In order to study the tradeoff regarding increased payload and decreased flight performance, we started our payload experiments by mounting two additional 6300mAh batteries beneath the bottom plate. Each battery weighs exactly 458g, which, together with the carbon fiber plates and mounting screws, resulted in a payload of nearly 1,000g. Except for an increased lift-off thrust requirement from 40% to 55% and a somewhat slower response time, no significant reduction in flight performance could be observed. Therefore, and due to our propulsion test results, the question arose, what if lifting the JAviator's empty weight, which would account for a payload of 2,200g? To this end, we mounted another completely assembled JAviator beneath the first one, but rotated it by 45 degrees to have the top one's rotors not in vertical line with the bottom one's. Although the lift-off thrust increased to roughly 80%, there was still enough thrust reserve for controlling this somewhat fancy-looking 'double-deck' JAviator. The flight performance was, as expected, reduced significantly and turned out to demand extraordinary reaction times from the pilot. However, we have demonstrated that our JAviator is capable of carrying its entire empty weight, and at the same time, provides sufficient freedom for controlled flying. Note that the same controller settings were used throughout all payload experiments. We believe that there is still potential for improving the JAviator's high-payload flight performance by appropriately adjusting the controller parameters for this purpose.
Many thanks to Silviu Craciunas for taking pictures and videos.