AFWERX supported electric scalable aerial transport project launched
Research in Flight (RIF), Flugauto, and Auburn University have teamed up to explore the
potential of Flugauto’s aerial transport platform for disaster response and military support
missions.
With the support of AFWERX, a United States Air Force program, the three partners have recently launched phase I leveraging NASA software for the design of a sub-scale flying
prototype. This prototype will then be used at Auburn University’s flight simulation facilities for testing and data collection. Insights gained from the tests will allow computer-simulated scenario modelling to assess the Flugauto platform for various applications.
‘Flugauto’s platform was designed to reliably operate under challenging conditions’ according to Flugauto’s CEO Dr. Frank Noppel, ‘which makes it ideal for logistical support missions.’
The Flugauto platform is all-electric and has vertical take-off and landing capabilities for
unrestricted access. It offers the benefits of aerial transport at the cost of ground transport.
Insights gained during phase I allow the team to adapt the Flugauto platform to specific
requirements during future phases. “We are very excited at the prospect of applying our lab’s tools and capabilities to the analysis of the novel Flugauto air vehicle concept.” says Dr. Imon Chakraborty, the project lead faculty at the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Auburn University. The project runs for several months and flight tests are anticipated to take place during the summer.
Flugauto: The company is designing and manufacturing aerial delivery robots (ADR) to solve modern-day challenges in the logistics industry. Its unique and patent-pending ADR platform features vectored thrust giving it unrivalled manoeuvrability and the ability to operate under challenging conditions.
Contact: Frank Noppel (frank@flug-auto.com)
Website: www.flug-auto.com
Research in Flight: Was established with the aim of developing new aerodynamic and
hydrodynamic analysis tools for aerospace engineering applications. The nucleus of this startup is the FlightStream® numerical flow solver that allows for rapid analysis of flow results over advanced geometries. The FlightStream® solver is versatile and foundational in its ability to work with unstructured surface meshes and have solver run times of only seconds.
Contact: Roy Harfield (roy.hartfield@researchinflight.com)
Website: www.researchinflight.com
Auburn University: The Vehicle Systems, Dynamics, and Design Laboratory (VSDDL), part of the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Auburn University, focuses on sizing, performance analysis, and flight simulation of novel aircraft concepts. The lab has developed a vehicle sizing and mission analysis framework applicable to fixed-wing, rotary-wing, and buoyant vehicles as well as multiple cockpit flight simulators for performing piloted simulations of novel aircraft and flight control architectures.
Contact: Imon Chakraborty (imonchakraborty@auburn.edu)
Website: www.vsddl.com
