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somattoday at 8:38 AM2 repliesview on HN

I am surprised it was not a coaxial design(think the mars copter, but designed for a real atmosphere)


Replies

K0balttoday at 10:22 AM

Twice as much rotor weight moving the same cross section of air. What might actually work would be a coaxial where rotor A and rotor B swept different parts of the rotor disc at different rotational speeds, to get blade speeds closer over the whole area, or the twin rotor front and back design, but apparently the structural weight of high power distribution for the dual rotor design is a significant problem, sweeping less disk for the weight than a single rotor system. I think a big part of it is that disk area goes up at the square of rotor length, so having multiple rotors costs you the advantage.

reliablereasontoday at 9:44 AM

I would think coaxial designs suffer as the lower rotor works in more turbulent non laminar air.