The third beta of the new OpenRelief Airframe is now available. This release is relatively minor and is intended as an incremental roll-out of our new design files. It includes the new bulkhead DXF and DWG files along with some illustrative images of this component’s build process. You can download the design package from here: […]

Work has progressed on developing the third generation Open Source Airframe. Edward Strickland recently shared these pictures from the prototype build in the UK. The first test flights are provisionally scheduled for September in Australia under the watchful eye of Alan Hart.

The Oldham Evening Chronicle has just published a story covering local college students building the OpenRelief airframe. Lead by Edward Strickland, our main airframe designer, these students are rapidly prototyping the third generation OpenRelief airframe. Their refinements include a dramatically simpler, tougher tail, a new wing and an improved landing gear. When complete, their work […]

The second beta of the third generation OpenRelief Airframe is now available: http://www.openrelief.org/documents/CTOL-UAV-3.0.0beta2.zip This includes the completed tail mount and tail planes. The only remaining item for the rear is the tail wheel/drag. The next few releases will cover an improved front fuselage, a new landing gear and a new wing.

This has a longer support within the tube to support the tail plane and stop vibration. It also features a more symmetric design for future ease-of-use. One issue we had during the first build was warping of the ply. It sprung up and stopped the laser cutter, tripping it out. We sorted this but are […]

The first beta of the third generation Open Source Airframe is now available here: http://www.openrelief.org/documents/CTOL-UAV-3.0.0beta1.zip This generation is intended to be cheaper, lighter and easier to build than previous versions. Ed and his team at Oldham college are fixing on a 6 foot long airframe with a 7 foot wingspan for now, though the slightly […]

The 2.0.3 version of the Open Source Airframe has now been released. This is just a refinement to the design package distribution, though it’s smaller and easier to parse. Enjoy. == Version 2.0.3 == 27/06/2013 - Updated the Bill of Materials to better match file names - Removed unnecessary files (dropped from 8.5 MB to […]

I’ve pulled together the threads on our vision and drone management software to provide a summary on the website: http://www.openrelief.org/home/labs/ My trigger was that there has recently been some awesome code released by the CanberraUAV team, and I wanted to review where we had been as a prelude to exploring (and promoting) their work. I […]

As you know, OpenRelief is about more than the technical aspects of disaster relief. It is a design project to help improve our responses via new ideas and new approaches. The robot plane we are developing is one part of this. The radiation sensor is another. However, we also need to address the question of […]