Trust Characteristics of Ducted Fan of a Quadcopter in Various Flight Modes

Ducted fans are widely used in vehicles with high supplied engine power per unit area swept by the propeller (hovercraft, vertical take-off and landing aircraft). Computational fluid dynamics is becoming a powerful tool for selecting the aerodynamic configurations of new aircraft and their engines, as well as determining their optimal operating modes. Full Navier–Stokes equations and various turbulence models are applied to simulate the flow induced by the rotation of the blades of the quadcopter propellers. The trust characteristics of the ducted fan are analyzed based on the results of numerical simulation in various flight modes, including hovering and oblique oncoming air flow. The influence of the tip clearance of the propeller and the inner wall of the duct on the thrust and power is reported.