Internal (faculty, staff, TA)
MAE
2025-2026
Winter
Spring

Project 9B: The Anteatairs

An anteater drone logo. It's really cool

Summary

A tiltrotor tri-coptor VTOL fixed-wing UAV engineered for search-and-rescue — currently undergoing airframe surface coating and final systems integration before flight testing.

The Mission
Modern search and rescue (SAR) operations face a critical tradeoff: ground teams are slow, and conventional fixed-wing aircraft require runway infrastructure that doesn't exist in disaster zones or remote terrain.

The Anteatairs solves this by engineering a tiltrotor VTOL UAV — a hybrid platform that takes off and lands vertically like a multirotor, then physically rotates its motors forward to transition into efficient fixed-wing cruise flight. No runway. No infrastructure dependency.

Built on a COTS fixed-wing airframe retrofitted with custom tiltrotor propulsion, with a scale fuselage modeled in Fusion 360, a purpose-designed payload delivery bay, FPV telemetry, and autonomous navigation — this platform is designed to rapidly deploy, survey large search areas, and deliver emergency first-aid supplies to survivors.

Project 9B is a UCI Samueli Senior Capstone project developed over two quarters under the MAE 151A/B curriculum, sponsored by Abdelrahman Elmarakby.

Technical Approach/Methodology

The Anteatairs team is solving the SAR access problem by engineering a tiltrotor VTOL (Vertical Take-Off and Landing) fixed-wing UAV — a hybrid aircraft that combines two flight modes in one platform. At takeoff, the drone's front motors tilt vertically to lift the aircraft straight up like a helicopter, requiring no runway. Once airborne, the motors rotate 90° forward, transitioning the drone into efficient fixed-wing cruise flight for covering large search areas quickly. This transition is controlled autonomously by an ArduPilot flight controller running on a SpeedyBee F405 Wing Mini, which manages stabilization, navigation, and mode-switching in real time.

The airframe is built on a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) fixed-wing platform that the team retrofitted for VTOL capability. Custom motor mounts, tilt mechanisms, and a payload delivery bay were designed in SolidWorks and Fusion 360, then fabricated using FDM and SLA 3D printing with ASA Aero material — chosen for its strength-to-weight ratio. To validate the wing's aerodynamic performance before full-scale flight, the team conducted wind tunnel testing on a 1:3 scale airfoil model at UCI's Aerolab, using a 6-axis force balance to measure lift, drag, and pitching moment across a range of angles of attack. All avionics — including ESCs, servos, GPS, FPV camera, and RC receiver — were first integrated and validated on a dedicated electronics test board before being installed in the airframe. The team is currently working to reduce total system weight from 3.5 kg toward a target below 2 kg, and is upgrading from 30A to 50A ESCs following an ESC failure identified during testing.

Outcomes

By the end of MAE 151B (Spring 2026), the Anteatairs team will deliver a fully integrated, flight-tested tiltrotor VTOL UAV capable of autonomous search-and-rescue operations. Specific deliverables include:

  • A flight-ready VTOL airframe with a 1.3 m wingspan, surface-coated composite fuselage, and a servo-actuated tiltrotor propulsion system capable of transitioning between vertical and forward flight within 2 seconds. The platform targets a cruise speed of 8–12 m/s and a minimum flight duration of 15 minutes on dual 4S LiPo batteries.
  • A validated avionics suite including a SpeedyBee F405 Wing Mini flight controller running ArduPilot, GPS-based autonomous navigation, 720p FPV live video feed, and 1 km RC telemetry range — all verified through ground testing and flight trials.
  • A servo-actuated payload delivery bay capable of securely carrying and releasing up to 2 kg of emergency first-aid supplies on command during flight.
  • Wind tunnel aerodynamic data from 1:3 scale airfoil testing at UCI's Aerolab, characterizing lift-to-drag ratio, stall angle of attack, and pitching moment across the flight envelope.
  • Engineering documentation including a full bill of materials (BOM), standard operating procedures (SOPs), PoC test results, and a compliance table verifying performance against all system requirements.
  • Accomplishments to date include successful electronics PoC validation (all motors, servos, GPS, and flight controller confirmed functional), wind tunnel testing of the scaled airfoil model, and presentation of the project at UCI's Annual Design Review in Winter 2026.

Project Media

Project Poster