First flight 2011 | ||
CPPC UAV is a Chinese UAV developed by [[zh:中国石油管道学院|China Petroleum Pipeline College (CPPC, 中国石油管道学院)] of CNPC : China National Petroleum Corporation], also known as Hebei Technical College of Petroleum Profession (河北石油职业技术学院). CPPC UAV is specially designed for aerial patrol, surveillance, and survey missions for petroleum pipelines, and has already entered service.
CPPC UAV program rooted from the need to improve the maintenance, patrol, surveillance, and survey tasks performed manually for petroleum pipelines due to the high cost, slow response, high cost due to the man-hour needed, as well as other problems of performing these missions manually. UAV is a good answer to reduce if not completely resolve these problems, and CPPC was tasked to develop an UAV specifically tailored to the need of petroleum industry. Program begun in 2011, and was successfully completed in 2013, earning sixteen patents. The program manager is Mr. Liu Yan-ru (刘彦儒), the department chairman of electrical engineering of CPPC. CPPC UAV is a fixed-wing UAV in conventional layout with high-wing configuration and a pair of skids as landing gear. Propulsion is provided by a two-blade propeller driven by a tractor engine mounted in the nose. Plans have been to further develop the UAV into a family to meet different demands. Although initially designed for missions for petroleum pipeline, the UAV can also be adopted for natural gas pipeline as well. The unit cost of a complete system including the UAV itself, ground control station and other prepherial equipment is around ¥ 500,000.