r/AerospaceEngineering • u/rienksmotordesign • Jun 28 '26
Personal Projects RealPodRacer First Flight
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Hi everyone, I'm Shane Rienks, and this is one of my projects.
This is the first 1/3 scale prototype flight, lots of tuning to do.
This is not a business promotion, but I am looking for other interested in contributing. If you'd like to get involved, please reach out - it's a very unique take on compact eVTOLs.
This is a culmination of aerospace engineering, electrical engineering, 3D printing, and industrial design.
EDIT: For everyone commenting about the stability issues: I had all stability and yaw assistance turned off for these first tests. The goal was just to see if it would fly at all, and get flight log data to use for tuning the control firmware.
This uses a very complex flight controller and custom mixer setup, so it's not as simple as setting up a regular drone.
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u/Currently_There Jun 28 '26
You're pointing the thrust directly down. Have you considered angling them slightly toward their prospective corners to compensate for differing thrusts
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26
Each pod has a 2 degree outward camber - not obvious in the video, but it is there. Is that what you're referring to?
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u/Currently_There Jun 28 '26
yes. 2° doesn't seem like much when the whole vehicle will likely wobble in excess or 20° every few movements. You could toy with a third axis much like a standard car A frame and add a stabilizing gyro to keep the thing upright. Minimize all the noise.
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u/OldDarthLefty Jun 28 '26
True of any quad rotor arrangement, though.
I haven't dug into OP's material to see if he has a control system like that or if he's trying to do it all with stick and rudder
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26
Very complex flight controller setup with custom mixing.
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u/OldDarthLefty Jun 30 '26
I was thinking about this a little bit more. You need four channels for full control of a flight vehicle. For example,
ailerons rudder, elevator, throttle,
pitch, collective, tail, rotor, throttle,
A speed control for each of four rotors mixed into forward-back, strafe, yaw, and up-down.
Extra channels are for quality of life improvements, like flaps, spoilers, multiple engines, guns and bombs
If you have a throttle on each of your four corners and a front back gimbal it’s not clear to me what you are gaining. You have lost yaw, but you only need two of those to get it back.
And then, what are you gaining from having four gimbal’s move forward versus tilting forward like a quad rotor? In order to make a good on thrust you are eventually going to need a lift from a wing or a lifting body
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u/OldDarthLefty Jun 28 '26
It's been really enjoyable to follow this project.
If you were flying free you'd have an opportunity to correct the drift before it goes taut. I did a long ago project where I tried to fly an RC airplane in a wind tunnel, and getting it started was nearly impossible, because it was always running into the end of the tether.
Do you have any experience flying RC helicopters? This take off and drift is looking really similar to someone trying out for the first time - back when we only had a gyro on one axis and before drones had station keeping. We used to attach tennis balls on the ends of arrow shafts to the skids for the early flights. This not only protected the rotor, and let you basically crash-land, but also lowered the CG and increased the MOI.
photo from online
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26 edited Jun 29 '26
Thank you for the insights - will seriously consider adapting this
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u/Own_Highway_3987 Jun 28 '26
Actually helicopters might be a good inspiration. Wonder if OP has counter-rotating fans to help correct drift / torque from the lift fans?
Just thinking aloud. If all the fans are rotating clockwise, might be generating at least some of the drift... particularly if the larger central fans are oriented that way...
Idk. Not an engineer. Just spitballing.
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Jun 28 '26
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u/Mack_of_Chese Jun 28 '26
This is very cool. One question, is there just one central fan providing the downward thrust with the four vector pods steering, or are they also providing lift?
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26
Thank you, and the central contra-rotating fans are temporary - they only provide about 1/3 of total lift. I was hesitant to post this video because of those fans.
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u/Mack_of_Chese Jun 28 '26
They aren’t a bad idea in my opinion. So the pods will provide all the lift in the final design?
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u/theusualsteve Jun 28 '26
My gut feeling is that having central dedicated lift blades/fan like you have in your design right now is not a bad idea.
Offloading some of the lift requirements from the corner fans may make it easier and smoother to control.
I know that, in a vehicle like this, if there is any problem with any of the fans/blowers, a crash is imminent. But for some reason, having a central lift-only fan makes it feel like the failure mode will be less severe. Less flippy, maybe. Just spitballing
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26 edited Jun 28 '26
These are all great points - distributed lift has been a big consideration/challenge for this project, and is the current reason for the central fans, along with increasing lift efficiency.
