High Efficiency Ceramic Propeller for Small UAS

The purpose of this program is to develop “CerFoil”, a radically new lightweight ceramic composite propeller for use in small unmanned air systems (SUAS). The team consists of Hydronalix, Inc. and the Oklahoma State University Next Generation Materials Laboratory who will design, fabricate, and test a new Scimitar type propeller design to radically increase aerodynamic efficiency through implementation of this new propeller design. The design is constructed of very lightweight high modulus composites to will provide a reduction in radiated noise compared to the state-of-the-art commercially available propellers. Most importantly, the application of this propeller design will improve UAV performance without any additional modification to the existing platform designs. Further, these designs could be fabricated by using additive manufacturing methods developed by the researchers working on this project.