Introduction
A propeller basically helps lift the drone in the air. Moreover, it also provides the thrust and torque to the quadcopter that helps it manoeuvre and flies in the air. A drone is like a helicopter, which also use propellers to fly and manoeuvre in the air. The theory of the drone is the same like helicopters but in this case, it uses four or six propellers that help hit stay stable in the midair. The reason we want our drone to be stable in the air is that the drone usually uses for taking aerial videos and pictures. An unstable drone will not be able to take steady pictures or videos in the midair. Actually, it works by thrusting the air down to generate an upward lift which is measured in grams or pounds. On the physics rules, the thrust must be equal to the weight of the drone to lift it up in the air. Heavier drone means, you need more powerful motors and propellers. We use thrust to weight ratio to determine the value of the upward thrust generated by a drone. The recommended value of TWR should be at least 2. You can also search the internet if you want to know more about the TWR and other functions of the propellers. There are many types of propellers available on the market that has a different thrust to weight ratio.
Folding Propeller
The folding propeller is a type of propellers which is used in many drones and aeroplanes. We called them folding because it is folded on the outside when we turn the motors on. The early version of these types uses only two blades but now they are available with three and four propellers. They are easily available on the market in different sizes.
Advantages and Disadvantages
Every type has its advantages and disadvantages. The main advantage of the folding propellers is that they make less vibration and noise and can be used for surveillance. Moreover, it also helps save fuel. The disadvantage of these propellers is that they are very costly compared to other propellers and the performance is also very poor.
Bull Nose Propellers
Bull Nose is another new type of propellers which is becoming very famous. Most of modern drones use these types of propellers. In this type, the surface area is increased to improve the thrust of the drone. Increasing the surface area of the propellers increases the thrust but it increases the fuel consumption and decreases the efficiency of the drone.
Pitch
Pitch of the propeller is an important thing to know. It is actually the measurement of how far a drone can move in the air in a single rotation of the motor. It means if you have a higher value of the pitch then your drone will move faster. This term is very important for you if you want to make some alternations in your drone. Another thing that influences the performance of a quadcopter is the angle of the propellers. We told earlier that a drone flies in the air by generating thrust and if you are able to increase the spinning of the propellers, you can increase the upward lift and overall performance of the drone.
Size of The Propeller
Some people increase the size of the propellers to improve the overall performance of the drone. They think that they can easily increase the speed of the drone in this way. But it is not right, by just increasing the size, you cannot increase the speed of a drone. The speed of the drone depends on the pitch and the surface area. You can increase the thrust of the drone by increasing the pitch and surface area but it will decrease the efficiency of the drone.
