Long endurance hybrid propulsion configuration for middle-large size compound-wing VTOL UAV

In recent years, long endurance middle-large size unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) has made significant progress in the industry field. Battery electric power system is easy to control for UAV, it is facing the challenge of poor energy density. Due to the fuel energy power system's ability to offset the energy density problem, this paper proposes a 25kg class hybrid power fixed-wing vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) UAV. This UAV offers advantages such as long endurance, low energy consumption, and high payload capacity. Ground experiments and prototype flight tests were conducted to evaluate the performance and feasibility of the hybrid power system during hover flight. The results of these experiments demonstrated that the UAV achieved a flight time of up to 20 minutes during hover operations, compared to the 5 minutes of flight time for the battery electric compound-wing VTOL UAV. This experiment confirms that the hybrid power system enables the realization of a long-endurance compound-wing VTOL UAV