Free eVTOL Corpus — Schema v0.1

Status

v0.1 is the initial schema. Adapted from the Free Humanoid Corpus schema v0.2, with humanoid-specific fields (morphology_family, dof_count, end_effector, height_m, mass_kg, runtime_minutes) replaced by eVTOL-appropriate fields (lift_architecture, rotor_count, mtow_kg, length_m, wingspan_m, pax_count, endurance_minutes, range_km, cruise_speed_kt, transition_method, cert_path).

The tool-required fields (id, canonical_name, corpus, first_disclosure_date, schema_version, disclosure_citation, prior_art_notes, sources, disclosed_subsystems, lineage_ancestors, lineage_descendants, draft, last_updated) are identical across both corpora so tooling is shared.

Purpose

A structured catalog of every eVTOL aircraft and eVTOL-adjacent flying machine — current commercial air taxis, military VTOL demonstrators, academic rotorcraft, jetpacks, hover bikes, flying-car concepts, and the science fiction works that anticipated them.

The corpus IS the prior art commons. This is a load-bearing architectural decision. Every entry is a defensive publication artifact, not a Wikipedia entry. The commons does not sit on top of the corpus as a separate layer; the structured data in this repository, timestamped at the moment of commit, is itself the invalidity-contention material that future challenges will draw from.

The corpus serves three functions, in priority order:

  1. Defensive publication. Every entry, at the moment of merge and timestamp, is a public disclosure of the engineering, design, and prior art it describes. prior_art_notes is not editorial commentary — it is the element-by-element analysis a competent examiner or invalidity-contention attorney could cite.
  2. Design space map. What has been imagined, what has been built, what has been claimed, and where the gaps are.
  3. Citation graph. Who built on whom, what lineage each design belongs to, what intellectual debts are owed.

Quality bar for entries

An entry is not done when the schema fields are filled. An entry is done when:

  • disclosure_citation resolves to a primary source verifiable by a third party.
  • first_disclosure_date is defensible against challenge — earliest verifiable public disclosure, not earliest plausible date.
  • prior_art_notes reads as a 102/103 anticipation analysis someone unrelated to us could cite without rewriting. It identifies specific subsystems disclosed and what claims those disclosures could anticipate.
  • sources cite primary references (papers, books, patents, episodes), not Wikipedia or aggregators, except where the aggregator is itself the primary source.
  • For patented entries, ip_citations lists actual patent numbers, and prior_art_notes points back at anticipating prior art entries by id.

Entries below this bar may be merged with a draft: true flag to make incremental progress visible, but they do not yet count as commons material.

License posture

CC0-1.0. The corpus itself is public domain dedication. Individual entries cite their sources but the structured catalog is unencumbered.

Entry schema

Each entry is one record. Required fields are marked [R], optional [O].

id                      [R]  slug, kebab-case, globally unique within corpus
canonical_name          [R]  the name most commonly used in literature
aliases                 [O]  list of alternate names, model numbers, codenames
corpus                  [R]  one of: private | open | fictional | academic
first_disclosure_date   [R]  ISO 8601 date or year; earliest verifiable public reference
disclosure_citation     [R]  source for the first_disclosure_date (DOI, ISBN, URL, patent #, episode ID)
creator                 [R]  company / lab / studio / author / collective
creator_country         [O]  ISO country code of creator
lift_architecture       [R]  see lift-architecture taxonomy below
rotor_count             [O]  total lift rotor / propulsor count if disclosed
propulsion_type         [O]  electric | hybrid-series | hybrid-parallel | turbo-electric | hydrogen-fuel-cell | combustion | fictional | unknown
propulsion_details      [O]  motor topology, ducted vs. open, tip-speed, etc.
mtow_kg                 [O]  maximum takeoff weight in kg, if disclosed
empty_mass_kg           [O]  empty weight in kg, if disclosed
length_m                [O]  airframe length in meters, if disclosed
wingspan_m              [O]  wingspan or rotor-tip-to-rotor-tip in meters, if disclosed
pax_count               [O]  total seat count including pilot; 0 for cargo, null for fictional
payload_kg              [O]  payload capacity in kg, if disclosed
power_source            [O]  battery chemistry, fuel type, fuel cell, tethered, fictional
endurance_minutes       [O]  hover or total flight endurance, minutes, if disclosed
range_km                [O]  range in km, if disclosed
cruise_speed_kt         [O]  cruise speed in knots, if disclosed
hover_ceiling_m         [O]  service ceiling for hover, if disclosed
transition_method       [O]  how it transitions hover→cruise (none / tilt-rotor / tilt-wing / tilt-duct / vectored-thrust / clutched-lift-fan / tail-sitter-pitch-up / mode-shutdown / N/A)
control_architecture    [O]  fly-by-wire, mechanical, simplified-vehicle-operations, autonomous, fictional, etc.
sensing                 [O]  air data, IMU, radar altimeter, lidar, etc.
notable_capabilities    [O]  list of disclosed/claimed capabilities
cert_path               [O]  Part 23 | Part 25 | Part 27 | Part 29 | SC-VTOL | Part 103 | experimental | military | fictional | none
ip_status               [R]  patented | open-permissive | open-copyleft | public-domain | fictional | trade-secret | unknown
ip_citations            [O]  patent numbers, license identifiers, repo URLs
prior_art_notes         [O]  what subsystems/claims this entry could anticipate as 102/103 prior art
lineage_ancestors       [O]  ids of entries this design descends from
lineage_descendants     [O]  ids of entries that descend from this (filled in later passes)
sources                 [R]  list of citations (papers, books, articles, repos, episodes)
notes                   [O]  free-text observations
disclosed_subsystems    [O]  structured tags identifying specific subsystems disclosed
                             (see subsystem taxonomy below); enables targeted prior art search
cpc_classifications     [O]  CPC classification codes for examiner discoverability
                             (e.g., "B64C 29/00" for VTOL, "B64D 27/24" for electric propulsion)
draft                   [O]  boolean; true if the entry has not yet cleared the quality bar
schema_version          [R]  integer matching schema spec version
last_updated            [R]  ISO 8601 date

