UAV Forge Noise Reduction

Background 

Drones are rapidly becoming a part of modern day life. Their ease of use and relatively low price has made drones more accessible to the public than ever. Similarly, companies such as Amazon are researching and developing drone based delivery systems to be used within cities. However, noise nuisances are disrupting and even unhealthy with prolonged exposure. Therefore, it is necessary to find a way to reduce the noise level of the drone. Under this background, our group would like to design an attachment that would reduce the noise of a drone.

Goal and Objective

The goal of this project is to reduce the overall noise of a drone by 5-15 dB. The attachment needs to have reasonable price. It needs to be light weight and shouId not negatively influence the aerodynamics of the drone. The attachment is also required to be easily mountable and avoid unnecessary vibration. In the first few weeks we hope to brainstorm 8 different methods/ideas for reducing noise, and select the best option or options through quantitative measurement for the rest of the quarter. Using a motor thrust stand, our team will collect a baseline decibel and thrust reading from a single drone arm. We will then complete the preliminary design of our attachment and move on to manufacturing. In testing, we will use the same setup to test the performance of the drone with the attachment.

Technical Details

In order to reduce the sound intensity to the level we want, our team is devoted to developing an attachment mainly focused on "noise reflection" and "noise-absorbing". To "absorb" the noise, we use solid materials with low young's modulus and low density to increase the speed of sound, which will result in lower sound intensity. Moreover, the elastic material is easy to deform, so we will design an out layer to protect it and reflect the sound. We trying to apply reflective materials like aluminum foil with a specific shape to reflect the noise upward. Then it can reduce the noise effect to the people on the ground. In additon, with the inspiration and testing evidence from Dotterel, we found that the utzilization of shroud can effectively reduce the noise of the propellers of the drones. With those three main concepts, our team is researching materials that will achieve our goals, and develop the appropriate shape for the attachment to help us reduce the noise of the drone.

Team Contact:

Cody Cacatian - CCACATIA@uci.edu

Sponser/advisor:

David Copp - dcopp@uci.edu