On September 28, the first flights with the VaMEx demonstrator were performed on the test site of the Institute of Flight Guidance, a decommissioned airfield between Braunschweig and Hanover.
Changing requirements and faulty hardware made it necessary to replace important components of the hexacopter. For example, the drive components and the flight controller were replaced. The new flight controller now also has an Ethernet interface, which makes communication with the onboard computer more robust.
A total of 3 flights were performed, which were used to make basic adjustments to the flight controller and the flight control system. The last flight was already fully automated.
The flight data collected will be evaluated and used to fine-tune the flight controller and the aircraft. In further flight tests, the maximum take-off mass calculated for the final setup of the demonstrator is to be achieved with the help of a replacement payload and the controller parameters adapted to the increased take-off mass so that the first flights for data recording can then be safely completed with the VaMEx sensor payload.