The Dodecacopter: a Versatile Multirotor System of Dodecahedron-Shaped Modules

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Garanger, Kévin, Khamvilai, Thanakorn, Epps, Jeremy, Feron, Eric
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Garanger, Kévin
Khamvilai, Thanakorn
Epps, Jeremy
Feron, Eric
author_facet Garanger, Kévin
Khamvilai, Thanakorn
Epps, Jeremy
Feron, Eric
contents With the promise of greater safety and adaptability, modular reconfigurable uncrewed air vehicles have been proposed as unique, versatile platforms holding the potential to replace multiple types of monolithic vehicles at once. State-of-the-art rigidly assembled modular vehicles are generally two-dimensional configurations in which the rotors are coplanar and assume the shape of a "flight array". We introduce the Dodecacopter, a new type of modular rotorcraft where all modules take the shape of a regular dodecahedron, allowing the creation of richer sets of configurations beyond flight arrays. In particular, we show how the chosen module design can be used to create three-dimensional and fully actuated configurations. We justify the relevance of these types of configurations in terms of their structural and actuation properties with various performance indicators. Given the broad range of configurations and capabilities that can be achieved with our proposed design, we formulate tractable optimization programs to find optimal configurations given structural and actuation constraints. Finally, a prototype of such a vehicle is presented along with results of performed flights in multiple configurations.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2504_16475
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle The Dodecacopter: a Versatile Multirotor System of Dodecahedron-Shaped Modules
Garanger, Kévin
Khamvilai, Thanakorn
Epps, Jeremy
Feron, Eric
Robotics
With the promise of greater safety and adaptability, modular reconfigurable uncrewed air vehicles have been proposed as unique, versatile platforms holding the potential to replace multiple types of monolithic vehicles at once. State-of-the-art rigidly assembled modular vehicles are generally two-dimensional configurations in which the rotors are coplanar and assume the shape of a "flight array". We introduce the Dodecacopter, a new type of modular rotorcraft where all modules take the shape of a regular dodecahedron, allowing the creation of richer sets of configurations beyond flight arrays. In particular, we show how the chosen module design can be used to create three-dimensional and fully actuated configurations. We justify the relevance of these types of configurations in terms of their structural and actuation properties with various performance indicators. Given the broad range of configurations and capabilities that can be achieved with our proposed design, we formulate tractable optimization programs to find optimal configurations given structural and actuation constraints. Finally, a prototype of such a vehicle is presented along with results of performed flights in multiple configurations.
title The Dodecacopter: a Versatile Multirotor System of Dodecahedron-Shaped Modules
topic Robotics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.16475