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A fuel cell/battery hybrid power system for an unmanned aerial vehicle

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Abstract

A hybrid propulsion system composed of a homemade Polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEFC) with a Lithium polymer (LiPo) battery in parallel connection was developed for Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The characteristics and performance of the system were evaluated considering its dynamic load responding capability and energy efficiency. A homemade PEFC stack composed of 36-unit cells and Balance of plant (BOP) was used to construct the fuel cell system directly connected to the propulsion system. Ten cells of a 3300-mAh 40C LiPo battery were combined with the PEFC system in parallel, and the LiPo battery was only switched on when high power was required for takeoff, acceleration and landing. The independent use of the homemade PEFC system and battery for the UAV showed a good load responding capability and a high fuel cell system efficiency of approximately 45%, which was obtained during cruising. The parasitic loss and the amount of unreacted hydrogen gas discharged outside of PEFC were nearly 3.91% and 0.89%, respectively. Results of the field test flights confirmed that the hybrid propulsion system based on the parallel connection of a PEFC system and a battery power is extremely effective in operating a UAV.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Surface Technology Division, Korea Institute of Materials Science, Seoul, Korea

    Cheolnam Yang & Sungmo Moon

  2. Dept.of Material Science and Engineering, Pusan Nat’l Univ., Pusan, Korea

    Cheolnam Yang & Yangdo Kim

  3. Advanced Materials Engineering, Korea University of Science and Technology, Seoul, Korea

    Sungmo Moon

Authors
  1. Cheolnam Yang
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  2. Sungmo Moon
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  3. Yangdo Kim
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sungmo Moon.

Additional information

Recommended by Associate Editor Yong-Tae Kim

Cheolnam Yang received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Materials Science and Engineering from Hanyang University. He is currently a principal researcher at Korea Materials Science and Technology (KIMS) and a Ph.D. student in Materials Engineering at Pusan National University. His research interests are fuel cells and unmanned aerial vehicles.

Sungmo Moon received his B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Materials Science and Engineering from KAIST. He is currently a principal researcher at KIMS and a professor in Advanced Materials Engineering at the Korea University of Science and Technology. His research interests are fuel cells and surface treatments for Mg, Al and Ti alloys.

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Yang, C., Moon, S. & Kim, Y. A fuel cell/battery hybrid power system for an unmanned aerial vehicle. J Mech Sci Technol 30, 2379–2385 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12206-016-0448-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12206-016-0448-3

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