I strongly doubt adding a ton of extra weight in aerodynamic surfaces, and drag, and complex mechanical parts, to avoid a few motors/servos is worth it in that context.
replyEvery gram of weight you remove is another gram of explosive you can add. Also consider the difference in supply lines for aerodynamic surfaces and mechanic parts and motors and servos. If you have four hundred servos, you can make one hundred quadcopters, or four hundred of these things. If you only have one hundred control boards powerful enough to control the single motor design though, you can still only make one hundred. (Tho the quadcopter can lift 4x the weight)
replyWhat's interesting is that the Ukrainians are building drones near their front lines because if they build them too far away and ship them in, the game has evolved and those drones are already yesterday's news.
A fixed wing drone only needs one motor, the control is easier, and the physics are more favorable for carrying high ordnance. I'm skeptical that this is going to change much.
replyIt's cool in that it can hover and do quadcopter type flight with only a single motor, and it's that second part that is interesting, because a fixed wing can also do a prop hang, but it can't do quadrotor-like flight from there.
It's usefulness is likely to be in other areas -- mainly applications where that flight mode is important.
A fixed wing drone needs at least one extra motor for the control surfaces. More likely two or three.
replyThis tech is more than a decade old, originally from UPenn AFAIK[0].
replymaybe new breakthroughs for the darpa project. kamikazes drones do not need so advanced prop tbh it is against the idea of being cheap.
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