Design of an Emergency Recovery System (ERS) for High Altitude Drone Systems

Abstract

A new type of emergency parachute system is developed using engineering, combining off-the-shelf components with parts produced with additive manufacturing. A new ultralight method for retaining the the parachute and lid using as thin line is developed and tested, An ultralight redundant trigger mechanism with health monitoring to ensure reliable triggering is also developed and tested. Parts and design are evaluated through calculations, aerodynamic simulation and modeling as well as physical testing. The prototype weighs 438 g and occupies a volume of about 1.1 Liters. Testing found that it was possible to surpass existing solutions in terms of mass and if this design was adapted to a lighter parachute, which is commercially available the total mass of ERS would be less than 300 g and a volume of less than 0.6 Liters.