's indicating that it's tail heavy (and is thus trimmed to provide positive lift with the horizontal stab, instead of more usual negative lift). For max efficiency you might want it little tail heavy, but have to be aware of that effect in a dive, or just avoid dives all together. Vector doesn't choose to descend at low amps. It's actually running the throttle at no less than cruise throttle position, but because it's descending it unloads the prop which causes the amps to drop below what you'd normally see for cruise. BTW, Vector will display watts. Just add it to the OSD.
With your weather conditions I was not surprised at a lack of thermals. Fishing and Flying - Watch the Birds!! Was a bit surprised with the Sink. Would be awesome to have Glide rate or Angle of attack but you have to have an accurate Ground Speed, too. I always look forward to your contributions. Perhaps a few tiny Wind Turbines could help the down-leg. When you are falling, you can bring them out like Flaps. A little Drag and a little Charging power? 2-Way to the Max.
Outstanding flight. I think you should do more testing with The Genasun MPPT. In fact The GV-10 MPPT could fit hour purpose. Genasun doesnt deliver custom voltage. Anyway, I'm very much enjoying the solar plane.
Have you ever tried to attached a mini generator on your fpv? like attaching a little windmill to generate electricity and charging the battery while flying?
Have you ever tried to attached a mini generator on your fpv? like attaching a little windmill to generate electricity and charging the battery while flying?
It’s so great what you’ve been able to do with solar tech, I wonder if you could do a toned down version on a hexactoper (with really long arms but lightweight enough to hold a lot of panels
You should have maybe a seperate two cell and bec That powers all the servos and the fc, that way if the main battery dies or disconnect you got a good battery powering the tech
@@ronaldpm Thats not a hobby when you are flying out of site, you have no way to detect any aircraft around you. You have no way to avoid the aircraft or even the aircraft avoiding the rc plane. And this is why the FAA got involved because of hits and near misses.
You might consider switching to a dragon link dipole for your 1.3 video along with a yagi on the ground. Very little wind resistance and tiny profile plus I've had great results with this setup out to 50 miles thus far. Awesome project though!!
That final analysis showing minimal power loss is hugely encouraging. I presume the current (pun intended) range of 'flexible' solar panels aren't the best when it comes to generating power. But once they are and are made available individually, then this type of project will be feasible for just about anyone. Myself included. ;¬)
In any fixed-wing airplane, the amount of power it takes to sustain level flight depends primarily on two factors: weight and glide ratio. I think you can improve both of these. Weight: you're using two cameras and a TV transmitter. Considering how much of your HD footage you're actually putting into your videos, the GoPro is a liability. Yeah, it looks a lot better than the FPV footage, but what are you really getting from it? Also, you could increase the dihedral slightly and remove the ailerons. The was done by the Daedalus project (72-mile human-powered flight) to reduce weight to the absolute minimum. ua-cam.com/video/cZjHcjyLprw/v-deo.html And also, your battery is too heavy! All the battery does for you is get you altitude, and as many have pointed out, you're flying way higher than is permitted for RC aircraft, anyway. So 80% of your battery is dead weight. Switch to a battery pack using smaller cells. DON'T switch to Li-ion - they have lower energy/weight ratio. Glide ratio: your wings could be a lot wider span without adding much structural weight, and a larger number of smaller solar cells (to get the same area) would give you a higher glide ratio, since aspect ratio dominates the factors affecting glide ratio. Also, adding elliptical wingtips would help reduce induced drag without adding much weight, again improving glide ratio. And one other thing: it doesn't look like much, but you'd get maybe 10% more solar cell area if you covered the fuselage top and horizontal stab with cells.
i thing your biggest 'problem' so far is the plane it self. The form isn't really aerodynamic. And i still remember when i got my first RC plane. A glider, made from Balsa, with no motor at all which i bodged a CO2 motor on. Later a powered glider, with the good old Mono-D packs. even that was able to fly for 1-2 hours and those batteries weight a lot and had about 2000 mAh maybe. So with a better airframe design i think this plane could easily charge its batteries while flying.
Next goal is to make it climbing during the day and charge and at night descent and keep flying until sunrise. 24h unlimited flight...
It requires huge battery capacity and produces a big and heavy plane... here look at this: ua-cam.com/video/8m4_NpTQn0E/v-deo.html This is 'Level 3' stuff...
What @Simon L said + you are assuming the night + day is going to be peaceful and sunny. One rainy day and the flight is pretty much over.
@@1stKillZone fly above cloud coverage
At least a vision fir durability and endurance
Kill Zone go into stratosphere bud, and maybe use some other system to help it get up initially. Can do for months until equipment failure maybe.
You should live stream a flight
Yup!
Yup
Cell tower,...ah no!
Yes
You donate $5, "your name is now flying over salt". Such an achievement in life
frill necked lizard lmfao
Sounds so salty about it too.
frill necked lizard money well spent
People can get conned pretty easily
One less thing on the bucket list LOL
Great work, indeed !
I built a 3,5 m solar plane (no buffer) during the 1990ies. Flew very well and is now on permanent display at "Flugwerft Schleissheim" (German Aerospace Museum).
Cool!
DUDE I SAW IT!!!!
Mhmmmmmm
@@KiraOTS where is that?
@@Silver-xd1ge ?
I'm loving this series man, keep it up. Been watching since the first solar plane and loving the progress. Best of luck with the V4, but this V3 seems to be doing pretty well. 👍🏼
Aussie RC Playground if
Aussie RC Playground you are trash
Daniel can you please make a video that explains the required electronics for long range FPV?
I don’t know how it works sooo
Check out Stone Blue Airlines channel. They have a great series on exactly what you need for LR FPV.
.
Long range FPV, you need directional antenna's, a lower frequency, looks like he is using 1.2Ghz band. 600mW+ transmitter, although you can get decent range by using decent antenna's. Bonus if you have a diversity receiver to utilize multiple antenna types. Tracking is even better. I can get 2KM with good signal on 5.8GHz with directional patch / helical antenna's and a 600mW transmitter with cloverleaf.
By using a 4G module and an appropriate data plan you can fly as far away as you want as long as you have cell reception...
How are you able to fly that high without the threat of FAA regulation?
i feel like this channel is so under rated
This series is pretty awesome; and you're like an rc enthusiast Napoleon Dynamite, I dig it
Got some sweet air that time
1. Nunchuck skills
2. RC plane skills
i love these videos but do you completely ignore the altitude rules from the FAA
Made it to a altitude of 2100 meters! That's great!
The way you were trying to measure efficiency at about 9:00 in the video is sorta problematic. You've got to measure both input and output. In other words, with the MPPT in the circuit, you need a power meter between the panels and MPPT, and another power meter between the MPPT and the battery. You would calculate efficiency as: output divided by input. For example: 100 watts coming out of the panels vs 93 watts coming out of the MPPT = 93% efficiency. You would then repeat that measurement for each different kind of controller (the two MMPTs and the PWM). That's the only way you're ever going to figure out which charger is the most efficient. Hope that helps, awesome vid.
MPPT's have their place in terrestrial solar power systems but they aren't the best solution here. They're useful when you have arbitrarily selected panel and battery voltages but for a custom system the elements can be selected to match so the controller is just extra weight on top of the small losses to thermal systems inside the electronics.
not enterly true. since the efficiency of the solar panals varry with both the amount of light and the resistance of the load (*spectrum of the light also matters). So the most efficient setting depends on these 2 variables. the amount of sunlight wont always be the same due too many obvious reasons. but the load resistance also varies. *eg: how full is the battery charged, what is the discarge rate, overall temperature potential out of spec solar panel.
so aslong the efficiency/consistency gained from the controler is more that the power needed to lift the weight one should use it.
wsc112782 for efficiency you indeed always NEED to mesure input and out put. otherwise you're just measuring raw power with unknown variables/changes.
have said that. since thats said rctestflight might want to invest in a cheap LUX meter to make setup comparisons more easy and fair.
Hey, thats exacly why do you need MPPT, in direct sunlight , at perfect angle on a sunny day you will get probably 95+% of your panels potential if you connect it directly to power system, but on a clouudy or smoky day, or even when you fly so just part of panels is exposed to sun, the MPPT can boost your power up a lot, and i mean really alot. Also your power meter is avaraging reading when it displays it so its n its not a good way to measure power. MPPTs work with usually with more than 10kHz control loop so its catching all the liitle power spikes and pushes most of it into the battery no matter how many cells it has .
