The design and performance quantification of four Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL) architectures for a canard-type aircraft configuration are presented. The aero-structural sizing of the canard configuration and the sizing procedure for the proposed VTOL configurations are described and discussed. The proposed VTOL architectures are based on a range of rotor distances to the centre of gravity, quad- and tri-rotor configurations, retractable front rotors and tilt rear rotors. The aerodynamic performance, total installed power and VTOL system mass were modelled and experimentally validated. The results show that a fully exposed VTOL system penalises the Lift-over-Drag (L/D) ratio significantly relative to a clean configuration. The VTOL system mass can be reduced by up to 32% by using a tilt tri-rotor configuration when compared with an equidistant quad-rotor+pusher configuration. The fraction of installed power usable for forward flight can be increased by up to 80% with a tilt configuration. For the proposed mission, the range can be significantly increased if a tri-rotor tilt configuration is adopted in place of an equidistant quad-rotor+pusher configuration.

中文翻译：

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鸭式飞机 VTOL 系统的设计和性能量化

介绍了鸭式飞机配置的四种垂直起降 (VTOL) 架构的设计和性能量化。描述和讨论了鸭翼构型的航空结构尺寸和建议的 VTOL 构型的尺寸调整程序。所提出的 VTOL 架构基于到重心的一系列旋翼距离、四旋翼和三旋翼配置、可伸缩的前旋翼和倾斜的后旋翼。对气动性能、总装机功率和 VTOL 系统质量进行了建模和实验验证。结果表明，相对于干净的配置，完全暴露的 VTOL 系统显着降低了升力比阻力 (L/D) 比。与等距四旋翼+推进器配置相比，使用倾斜三旋翼配置可将 VTOL 系统质量减少多达 32%。通过倾斜配置，可用于向前飞行的装机功率部分可增加多达 80%。对于提议的任务，如果采用三旋翼倾斜配置代替等距四旋翼+推进器配置，则可以显着增加航程。