HAL tests rotary drone co-developed with IIT-K

It can operate for an hour and travel eight to 10 km.

Karnataka : Bengaluru : 03/08/2018 . The Hindustan Aeronautics Limited successfully demonstrated flight of a 10Kg Rotary Wing (Helicopter) Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (RUAV) here in the presence of its Board of Directors,recently.  The RUAV is of a 2-stroke petrol engine, twin blade main rotor and tail rotor, payload capability of 2.5Kg including live stream video camera and range of the vehicle is 8-10 Km with an endurance of one hour.

A 10 kg rotary drone co-developed by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) and IIT-Kanpur was recently flown for the first time in Bengaluru, the defence public sector company said on Friday.

The 10-minute flight of the helicopter-like RUAV or the Rotary Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle was powered by a 2-stroke petrol engine. The RUAV can carry a 2.5-kg payload or instrument including a live-streaming video camera. It can operate for an hour and travel 8-10 km, a statement said.

“With this demonstration, HAL’s Rotary Wing R&D Centre is well poised to undertake development of [heavier] rotary UAVs with weapons as payloads,” HAL chairman and managing director T. Suvarna Raju was quoted as saying.

Apart from military and civil helicopters, the centre is designing and developing rotary UAVs for defence, paramilitary forces and homeland security. The RUAV is the first outcome of HAL’s R&D tie-ups with academic institutions such as IITs of Madras, Roorkee, Kharagpur, Bombay, Kanpur and the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru.