this is awesome, will you relaease the stL

I never built it so there are no real designs. These were just doodles in SketchUp. I have most of the skills now needed to make it, but I don't have time/money. One day when I achieve financial freedom I'll come back to it.

ill be happily waiting. this project concept is to cool to leave alone.

Such a rad project, how's it coming?

This project has stalled, I don't know maybe indefinitely? My life took a different direction(went into software) so I haven't done much flying/haven't had an interest to build stuff like this. This thing is also stupidly complicated for no real benefit and it's dangerous. You can electronically break propellers with the ESC but I don't know how well that would work in this application regarding wear/tear and how safe it is for you "to just catch it".

It is neat though, regarding the challenges involved with programming/direction/physics like working with an IMU. I'm still a high-level guy so some Arduino is the lowest I've gotten. Python would be next closest thing. But yeah and I have a 3D printer now/can design but would need to work out the safety of those blades how big the hubs have to be so they don't separate/be a hazard.

Definitely insan. Those are the Best Projects.

Magnetism using custom wound coils in a clever configuration might be better/faster/more reliable than memory wire for tilting your rotors, though. Maybe, maybe not. I haven't done the math or anything.

Thanks for your input. 

My concern was the constant load. A servo has the gears like a hydraulic, where you leave it in that position and it takes some force to move it eg. drag from the air. But a current based pitch control may use a lot of power. 

Also the induction coilwash-plate would need to operate at two different levels. A low and a high. One for signal/positioning and the other to actually maintain the pitch of the blade. 

The concern is the rotating speed, cross section of the coils/number of winds and the capacitors on the individual micontrollers(for maintaining power when the coils aren't directly over each other) on each blade to respond fast enough as the blades rotate over the stationary control piece. Hence I tried to go for mechanical linkages initially.

I agree that muscle wire is probably way too slow. You should look at the underactuated helicopter rotor that came out of some university or other a couple of years ago. It uses the same motor that drives the rotor to control the cyclic pitch, using speed variations and angled hinges. The blog had a post on it, IIRC.