Dynamics of flapping micro-aerial vehicles

The dynamics of flapping wing micro aerial vehicles (MAVs) is studied in this paper. The MEMS Laboratory in Tamkang University has been developing flapping-wing MAVs for several years. Based on the developed flapping-wing MAVs we study its dynamics and compare our results with flight test data. Although several papers have discussed similar topics previously, using our flight test data we demonstrate the validity of the assumptions and derivations. We also propose a claim that links the average aerodynamical forces to the wind tunnel test data, so that a flapping MAV can be analyzed with the same methodology as what we have done to a fixed-wing aircraft. Flight test data and numerical simulations are also provided to demonstrate the validity of our derivation.