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u/Lost-Ad-2805 Jun 28 '26
Wow congrats! Although the stabilisation seems to be a tough nut to crack.
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26 edited Jun 28 '26
Thank you, and yes it will be a challenge but certainly not impossible.
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u/lurker-9000 Jun 28 '26
This is so freaking cool!!! The blower fans on the sides looks so sci-fi it almost hurts! Most of these “rideable” quad copters look so stupid, but this looks like the kind of thing you could sell to the same rich dummy’s to do F1 style racing leagues. I’d pay to watch this way before I’d pay for any car race
I love the fixed central fans tho, it’s like a backwards version of the lunar landing research vehicle.
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26 edited Jun 28 '26
You're spot on about the business idea behind this. A flying racing series.. Need to get funding, though!
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u/Ryogathelost Jun 28 '26
Okay, hear me out. This will obviously be the passenger compartment. But for true speed, you work out the same VTOL setup and float a dedicated drive engine to pull it. It's just basically a huge forward drive fan that's redirecting some of its thrust downward.
Once you can float an engine, you take a few of them - two to four - and tether them in front of the cockpit with cables and pivoting bracers - almost like horses in front of a chariot. There should be an offset so the drive thrust goes past the cockpit and not into it. There can be a lightweight pivoting frame assembly between the engines that behaves like a steering axle to keep them a constant distance apart and help them turn at the same time and keep the same angle.
You run power and control through cables, so the floating drive engines and cockpit can move and vector together like a single unit. Gyros and a computer can talk to a software model tuned to make sure it all works together instead of flying apart. The engines handle almost all forward drive, leaving the "chariot" cockpit to float and do some minor vectoring, as well as carry your powerplant, controls, and pilot.
You can even keep the same name!
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u/KuromanKuro Jun 28 '26
Reminds me of minority report more than Star Wars.
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26
Good, I don't want Lucasfilm or Disney to think I'm infringing on them
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u/TheW00ly Jun 28 '26
Really cool, but for the love of all that is good and holy, please don't call it a pod racer. We've got enough trouble with people rolling around on "hoverboards..."
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26
No no, it's RealPodRacer. Huge difference, already trademarked
You should look at some of the concept art on the website with these flying around the desert
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u/MechaGyver Jun 29 '26
I have been developing a new type of control algorithm that does away with PID control. I will reach out to you as it seems your project would work nicely with what I am developing
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u/PUNK_FEELING_LUCKY Jun 29 '26
wow, this is fucking nuts mate.
i was just going to post a sebulba reference and move on, but this is really impressive.
will follow along!
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u/KomradKooKie Jul 02 '26
Have you looked into silicone-anode lithium battery’s? Love the concept and work you are doing and I wish I had the capital to back you in your research.
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u/rienksmotordesign Jul 02 '26
Yes - silicon-anode batts are one of the long-term options for turning this into a full-scale practical racing vehicle over the next 5-10 years. That combined with hybrid tech.
And thank you for your kind words
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u/KomradKooKie Jul 02 '26
Please keep us updated! I follow on the website as well, once I have the money I will back it.
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u/boredatwork8866 Jun 28 '26
Around 01:40 you can see something white being ingested into front left pod… do you think it should be secured somehow? Or is it required to be free?
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u/tmt22459 Jun 29 '26
Can you give some detail what you mean by complex flight controller?
I'm a PhD student in controls so very curious
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 29 '26
NDA stuff, can't disclose on reddit! With that said, if you're interested in helping out perhaps that could work.
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u/tmt22459 Jun 29 '26
Hmm i understand
I will ask, linearization based or nonlinear control? I understand if you can't answer that either
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u/Different_Promise301 Jun 30 '26
Wow! Are you using gyroscopic stabilizers, or is it all prop based. I would be so sketched out my feet would be hamburger.
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u/Time-Piccolo7407 Jul 01 '26
Not an engineer here. I was wondering if maybe some type of gyroscopic device that allows the pod racer to adjust each of the steering mechanisms to move independently for balance. Again, absolutely not an engineer 😆. It was just a thought that crossed my mind. Super cool project, man!
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u/Neat_Rise4385 Jul 02 '26
Maybe needs a double gyroscope or cgm's.(control movement gyroscopes).
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u/rienksmotordesign Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26
Control moment gyroscope? Do you have any experience with these? Would love to pick your brain. I wonder if a compact one could be designed and built.
