Draganfly has been awarded a new patent for a vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) cargo delivery drone with variable center of gravity.

According to Draganfly, the design is ideal for beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) operations, and for transporting goods in hard to reach areas or flight over people at night.

“With the signing of a signature customer and now this key industry patent we are confident in our role as an important global player in drone delivery space,” says Cameron Chell, CEO of Draganfly.

“This showcases Draganfly’s continued focus on IP and highlights the strength and innovation of our engineering team.”

According to Draganfly, US Patent No. 10,807,707 is an “unmanned aircraft system (UAS) configured for both vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) and fixed-wing flight operations includes forward, and aft wing assemblies mounted to the fuselage, each wing assembly including port and starboard nacelles terminating in motor-driven rotors powered by an onboard control system capable of adjusting rotor speeds.”

By shifting its center of gravity forward, pivoting the wing assemblies from a powered-lift position perpendicular to the fuselage to a winged-flight position parallel to the fuselage, the UAS may transition between a powered-lift VTOL configuration to a winged-flight configuration.

The forward rotor blades may be folded back so that the aft rotors may provide primary thrust for winged flight operations. Onboard attitude sensors may detect rotor or control failures. The control system would respond by triggering a conversion to the winged-flight configuration for recovery operations.