This paper presents research directed towards the development of an unmanned micro-rotorcraft intended for battlefield surveillance. A 6 inch diameter micro-rotor system was developed and tested to explore the impact of blade geometry on the micro-rotor performance. Micro-rotor blades with varying aspect ratio, planform, airfoil camber and thickness were tested at different rotor speeds and blade collective settings and the rotor thrust, power consumption and figure of merit were recorded. In general the micro-rotors displayed adequate lifting capacity (Ct/σ: 0.16), however the overall hovering efficiency was very poor (Figure of Merit: 0.55) due to severe profile power losses associated with low Reynolds number viscous flows and flow separation resulting from a predominantly laminar boundary layer.
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