Design Method of High-efficiency Propeller for Solar-powered UAV in Low Altitude

Currently,the design of conventional propeller and high altitude propeller is popular,and the study on propeller for solar-powered unmanned aerial vehicle(UAV)in low altitude is few.Therefore,a high-efficiency propeller design method for solar-powered UAV in low altitude is proposed.According to the flight span curve of the solar-powered UAV,the climb and main cruise altitudes are selected as the design points.Firstly,based on the Betz minimum energy loss design criteria,strip theory and its reverse derivation,the chord length and pitch angular distribution under each design point are calculated.Secondly,the weights of the calculation results of each design point are assigned according to the flight span curve to obtain the final design chord length and pitch angle distribution.Finally,based on CFD numerical simulation method,the performance of the designed propeller is performed with simulation and calculation.The results show that,compared with the conventional propeller,the efficiency of the propeller desi