AESIR, named after a family of Norse gods, has developed a family of Vertical Take Off and Landing (VTOL) Unmanned Airborne Vehicles (UAVs) designed to operate in both urban and rural environments, providing a platform suitable for tasks including surveillance and cargo lift. The VTOL craft use the Coanda effect to generate lift and have inherent stability as a surveillance platform. The design has no external rotating parts and can survive low speed impact with the ground, buildings and other fixed objects. The AESIR UAVs provide a sustained hover capability, have a large payload capacity when compared to similar sized fixed wing craft, and have been designed to use “plug-and-play” payloads resulting in considerable flexibility. Designed into the craft is an effective perch-and-stare capability. The AESIR family of craft range from a 300mm diameter craft called Vidar, through Odin, which is a 1m diameter craft with a payload capability of 10kg, to Hoder, which is a multi engine craft with the capability to lift a payload of 1 ton.
Vidar is a man portable craft designed to provide surveillance and situational awareness inside buildings and in close confined spaces. It has an electric engine powered by Lithium Polymer batteries and a 15 minute endurance with a 100g payload. Odin is fitted with a rotary internal combustion engine and can carry a 10kg payload for up to an hour. Fitted with an autonomous flight control system and managed through a simple to operate ground control system, it can be adapted to a range of tasks including ISTAR, communications relay, electronic warfare, asset protection, IED detection and can be used as a loitering munition. Hoder is a heavy lift craft capable of carrying a one ton payload. It is primarily intended for cargo transport but can easily be adapted to become a long endurance craft by reducing the payload and increasing the fuel. Hoder is in the early stages of development but is expected that it will be multi-engined.
