| 摘要 |
A safe, quiet, easy to control, efficient, and compact aircraft configuration is enabled through the combination of multiple vertical lift rotors, tandem wings, and forward thrust propellers. The vertical lift rotors, in combination with a front and rear wing, permits a balancing of the center of lift with the center of gravity for both vertical and horizontal flight. This wing and multiple rotor system has the ability to tolerate a relatively large variation of the payload weight for hover, transition, or cruise flight while also providing vertical thrust redundancy. The propulsion system uses multiple lift rotors and forward thrust propellers of a small enough size to be shielded from potential blade strike and provide increased perceived and real safety to the passengers. Using multiple independent rotors provides redundancy and the elimination of single point failure modes that can make the vehicle non-operable in flight. |
| 主权项 |
1. An aircraft comprising:
a fuselage; a forward wing coupled to the fuselage and located forward of a center of gravity; an aft wing coupled to the fuselage and located aft of the center of gravity; a first plurality of lift rotors located between the forward wing and the aft wing on a port side of the fuselage, at least one of the first plurality having a first cant and at least one of the plurality having a second cant, the second cant having an angle different from the first cant; a second plurality of lift rotors located between the forward wing and the aft wing on a starboard side of the fuselage, at least one of the second plurality having a third cant and at least one of the plurality having a fourth cant, the fourth cant having an angle different from the third cant; a propeller coupled to the fuselage for providing forward thrust; and a flight computer, coupled to the fuselage, and configured to independently control an amount of thrust provided by each of the first plurality and each of the second plurality of lift rotors according to a difference between a current orientation of the personal aircraft and a desired orientation of the personal aircraft. |