Lift-architecture taxonomy

Single load-bearing axis for sorting entries.

  • multirotor — fixed vertical rotors, often 4–18 (EHang, Volocopter, Jetson)
  • lift_plus_cruise — separate lift rotors + pusher/puller cruise propulsion (Beta Alia, Wisk Cora)
  • tilt_rotor — rotors tilt, wing fixed (Joby S4, Bell XV-15, V-22 Osprey)
  • tilt_wing — wing and rotors tilt together (LTV XC-142, Canadair CL-84)
  • tilt_duct — ducted fans tilt (Bell X-22, Doak VZ-4)
  • vectored_thrust — single or few jets/fans with vectoring (Harrier, F-35B)
  • ducted_fan_array — embedded ducted fans (Lilium, Aurora LightningStrike)
  • compound_rotorcraft — main rotor + auxiliary thrust (Fairey Rotodyne, Jaunt)
  • cyclorotor — cyclogyro / cycloidal propeller (D-Dalus, Pescara cyclogiro)
  • coleopter — annular wing tail-sitter (SNECMA C.450)
  • tail_sitter — fuselage rotates for transition (Convair XFY Pogo, X-13)
  • coanda_lift — Avrocar-class
  • flapping_wing — ornithopter (largely fictional)
  • jetpack_personal — strap-on (Bell Rocket Belt, Gravity Industries, JetPack Aviation)
  • hover_bike — open-rotor straddle (Aerofex, Hoversurf)
  • ground_effect_hybrid — WIG / ekranoplan with VTOL-like operations (REGENT seaglider)
  • buoyant_hybrid — airship with vectored-thrust VTOL augmentation; static (and partly aerodynamic) lift plus distributed/vectored electric thrust (LTA Pathfinder 1, Hybrid Air Vehicles Airlander 10, Flying Whales LCA60T)
  • transformer — drive+fly or fold-out (ASKA A5, AeroMobil, PAL-V, Klein Vision AirCar, Alef Model A, Airbus Pop.Up, XPENG AeroHT)
  • fictional_repulsor — anti-grav; useful as fictional-class anchor for generic “any VTOL” claims
  • other — escape hatch with explanation in notes

IP status definitions

  • patented — known patents asserted, with patent numbers
  • open-permissive — MIT, BSD, Apache, CERN-OHL-P, etc.
  • open-copyleft — GPL, CERN-OHL-S, etc.
  • public-domain — CC0 or equivalent dedication, or expired protection
  • fictional — exists only in narrative; copyright on the depiction may exist but the engineering description is unencumbered as prior art
  • trade-secret — claimed but not disclosed
  • unknown — needs investigation

Subsystem taxonomy

Tags applied to disclosed_subsystems to enable targeted prior art search. An entry tags every subsystem it discloses with enough specificity to cite. Tags are append-only to preserve cross-entry searchability.

