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Ultra-Light Micro Air Vehicles
Roland Piquepaille writes "Dutch engineers have built the third generation of the DelFly autonomous air vehicle. The DelFly Micro made its first public flight earlier today in Delft. This micro air vehicle weighs only 3 grams and has a wingspan of 10 centimeters. This very small remote-controlled aircraft carries a 0.4 gram camera. The DelFly Micro, which looks like a dragonfly, can fly for 3 minutes at a maximum speed of 5 meters/second. It could be used for observation flights in difficult-to-reach or dangerous areas."
There's a video of the DelFly Micro in action here. It takes flight about a minute and a half in.
"Roland" is the submission whore that "blogs" (copies) stuff from all over, links to it, adds a simplistic comment then somehow gets that submitted to Slashdot.
He does it for ad revenue. Quite effective at it, and quite annoying for those great unwashed that don't suck Slashdot dick to get stories submitted.
At small scales the Reynolds number ~ vL/nu gets smaller. So for a given velocity, smaller objects behave like they are in a more viscous medium. Flexible wings that "swim" through the air can be more efficient and more stable than fixed wings at such scales.
copied from snopes
This old chestnut has been around for years. The way I first heard it (at least 15 years ago) was that the Chicken Gun was Canadian and the FAA had to have the concept of a thawed fowl gently explained to them.
I have no doubt every country has a different idiot/victim, depending on who your most popular "moron nation" happens to be at the moment.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
I've got three, and one is faulty (it still flies but the motor or something is not smooth- blades stop spinning nearly immediately when you cut the throttle).
That sure sounds like hair either wrapped around the rotor spindle or pressing between the spindle and the motor to me. Even one hair can slow down the blades and make the thing unflyable. I use a big magnifying glass and an X-Acto knife blade to clear any foreign matter out of this area.
No mod points, no meta-moderating/Firehose/all the other free work Slashdot wants me to do.