Homebuilt Angle of Attack Sensor Assembly

Описание: About a year and a half ago, after my last version of the AoA sensor failed a couple of flight tests, I became frustrated. During slow flight, the wind vane would flap up and down and wasn't very accurate. I felt defeated when I considered how many hours I'd poured into the design of the sensor body. I decided to take a break and decided to postpone uploading 3D models until I had figured this issue out.

As I considered the behavior, I think the issue was caused by the round side of the body and the close proximity of the wind vane to that round side. At high angles of attack, the air would pass to the side of the round body, which deflected the air outward toward the wind vane. And on top side of the sensor, the air went past the round side of the body to a more open area, away from the wind vane. So while deflected wind was hitting the bottom of the vane and pushing it up, there was less wind hitting the top. So the wind vane went way up.

A few months later, I finally decided to re-design it. This time with flat sides. And I moved the wind vane a little farther away from the sensor body to place it more into the flow of relative wind where it would be less affected by air passing around the sensor.

This latest version seems to have tested very well. The flapping is gone now and the indicator seems to show the same angle of attack when it stalls.

This video demonstrates how to assemble the parts (both 3D printed and purchased) to build an Angle of Attack Sensor.

#homebuilt #homebuiltaircraft #angleofattack #experimentalaircraft #arduino #androidapp