Lift architecture

  • lift-distributed-electric-propulsion
  • lift-tilt-rotor
  • lift-tilt-wing
  • lift-tilt-duct
  • lift-vectored-thrust
  • lift-ducted-fan-array
  • lift-coaxial-rotor
  • lift-cyclorotor
  • lift-coanda-effect
  • lift-tip-jet-rotor
  • lift-compound-rotorcraft
  • lift-modular-docking — modular units that dock (in flight or on the ground) into a single composite multirotor airframe (ETH Distributed Flight Array, UPenn ModQuad, DRAGON, Airbus Pop.Up, Bell APT)
  • lift-buoyant-hybrid — static (helium) lift augmented by distributed/vectored electric thrust for controlled VTOL (LTA Pathfinder 1, Airlander 10, Flying Whales)
  • lift-stopped-rotor — rigid rotor that stops in flight to act as a fixed lifting surface (Sikorsky/DARPA X-Wing)

Transition control

  • transition-conversion-corridor
  • transition-thrust-borne-to-wing-borne
  • transition-3-bearing-swivel-duct
  • transition-lift-fan-clutched
  • transition-tail-sitter-pitch-up
  • transition-mode-shutdown

Propulsion

  • propulsion-bldc-direct-drive
  • propulsion-bldc-geared
  • propulsion-turbo-electric
  • propulsion-hybrid-series
  • propulsion-hybrid-parallel
  • propulsion-hydrogen-fuel-cell
  • propulsion-rim-driven-fan
  • propulsion-tip-jet

Energy / power

  • power-li-ion-pouch
  • power-li-ion-cylindrical
  • power-li-po
  • power-solid-state
  • power-battery-swap
  • power-fast-charge-megawatt
  • power-hybrid-genset
  • power-tethered

Control allocation

  • control-rotor-failure-reconfiguration
  • control-differential-thrust-attitude
  • control-fly-by-wire-triplex
  • control-simplified-vehicle-operations
  • control-trajectory-mpc
  • control-zero-pilot-rl-policy
  • control-fully-actuated-omnidirectional — independent control of force and torque in all 6 DOF; arbitrary-attitude hover (ETH Omnicopter, Voliro, CycloTech)
  • control-swarm-coordinated-fleet — one operator / planner controlling a fleet of N independent aircraft as a single coordinated system; formation flight and in-flight reconfiguration (KMel/UPenn nano-quad swarm, Intel Shooting Star, CollMot, ETH Flight Assembled Architecture)

Autonomy

  • autonomy-bvlos-detect-and-avoid
  • autonomy-utm-integration
  • autonomy-vertiport-approach
  • autonomy-pilot-removed

Sensing

  • sensing-air-data-boom
  • sensing-radar-altimeter
  • sensing-lidar-terrain
  • sensing-rotor-icing-detection
  • sensing-vibration-health-monitoring
  • sensing-stereo-camera-daa

Safety / airframe

  • safety-ballistic-parachute
  • safety-rotor-burst-containment
  • safety-emergency-autorotation
  • safety-controlled-emergency-landing
  • safety-redundant-bus
  • airframe-composite-monocoque
  • airframe-tilting-wing-spar
  • airframe-in-flight-morphing — airframe geometry actively reconfigures in flight (folding arms, transforming multilink body) with adaptive control allocation (EPFL folding drone, UZH Foldable Drone, DRAGON)
  • airframe-collision-resilient-cage — rotating / decoupling protective cage enabling collision-tolerant flight and contact-based maneuvers (EPFL GimBall, ModQuad cuboid frame)

Certification path

  • cert-part-23
  • cert-part-25
  • cert-part-27
  • cert-part-29
  • cert-sc-vtol
  • cert-part-103-ultralight
  • cert-faa-bvlos-waiver
  • cert-easa-special-condition-vtol
  • cert-experimental
  • cert-military

This taxonomy is expected to grow. New tags are added with provenance — the first entry to introduce a tag documents it in notes.

Storage format

Master corpus: corpus.jsonl — one JSON object per line, append-only, git-tracked. Per-corpus mirrors: private.jsonl, open.jsonl, fictional.jsonl, academic.jsonl. Index: CORPUS_INDEX.md — generated, alphabetical by canonical_name with id and one-line summary. Lineage graph: lineage.json — derived, ancestor/descendant DAG.

Versioning

Schema version increments on breaking changes. Entries carry schema_version so older entries can be migrated. v0.1 is the starting point and should be expected to evolve once the seed slice exposes inadequacies.

Public domain (CC0 1.0). The corpus IS the prior art commons.

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