Towards an Autonomous Robotic Dragonfly: At-Scale Lift Experiments Modeling Dragonfly Forewings

摘要

We report on lift experiments conducted at scale for an artificial platform mimicking the dragonfly species: Sympetrum sanguineum. The platform, as well as the lift sensor, was custom designed and built. The flapping mechanism consisted of a piezoelectric bending-beam actuator, transmission using carbon-fiber elements and polymide-film joints, and wings constructed of polyester film with carbon-fiber support structure. The flapping kinematics of the Sympetrum san-guineum was replicated as closely as possible although only a pair of forewings were used in these experiments. The lift generated, when accounting for the addition of a pair of hindwings, is sufficient to allow for the hovering of a real-life dragonfly. The results, the first at-scale fully transient measurements of artificial dragonfly forewings, show that the lift curves quantitatively as well as qualitatively validate existing 2D and 3D computer simulations of dragonfly forewings.