A software engineer who’s also into drones and 3D printing has shared a single-motor drone that they built inside their home and tested on their bed. Joshua Bird shared a video of how they created it on YouTube , highlighting the unique technique they used to maintain controllability and stability. The design used a combination of a hinged propeller, rapid changes to the motor’s rotation speed, and a custom flight controller and motor controller firmware that allowed the motor to react to necessary changes in under 0.2 milliseconds.

Most rotary wing aircraft require a mechanism to counteract the torque generated by the motor or engine and to change its flight direction, typically with the use of a swash plate to change rotor disk attitude and a secondary propeller. While this method has been effective for decades, it has made rotary-wing aircraft heavier and more complex.…