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Comment by OnlineGladiator | Hacker News Reader

I would love to see the iterations that led to that final design, because there's almost nothing conventional about it. I know they spent a surprising amount of time just on the hook.

https://www.wired.com/story/wing-alphabet-x-drone-engineerin...

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I work in electric aviation, and we're looking at similar hybrid fixed/vtol/distributed designs. You need the VTOL for most practical drone applications including delivery, but you need fixed-wing linear flight for range. It's better to use many small fans for the VTOL part for reliability and stability, and it's more trouble that it's worth to try and re-use the same thrust units for hover and for forward flight (the design points are completely different). The main clever thing that strikes me about this design is the twin boom, which minimizes drag in forward flight and is very frugal with support structure for the lift fans.

On the other hand, this drone doesn't look production-ready to me. Too many exposed wires and servos. I don't rate its chances in a good downpour.

Any idea why the right tail is a different shape? Is that an antenna sticking out? Why the bulbous white part?

I believe that's a Pitot tube. It's to determine the airspeed of the drone.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitot_tube

That Wired article is from 07/15/2018.

Definitely not production ready. It's got exposed PCBs on the side of the boom. Probably the engine drivers.

>and it's more trouble that it's worth to try and re-use the same thrust units for hover and for forward flight (the design points are completely different).

Do you know why the Osprey designers went for tilt-rotor? Would it be easier or harder to do something like that at drone delivery scale with electric motors?

That's a great point. If you look at it, it makes sense because it's much easier to load balance packages that might have off-center mass when you have linear rails with multiple propellers like that, and for forward speed and longevity the wings make sense, but... what else did they try first? I feel like there must have been a dozen steps from quadcopter to osprey-like VTOL to gyrocopter to this.

The hook was what I remembered the most from their video 5 years ago though!

https://youtu.be/cRTNvWcx9Oo?t=67

Am I missing something or does that article about a hook not include a picture of said hook?

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