1. By
A.SATYA JAYANTH
(08Q91A2102)

2. ABSTRACT
Micro air vehicles “MAV” belong to a class of aircrafts currently
with a maximum size of 300mm and are capable of operating at
speeds of not less than 12m/s. MAV’s are expected to find
applications in border patrol, visual surveillance etc. MAV’s are
typically characterized by a low aspect ratio wing operating at
low Reynolds's numbers (10^5 ~ 10^6). A camber plate MAV of
300mm wing span generates cl of 0.7-0.8, comparatively blended
wing MAV generates cl of 1-1.3 this motivates the work to be
carried out. This work contains the aerodynamic design, airframe
modeling, production and development of a blended wing MAV.

3. WHAT IS BLENDED WING BODY?
Blended Wing Body (BWB) aircraft have a
flattened and airfoil shaped body, which
produces most of the lift, the wings
contributing the balance.
BWB incorporates design features from both a
futuristic fuselage and flying wing design.

4. NASA BWB (blending wing body)
X-48 AIRCRAFT

5. ADVANTAGES
Blended wing body has lift-to-drag ratio 50%
greater than conventional airplane.
Efficient high-lift wings and a wide airfoil-
shaped body.

6.  Its fuel burn will be 27% lower than its
conventional Airbus.
 Take off weight 15% lower.
 Empty weight will be 12% less.
 It will only require three instead of four
engines, and will match or exceed
conventional performance, despite having
27% less thrust.

7. It is lighter.
More fuel efficient.
Requires far less power.
More aesthetic in appearance.

8. HISTORY ABOUT BLENDED WING
CONFIGURATION
Stout Batwing first blended wing
configuration… in 1926

9. Micro Air Vehicles (MAV)
 Micro air vehicles belong to a class of aircraft
currently designated with a class of size
300mm and are capable of operating at
speeds of not less than 12m/s.
They are typically characterized by low aspect
ratio.

10. MAV’s are a class of small light-weight
aircrafts designed to operate in situations that
are practically unsuitable for large aircrafts.
MAV’s are used for battlefield reconnaissance,
visual surveillance, border patrol, air sampling
for civil services.

11. STEPS INVOLVED IN DEVELOPMENT
OF A BLENDED WING BODY
AIRCRAFT
(MAV)

12. AERODYNAMIC STUDIES
The aerodynamics of the aircraft is greatly
affected by airfoil, operating chord based
Reynolds number, plan form shape and
wingtip devices like winglets.

13. AIRFOIL SELECTION AND ANALYSIS
The number of airfoils are referred from
various technical papers.
Performance studies on number of aircrafts
indicated that GM78, J5012, MH45 are the
three airfoils having better performance and
meets the requirements of Blended wing
MAV.

14. GM78

15. J5012

16. AIRFOIL AOA Cl/Cd Cl
GM78 7° 70% 1.2
J5012 7° 55% 0.7
MH45 7° 70% 1.0
This comparison of aerodynamic
performances shows that the GM78 is the best
suitable airfoil for a blended wing aircrafts.
After that selection analysis is to be done.

17. PLANFORM DESIGN
Chosen plan form designs are
Fig.1 Fig.2 Fig.3

18. After the comparison of the performance
analysis of the three plan forms the inverse
Zimmerman plan form (fig.3) is chosen to be
the best.
With and without winglet the graph of Cl and α
is

19. STABILITY AND WINGLETS
Directional stability is associated with angular
motion about the z-axis.
Vertical wing is the conventional mechanism
for directional stability.
Winglets with 90° can help to reduce the
induced drag.
Winglet sizing is done by vertical tail volume
coefficient.

20. AIRFRAME AND SKIN PRODUCTION
FINAL ASSEMBLY AND FINAL TEST
 Airframe is a skeleton of MAV and is prepared
by the composites of Kevlar and Rohacell.
Using a technique named rapid prototyping is
used in the mechanism of skin material.
Blended wing model is prepared for testing.

21. Blended wing
MAV model

22. CONCLUSION
A light weight micro air vehicle as been
developed through a systematic approach with a
blended wing configuration.