Flying STAR, a Hybrid Crawling and Flying Sprawl Tuned Robot

This paper presents Flying STAR (FSTAR) a reconfigurable hybrid flying quadcopter robot. FSTAR is the latest in the family of the STAR robots fitted with a sprawling mechanism and propellers allowing it to both run and fly using the same motors. The combined capabilities of running and flying allows FSTAR to fly over obstacles or run underneath them and move inside pipes. The robot can reduce its width to crawl in confined spaces or underneath obstacles while touching the ground. We first describe the design of the robot and the configuration of the wheels and propellers in the flying and running modes. Then we present the 3D printed prototype of the FSTAR robot which we used for our experiments. We evaluate the energy requirements of the robot and the forces it can generate. The experimental robot can fly like an ordinary quadcopter but can also run on the ground at a speed of up to 2.6 m/s to save energy (see video).