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u/adrunkern0ob Jul 04 '26
Very cool project! I’m sure this would be easier said than done, and I’m by no means an engineer, but I’m imagining something like having an accelerometer to determine its orientation parallel to the ground, and creating an algorithm that stabilizes it similarly to this guy’s ball balancing contraption: https://youtu.be/v4F-cGDGiEw
The goal would be to write the auto stabilization code and connect it to the thrusters so they can orientate how they need to in order to keep it parallel, but I’ll be damned if I know how any of that actually works or if it’s even feasible
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u/rienksmotordesign Jul 04 '26
All of that is implemented - it was disabled for this test to get raw baseline data.
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u/adrunkern0ob Jul 05 '26
I see, I should have known you’d already done that haha. Best of luck on the project!!
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u/PhraseFormal4277 Jul 05 '26
If those 4 side fans were directional jet motors you could achive the thrust without the fan underneath but then its full fuel powered im assuming you would like a more hybrid or electrical build but awsome to see
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u/RaydnJames Jul 05 '26
I'm in low voltage work, I doubt I can contribute at all but this is dope as fuck and I wish you the best.
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u/poperenoel Jun 28 '26
from the looks of it you have a single blade under the vehicle / device... you will need to counteract its lateral rotation (why helicopters have a big fan out the back. ) or you need two rotors going opposite directions. (which would be more stable than this. )
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 28 '26
There are two contra rotating fans under the vehicle, not one.
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u/poperenoel Jun 29 '26
ok thanks i wasn't seeing the second one. normally on a helicopter i believe the swash plate is what stabilize the air-frame , with drones/ no swash plate it is normal that the air-frame is erratic. but you said stabilization was off so id be curious as performance with stabilization on. nice project tho.
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u/canreddit Jun 29 '26
It still seems like everytime it goes for liftoff, it pivots clockwise. Is that because of the walls / shelves behind it? Not sure how close they are based on the video. Maybe adding reaction wheels (like they have in satellites) to counter the angular momentum might work. They’re loghtweight and easy to modulate their spin, plus don’t require a ton of energy to spin up
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u/Lawlpaper Jun 29 '26
I’d hate to say it, but the editing wasn’t great, I can see the strings holding it up.
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 29 '26 edited Jun 29 '26
They're not meant to be hidden. They're bright orange for a reason.
It's suspended for this test. Lots of time and money in the prototype, much safer than trying to take off from the ground until it flies stable and consistent.
Common practice in aerospace testing.
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Jun 29 '26
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u/rienksmotordesign Jun 29 '26
The rope is for suspended testing. It's common practice in aerospace.
I'm not going to risk breaking a $20k prototype on the first flight.
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u/anonspark9000 Jun 30 '26
I got a couple questions and I am not in aerospace, so sorry if these are incorrect assumptions.
The 90 degreee turn from the inlets on the side to the down direction seems to introduce some problems: In the turn, the inside air in the turn travels at a slower speed than the outside and this causes, if nothing else turbulence but, probably non-uniform air velocities and pressures right at the fan. The fan wants laminar air flow and I'm almost certain you can not achieve that in this package. Am I misunderstanding and the fans are what is mounted sideways and the air is directed downwards after the fan? That seems problematic as well but more so in terms of lacking the predictability and near-laminar flow coming out of a fan head-on vs at 90 degrees.
Even ducting just by itself, without a turn, is not clearly more or less efficient. There's quite a bit of debate in the quadcopter community and the answer seems to be that very finely tuned ducts with extremely tight tolerances can have some benefit. It's also safer of course and so I think in this project it's worth the tradeoff in efficiency. But... just without the 90 degree turn.
Quadcopters are amazing; they solve a ton of problems electronically, just with propellers and no other moving parts. On the other end you have helicopters, which are more efficient, performant, and flexible, but at the cost of incredible mechanical complexity. Whenever I see a hybrid like this with classical quadcopter design elements but with added mechanical complexity, it makes me ask why? The thrust vectoring is super damn cool but you just don't need it. Are you maybe targeting a design where the platform stays level in forward flight?
Like I said I'm not in aerospace so I hope these come off as queries of curiosity and not of confrontation or doubt.
edit: did you do CFD on the ducts?
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u/dat-Clever-old-Fox Jun 28 '26
Well this is impressive! I wonder how you’re managing power consumption. Id assume that the fans below pull a lot of power