Unmanned Systems Technology 017 | AAC HAMR UAV | Autopilots | Airborne surveillance | Primoco 500 two-stroke | Faro ScanBot UGV | Transponders | Intergeo, CUAV Expo and CUAV Show reports

56 P rimoco, based in Prague in the Czech Republic, isn’t a typical UAV developer. It has designed its initial UAV offering not only as an airframe but as a complete, made-in-house vehicle including the engine, to meet what is expected to be a massive growth in demand for mid-sized unmanned commercial and military aircraft. As part of the project, the engine has been devised to be fully integrated with the craft, and is an air- cooled two-stroke with four cylinders in a horizontally opposed configuration and a displacement of 500 cc. Designed specifically for the unmanned environment, the naturally aspirated Primoco 500 boxer engine runs on unleaded gasoline and, with a maximum crankshaft speed of 7000 rpm, produces 50 bhp. Having a light alloy structure, its ready-to-operate weight is only 25.5 kg including an integrated 24 V, 1400 W generator. The twin-spark power plant has been designed specifically for reliability, and is currently being developed for a time between overhauls (TBO) of 500 hours. Primoco will be making it available to other UAV vehicle manufacturers that have similar engine requirements. To find out more about this intriguing engine project, UST visited Primoco’s Prague base in November 2017. Ian Bamsey examines the development of this UAV power plant, which is designed to be fully incorporated with the rest of its intended vehicle Model of integration December/January 2018 | Unmanned Systems Technology The Primoco 500 (minus rear-mounted generator)