Abstract
In this paper, research and development of folding and deployment mechanisms is introduced for a deployment wing type autonomous air vehicle. We propose two type mechanisms. One is a hard wing type that can be stored by folding wing segments connected with spring hinges and can be deployed by the springs. The other one is a soft wing type made from EPP that can be stored by bending the wing and can be deployed by its own bending restitutive force. These two autonomous air vehicles are developed and flight experiments including an opportunity to launch them to an altitude of 4,000m are conducted. This paper shows the design details and the results of these experiments.
