Design and Study of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Powered by Solar Cells by Using Advance Aircrafts Simulation Softwares

Abstract

The objective of this work is to design the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) powered by solar cells, to provide maximum power which consumes by the electrical motor of the aircraft during takeoff at its maximum weight 11(kg). UAV was designed to use for multi-purposes tasks civil and military missions, such as surveillance, communication, intelligence and monitoring. Solar cells power magnitude was checked and selected their types as Ga0.5In0.5P/Ga0.99In0.01As/Ga triple junction which has got practical average efficiency limit of 30%, that placed on the upper surface of wing as a matrix consist of 14 raw .Each raw contains 62 cells (0.04m×0.08m). Several advance software programs were used (Java foil, Advanced Aircraft Analysis version 2.5 (AAA2.5) and the j2 Universal Tool-Kit for Aircraft Dynamics).All of them, give the perfect aircraft design that is suitable operation of solar cells to get maximum power which is sufficient to produce maximum thrust for aircraft motor, and able to complete its mission during steady flight .The residual of solar cells power can be stored in batteries to use it as a power at night flight. The results were obtained from the present work which is nearest to the fact have more reliability and accurate by using these cells which install on the wing surface for producing the requirement power and by using the mentioned softwares specially J2 software which gives the authority to produce the aircraft due its theoretical simulation was applied on aircraft configuration with its real dimensions to predict suitable performance during its flight as a steep before for manufacture to avoid any manufacture cost loses for the model during test because of the cost of the cells and its position on the wing.