Avartek Boxer Hybrid
The Avartek Boxer Hybrid is a gasoline powered unmanned aerial system (UAS, UAV, RPAS or simply a drone). The main feature of Avartek Boxer is the hybrid system that provides all the flight energy by transforming gasoline into electric thru its onboard power generator for much longer flight times while maintaining the heavy payloads of large LiPo powered drones.
Instead of carrying heavy batteries the Avartek Boxer Hybrid is designed around a liquid cooled mini generator power plant that transforms gasoline into electrical power. Currently the Boxer generator is capable of delivering 4 kW of energy which translates to 5 kg of real payload and 2 hour flight times. This quadruples the flight mission lengths and provides easy on field operations due to the lack of battery management and charging problems.
The Boxer design is fully custom. The airframe was designed by Avartek in Solidworks and all parts are manufactured in Finland. Only motors, escs, the flight controller and other electronics are out sourced.
The whole copter is designed around the hybrid generator’s capabilities of producing 10x more energy than similar weight in LiPo batteries. 4 kg of gasoline provides 2 hours of flight time at take-off weight of 25kg, while a typical LiPo battery in this size of a drone of 11kg would only provide 30 minutes. 4 kg of gasoline (5 litres) equals 40 kg of LiPo batteries. On field operations greatly benefit from the very quick duty cycle of hybrid drone by offering easy refills instead of on battery management and recharging arrangements.
Boxer uses open source Arducopter code in a Hex Orange Cube flight controller and dual GPS/Compass setup for enhanced redundancy and accuracy. Boxer flight controller is mounted on a Kore board for better and lighter cabling. The flight controller system provides high performance, easy mission programming with rally points, fences and excellent fail safe programming and an easy to use system with unparalleled options for customization both from flight controller, sensor and add on hardware as well from the software perspective. Hex Cube Orange with Arducopter firmware is 100% open system and compliant with latest technologies.
Avartek offers ready made payload setups. Safe, quick mounting and fully suspensed – ready to mount the sensor, IMU and auxilaries, such as onboard PC and telemetry/cloud datalinks. In Boxer typically auxilaries are mounted inside the airframe while the IMU is securely attached to the sensor.
Quicklocks provide quick mounting points to the hardware rail underneat the airframe. This provides quick access to the payload and allows for quick payload swaps in the field. The long payload rails and heavy lift capability makes the Boxer an ultimate multi sensor UAV. Boxer features a large deck that can accommodate payload auxiliary sensors such as hyper spectral camera irradiance sensors. Payload GPS antenna can be attached to the antenna tower. Cabling can be pulled thru the body with customisable deck covers.
Payload Power System
Onboard payload power system provides 12V/8A power for the mounted payload. Payload power is reachable by an XT90 connector.
Avartek designed Brushless Power
Avartek Boxer motors provides excellent flight power for the Boxer Hybrid drone. These brushless motors features industry’s best bearings for minimized vibration and durability.. Boxer brushless motors are regulated by T-Motor 60A speed controllers for best multicopter performance.
Boxer Hybrid uses the 4 KW Pegasus Range Extender. This generator is now well tested and the generator firmware has reached a mature state where users can expect reliable performance with well designed failsafes. The generator system is very light weight and provides industry’s best weight/power performance.
Generator is remote starting making it very easy to start the system running and generating flight energy. This also provides an added fail safe since in a case of a flame out the generator can restart in the air.
Avartek designed muffler provides excellent engine noise muffling with zero power loss. Muffler works great thru-out generators rpm range. Avartek Boxer muffler makes the drone so much less noisy. We will post exact noise test result once available. Test will be held in Finland, September 2020 by Finnish Traffic Management and VTT Research (governmental technical research institute).
Technical Data and Configuration
- Frame size: Octo-X, for redundancy and easier transportability provided by folding arm design 1475mm (diagonal), height 800mm
- Transportation size: length 990, width 745, height 570mm
- Empty weight: 16,5 kg (including 5A flight battery)
- MTOW: 27,0 kg
- Flight Controller: Hex Cube Orange, with Arducopter Firmware and dual GNSS and Compass antennas
- Power distribution: Kore board, with 12V 2A payload power
- Payload power: 12V 8A, accessible by XT90 connector
- Remote Controller: Futaba T14SG, Receiver R7008SB
- Telemetry Link: 868Mhz/900MHz Long Range RFD-Modem
- Groundstation: Open Source software, Mission Planner recommended
- Failsafe: Radio, GNSS, GeoFence, Voltage and Ground station, programmable Failsafe procedures
- Motor controller ESC: T-Motor Flame 60A
- Motors: Avartek Boxer KV130
- Propeller size: 28”x8”
- Flight Battery: Lipo 12S 5Ah (standard)
- Battery Flight Time: 3.5 min @ 25kg
- Generator System: GE70 Pegasus Aeronautics
- Max.GeneratorPower: 4 KW
- Power @25kg: 3,2 KW
- Fuel tank size: 7 Litre
- Flight battery: 12S 5Ah
Boxer Hybrid folds for easy transportation and storage.
It is compact enough to fit in a trunk of normal station wagon.
Long Range Telemetry for Groundcontrol station
- The RFD900x is a high performance 868 or 900MHz, ISM band radio modem. It is designed for long range serial communications applications requiring best in class radio link performance.
- Frequency Range: 902 – 928 MHz (USA) / 915 – 928 MHz (Australia) / 868 – 870 (European Band)
- Frequency hopping spread spectrum (FHSS)
- Transparent serial link
- Point to Point, or Multipoint networking
- Default settings: 57600 baud, N, 8, 1, and 64k air data rate
- Error correction routines, Mavlink protocol framing (user selectable)
- Mavlink radio status reporting (Local RSSI, Remote RSSI, Local Noise, Remote Noise)
- Automatic antenna diversity switching on a packet basis in realtime
- Automatic duty cycle throttling based on radio temperature to avoid overheating
Ships with Professional Fueling System
20 Litre capacity with electric gasoline pump in a beautiful CNC machined aluminum case with carbon collar and Festo fillings.
Don’t forget to mix 2.5% oil into the gasoline before running the generator…