Keep up the good work, one of the most interesting series on YT right now.
cheers!
Today's a good day to see how high I can get.
Try adding a substantial electrolytic capacitor in parallel with the solar array. I can act like a super charger by defeating voltage lag. I've had good success with this method on stationary systems. I generally see a net boost of 30% or more under heavy loads.
That's really a beautiful plane!
Loving that "the end"
please switch to the metric system
Google Mach Tuck. If the air going above your wing reaches your wings critical mach number, there will be a certain point to where the wind over your wing will be going faster than the sound barrier. In world war two, this phenomenon took the life of a pilot and crashed a P-38. Some symptoms of this may include the nose dive you were experiencing, Dutch rolls, and wing flutter. To alleviate this issue, the wings shape must be changed to alter the wings critical mach number. In history, this is where we first begin to see the shape of the wing change shape as well as observe the material research for constructing a more robust wing. If you sweep your wings back, your wing chord should improve.
I am no expert entirely on the matter, but I remember writing a paper on it a while back. A Hershey bar wing is not designed to have high velocity wind traveling over its surface, and I must add that the wing is pretty long to allow for some flex. This would lead me to believe that you may encounter some vibrations. I learned the most about this from watching an old documentary when I typed in Mach Tuck in to UA-cam's search, but I also had literature to back this up in my paper from textbooks. Definately a good thing to look into if you have time : )
ua-cam.com/video/LSmqsg0DbTY/v-deo.html
This plane is way too slow to encounter mach tuck. Even if you have a very low critical Mach number like the P-38 (which had a critical Mach of 0.68) that would correspond to a speed of 837 km/h at sea level.
Why don't you use a folding propeller to reduce drag when you throttle back
There likely isn't a folding prop that will compare to the efficiency of the props he is running. He is running fairly low RPM with big props and low air speeds to get high efficiency. Typical folding props are designed to run at higher RPM and higher airspeed.
Why uding a boost mppt when the solar voltage is higher than the battery voltage? Maybe a buck would do a better job
Exactly. The solar cells should be rewired into a panel whose useful voltage range is either always below or always above the battery voltage range, so that you can use a step up (boost) or step down (buck) MPPT, respectively. If the voltage ranges overlap (like they do now), you need a significantly more complex MPPT which can both increase or decrease the panel voltage to match the battery voltage.
As a 20 year veteran of UAS etc. I’m always pumped to see people testing ideas and theories of unmanned vehicles but I have to ask did you get it TFR or COA from FAA or what?
Didn't know logic was into RC stuff
can I just come chill with you sometime? I'm in Utah too.
It dropped madly at 12:12 due to a stall. check the airspeed tape!
How is this legal? I thought 400ft was the FAA altitude limit?
On either side of the I-80 corridor East of Wendover is restricted military airspace. Check out a sectional chart.
Yeah, I was wondering when it would be stated there was clearance for this flight. Guessing the answer can be inferred...
Truly Awesome Flight Unbelievable (( 7 Thousand Meters )) Unfortunately in My Country Australia it's go too Jail Directly too and Don't PASS GO !!
he should have gone highter.
What's the law say about how high model aircraft can fly? I want to go above 400 feet and have a spot to fly that I've never seen any traffic an fly with spotters
In the UK, if it's less than 7kg then the limit is as high as you can see and control the model (and get out of the way of manned aircraft if you spot one). If it's more than 7kg then more restrictions apply including the 400ft limit. If you're flying FPV with any aircraft you'll need a spotter.
Thinks the fire smoke came from mid Utah or Idaho... lmfao... bro there was over 500,000 acres on fire in California when you taped this... that’s where it is from
Bob Saget I live about 50 miles from the fire and you can’t see 5 feet in front of your face
I'm ever impressed with this project. Next test can be an entire sunny day in RTH. I have a feeling it can do it.
Who will be World First Higher Altitude RC FPV Solarglider, go to reach of edge space. ??????????
