Multicopter with boom-mounted rotors

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10364036-B2
Application number	US-201615297035-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 18, 2016
Priority date	Oct 18, 2016
Publication date	Jul 30, 2019
Grant date	Jul 30, 2019

Abstract

A multicopter aircraft with boom-mounted rotors is disclosed. The multicopter includes a fuselage; a port side wing coupled to the fuselage; and a starboard side wing coupled to the fuselage. Each of the wings has mounted thereto one or more booms, each boom having a forward end extending forward of a corresponding wing to which the boom is mounted and an after end extending aft of said corresponding wing to which the boom is mounted. The aircraft further includes a first plurality of lift rotors, each rotor in said first plurality being mounted on a forward end of a corresponding one or said booms; and a second plurality of lift rotors, each rotor in said second plurality being mounted on an after end of a corresponding one or said booms. Each rotor produces vertical thrust independent of the thrust produced by the other rotors.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An aircraft, comprising:
a fuselage;
a port side wing coupled to the fuselage;
a starboard side wing coupled to the fuselage;
wherein each of said wings has mounted thereto two or more booms, each boom having a forward end extending forward of a corresponding wing to which the boom is mounted and an after end extending aft of said corresponding wing to which the boom is mounted;
a first plurality of lift rotors, each rotor in said first plurality being mounted on the forward end of a corresponding one of said booms; and
a second plurality of lift rotors, each rotor in said second plurality being mounted on the after end of the corresponding one of said booms;
wherein each rotor in said first plurality and each rotor in said second plurality produces an amount of vertical thrust independent of levels of vertical thrust produced by the other rotors;
wherein a first subset of said booms each is mounted to said port side wing or said starboard side wing at a non-zero angle relative to a substantially vertical axis of the aircraft such that the boom is tilted inboard towards the fuselage; and
wherein a second subset of said booms each is mounted to said port side wing or said starboard side wing at a non-zero angle relative to the substantially vertical axis of the aircraft such that the boom is tilted outboard away from the fuselage.

2. The aircraft of claim 1 , wherein the port side wing and the starboard side wing each has three booms mounted thereto and wherein the first plurality of lift rotors is 6 and the second plurality of lift rotors is 6.

3. The aircraft of claim 1 , wherein the lift rotors in the first and second plurality of lift rotors are driven by electric motors.

4. The aircraft of claim 1 , wherein the port side wing and the starboard side wing comprise a single wing structure mounted to the fuselage such that said port said wing comprises a port side portion of said single wing structure extending to the port side of the fuselage and said starboard said wing comprises a starboard side portion of said single wing structure extending to the starboard side of the fuselage.

5. The aircraft of claim 1 , further comprising a split boom structure extending aft from each of an inboard pair of said booms, the split boom structure comprising a port side boom and a starboard side boom extending aft of the fuselage and being joined at an after end of the split boom structure by a tail structure.

6. The aircraft of claim 5 , wherein each of said booms comprising the inboard pair of booms forms at least in part an integral part of a corresponding one of said port side boom and said starboard side boom.

Assignees

• Kitty Hawk Corp

Inventors

• Tighe James Joseph
• Allison Eric

Classifications

• B64D29/02 Primary

  associated with wings · CPC title

• B64C29/0025

  the propellers being fixed relative to the fuselage · CPC title

• B64D27/24

  using steam or spring force (jet aircraft B64D27/16) · CPC title

• Y02T50/62

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• Y02T50/60

  Efficient propulsion technologies, e.g. for aircraft · CPC title