• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.46 no.9
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• pp.723-734
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• 2018

A structural weight estimation methodology for the multicopter design process is presented. In general, a multicopter is composed of an airframe, motors, propellers, battery and so on. Among these, the weight of motors, propellers and battery can be obtained from the weight trends with respect to design parameters. However, the structural weight is hard to be estimated due to the various configurations and design concepts of multicopters. Moreover, the airframe weights of most commercial multicopter products are not provided. Thus, an accurate airframe weight model is required for the reliable mutlcopter design process. Firstly, the standard configuration of multicopters is defined. Then, we proposed the structural weight estimation method using the number and diameter of propellers determined from the initial step of sizing process. Finally, we validated our suggested method using the commerical products.