O look people another person who wants to kill the hobby. flying 18000 feet really .So um what happens when you find an air liner flying at 18000 feet and u hit it then the hobby is ruined for all of us
He only hit 7,000 feet numb nuts
“Your name flying over a salt” 🤣... “We are flying over a bowl of soup” 🤣🤣🤣 and more soup and soup hahahahahahahahaha 🤣🧑🏼🚀
*not an easy feat* _young grasshopper is rapidly becoming a Jedi master_
How much was the total cost of the Solar Plane V3 and what materials did you use?
Texus Noe if you find out, let me know. I’ve emailed him
do you have a parts list?
Man this is such a good channel keep up the good work 👌🏻👌🏻 i hope you get paid for these videos cuz its a lot of work.
I love cracking open a nice IPA and watching these videos
This airplane you made is so awesome. It has seemingly unlimited fly time and can fly itself and can go several thousand feet high. I need to learn how to make a plane like that myself some time!
You might want to look into a can antenna to focus the rf energy downwards which could improve control and video range, as long as you only go up!
I would love it if you got back to flying the solar plane, Daniel.
am I the only one that clicks on a new rctestflight video and instantaneously click like?
Which flight controller are you using .. and also what glasses and sensors are on board.. power.. airspeed etc. would appreciate a parts list. Thanks.
This man has a concract whit department of defense
I would support you just for some sanity. Too much YT for me recently while researching and I can relax while you do your video content. Must look into the V3
Make some tests with the MPPT ans some load on the power system! That's where the mppt make difference. At least that's what the science is teelling right now.
Mabe the real vs. ideial efficiency of an mppt doesn't make that difference on a real application, that would be cool to see
You should make it your goal to design a solar plane that can cross the ocean or circle the world without stopping! Not sure how you'd track it outside of cellular networks (Iridium connection?).
Don't you think flying wing shape would be better to do such flights? Flying wing has less drag (wings angled backwards) and large wing area. It means lower cruise throttle and more space to put solar cells. But it would be difficult to transport. You are creative so you would find out some clever way to do it.
AllTheFlyingThings not suitable, too heavy
If make it from insulation foam - yes, it would be too heavy. But what about carbon and covering film? It would be fragile, difficult to make and expensive. But I don't think that heavy. It's just an idea.
Landing would shatter the panels. This plane lands at like 8mph so you can catch it gently.
As I understand it, perfectly designed flying wings very slightly outperform perfectly designed conventional planes with the same wing area. If your design isn't perfect (inevitable), the conventional plane will probably be superior. The exception is if you want to build a stealth plane- in that case, the flying wing design is better due to lower RCS.
You are awesome - you’ve come a long way and done some amazing things. Nice.
Do you using a LNA (Low Nois Preamp) at your V-RX Antenna? I am using a 0.6dB NF,37dB Gain PreAmp for 1285MHz.
awesome ! H=7100F surprise !
When a plane noses down with an increase in speed (dives steeper on it's own) that plane is in a tail heavy condition.
Nice video again Daniel, thanks. On my planes I'm using BLHeli ESC's and I have the props set to lock when the motors are shut down and have found noticeably better glide times, something you might want to try. I appreciate you sharing your info with us. Billy in Canada
what about the faa rules?
1st rule of flight club is you don’t talk about flight club
Those look like ~5.0Amp @ 0.6 volt cells, and most definitely need to have the sun Ray normal to the surface of the solar cell, to maximize power output of the cells.
what about a retractable trailing antenna? it creates drag but its a technology used by the military for high range low frequency communication.
Oh my god ! The earth is realy flat !!!
David Robert lol
idiot! clearly the earth is donut shaped!
"The End"
What is your low voltage cut-off set to? My understanding is the li-pos peak to 4.2V/cell but operate at a nominal 3.7V/cell w/ 3V lvc. Look up discharge graphs for li-po. 5s = 18.5V nominal
Edit. Lvc more like 3.2v/cell
Advice from a scientist in atmospheric physics: In case you will meet haze, etc. during future flights: Climb as fast fast you can, since these haze particles (aerosols) are confined in the so-called planetary boundary layer (not exceeding height of thermals).
