Advanced Folding Robotic Arm for Quadcopters

This paper analyzes the design of a prototype robotic arm for a quadcopter (drone). This prototype is a modular folding mechanism that extends from the body of the drone. When fitted with an appropriate gripper, this mechanism can be used to retrieve or sample objects and then can retract so that the drone can fly with minimal drag from air resistance. This foldable robotic arm only uses one actuator to move and extends to almost six times its original length. The use of a drone for sampling can be advantageous since it can allow access to areas that otherwise might be difficult or impossible to reach by Autonomous Ground Vehicles (AGV’s). In this project, a SolidWorks model of the mechanism was created and analyzed, then a prototype of this mechanism was built and tested and it has performed as expected.