Aerovel has released this video of the Aug 11, 2011, transition between vertical and horizontal flight by its Flexrotor vertical take-off and landing small unmanned aircraft. The flight included a hover and vertical recovery. Flexrotor has been designed by the same people who developed the Insitu ScanEagle long-endurance small UAV and is designed for fully automatic vertcial take-off and recovery and an edurance of more than 36 hours. Launch and retrieval is from a portable fold-out rig with widely spaced parallel bars to support the wings.
Most interesting to note the APC propellers on the wing tips clearly handling yaw in the hover. A different sort of tricopter if you will.
All in all a very competent system that we will be seeing more of.
Yes, very impressive indeed! I’ve got a picture around here somewhere of an Aerosonde in the garage.