Just climb and climb and your plane will gain performance, once out of this hazy stuff.
And get rid of this heavy Lipo. There are numerous RC planes around with PURE solar cell operation !
Neet airplane, but do you really need that much strength in the wing ribs? As wings go, there is very little force compressing the top and bottom surfaces of the wing together; your wing ribs look heavy. I would bet that wing ribs made from 1/8" Balsa wood and 1/64" plywood laminated together, even without lightening holes, would be much lighter.
For what it's worth, I have one of those cheap CMP12 PWM charge controllers on my boat (a very bare bones boat with 2 x 20W panels) and it's more efficient than any MPPT controller I've tried so far over the course of a day, with the sun and boat moving around. I plan to test a few more, but it's by no means a certainty that MPPT is best. It's certainly not super important for my application.
Quick question how are you legally flying in Utah to 1800 feet?.. Excuse me. 6000+ FT. I believe this is the reason why the FAA wants to have all of our rigs chipped so that they can know where we are
The mppt is not more efficient in ONE situation, but in the average of ALL situations.
Excellent video. Keep them coming.
Noooo I’m late but good vid
i know the charge rate in watts is important. but if you charge without voltage protection the max voltage of the cells must be the max charging voltage. another thing is if the solar voltage is lower as you battery you wont charge. ok this is obvious but what i wil say is, your mttp charger might be able to boost charge so it could use a lower voltage as input to get a higher voltage output so you get still power. unfortunaly most mttp are buck converter type charger and they go in a pwm mode if the input voltage is to low and stops about 2v difference. what you need is a boost-buck converter with mttp tracking
What if you put a small battery in it, and a bigger one, then after climbing high enough, make the bigger one go down with a parachute. Then glide with solar assist for as long as you can. Maybe the weight difference would help to sustain a flight with the voltage not dropping at all :?
What type of solar cells do you use whats the size off them ,because 50 watt of solar energy is not enough for charging fast a high capacity battery or mentaining the engine at least at half power,on the market i saw solar cells size 6*6 high graded 5 wats each,
Why doesn't the level line on the monitor change angle when you bank left or right for a period of time? The horizon curves down to left and down to the right when you turn left or right...and now the horizon for you is at a different angle....Just saying.
I have a Question why you don't use a 4G to control this plane.. And What are the disadvantages if controlled by 4G
At 13:10 you can see the right wing twist. This might explain the odd diving behavior.
Avoid using a charge controller, it reduces efficiency and adds weight. Even if the generated solar voltage is much higher than the battery, the internal resistance of the battery will prevent the voltage from rising higher than the current state of charge. As long as you don't exceed the max charge rate or charge over 4.2V per cell, the direct connection will be your most efficient. If you are using a diode to block voltage, consider Schottky diodes to reduce drop. If you can find a small FOC based motor drive, it should also gain efficiency.
Usually when a plane tucks and speeds up in a dive, it's indicating that it's tail heavy (and is thus trimmed to provide
positive lift with the horizontal stab, instead of more usual negative lift). For max efficiency you might want it little tail heavy, but have to be aware of that effect in a dive, or just avoid dives all together.
Vector doesn't choose to descend at low amps. It's actually running the throttle at no less than cruise throttle position, but because it's descending it unloads the prop which causes the amps to drop below what you'd normally see for cruise.
BTW, Vector will display watts. Just add it to the OSD.
As challange would be awesum to get a big plane running, day and night, will need very slow climb, huge wings and lots of batteries
Genasun doesn't send their products all around the world. Can you advice some another charge controller, please?
watched so many of your videos , searched for solar plane alot , and yet after a year i find this video. YT algorythm sucks
With your weather conditions I was not surprised at a lack of thermals. Fishing and Flying - Watch the Birds!! Was a bit surprised with the Sink. Would be awesome to have Glide rate or Angle of attack but you have to have an accurate Ground Speed, too.
I always look forward to your contributions. Perhaps a few tiny Wind Turbines could help the down-leg. When you are falling, you can bring them out like Flaps. A little Drag and a little Charging power? 2-Way to the Max.
Outstanding flight.
I think you should do more testing with The Genasun MPPT. In fact The GV-10 MPPT could fit hour purpose. Genasun doesnt deliver custom voltage. Anyway, I'm very much enjoying the solar plane.
Have you ever tried to attached a mini generator on your fpv? like attaching a little windmill to generate electricity and charging the battery while flying?
Have you ever tried to attached a mini generator on your fpv? like attaching a little windmill to generate electricity and charging the battery while flying?
If anyone carries on about your flying hights, try flying in areas when Uroc gets their waivers for rocketry?
Great video series ... love your experimental nature. And those awesome CATCHES ... !
Keep it up.
I'm new here, but could you use a Runcam instead of a GoPro to save weight and drag?
I will like to meet with you, so I can learn some few things from you. I love adventures like this.
LOLs your names are now salty 💀😂
This is probably not a new idea, but what about recovering energy from the prop during glide descent?
I have a special account just for this channel --- it's THAT awesome!
It’s so great what you’ve been able to do with solar tech, I wonder if you could do a toned down version on a hexactoper (with really long arms but lightweight enough to hold a lot of panels
You should have maybe a seperate two cell and bec That powers all the servos and the fc, that way if the main battery dies or disconnect you got a good battery powering the tech
Is it legal to fly an RC to this altitude? Whats to stop a commercial aircraft from hitting you?
It's videos like this, that the FAA got involved in our hobby and put restrictions on us!
@@ronaldpm
Thats not a hobby when you are flying out of site, you have no way to detect any aircraft around you.
You have no way to avoid the aircraft or even the aircraft avoiding the rc plane.
And this is why the FAA got involved because of hits and near misses.
PMW controller- wait, like Pu**y, Money, Weed? Shit I want one
You might consider switching to a dragon link dipole for your 1.3 video along with a yagi on the ground. Very little wind resistance and tiny profile plus I've had great results with this setup out to 50 miles thus far. Awesome project though!!
very nice plane..what is your vtx it 1.2 ?how many mw? thanks.
Just out of curiosity, How much did it cost you in total to build the FPV solar plane? Also, I live pretty close to you! ^.^ I live in Provo. :)
That final analysis showing minimal power loss is hugely encouraging. I presume the current (pun intended) range of 'flexible' solar panels aren't the best when it comes to generating power. But once they are and are made available individually, then this type of project will be feasible for just about anyone. Myself included. ;¬)
In any fixed-wing airplane, the amount of power it takes to sustain level flight depends primarily on two factors: weight and glide ratio. I think you can improve both of these.
Weight: you're using two cameras and a TV transmitter. Considering how much of your HD footage you're actually putting into your videos, the GoPro is a liability. Yeah, it looks a lot better than the FPV footage, but what are you really getting from it? Also, you could increase the dihedral slightly and remove the ailerons. The was done by the Daedalus project (72-mile human-powered flight) to reduce weight to the absolute minimum. ua-cam.com/video/cZjHcjyLprw/v-deo.html And also, your battery is too heavy! All the battery does for you is get you altitude, and as many have pointed out, you're flying way higher than is permitted for RC aircraft, anyway. So 80% of your battery is dead weight. Switch to a battery pack using smaller cells. DON'T switch to Li-ion - they have lower energy/weight ratio.
Glide ratio: your wings could be a lot wider span without adding much structural weight, and a larger number of smaller solar cells (to get the same area) would give you a higher glide ratio, since aspect ratio dominates the factors affecting glide ratio. Also, adding elliptical wingtips would help reduce induced drag without adding much weight, again improving glide ratio.
And one other thing: it doesn't look like much, but you'd get maybe 10% more solar cell area if you covered the fuselage top and horizontal stab with cells.
i thing your biggest 'problem' so far is the plane it self. The form isn't really aerodynamic.
And i still remember when i got my first RC plane. A glider, made from Balsa, with no motor at all which i bodged a CO2 motor on. Later a powered glider, with the good old Mono-D packs. even that was able to fly for 1-2 hours and those batteries weight a lot and had about 2000 mAh maybe. So with a better airframe design i think this plane could easily charge its batteries while flying.
Why you don´t use a folding prop?
Yeah either that or turn on ESC braking.