Merlin is a lightweight electrically powered unmanned bi-plane miniature UAV, developed to support light ground forces with surveillance capability. The 1 meter long vehicle uses 1.6 meter span bi-plane wing. Its Gross takeoff Weight is 6 kg, and two-axis stabilized payload weight is 0.8kg. The operator can assemble and prepare the Merlin for a mission in five minutes. The MAV is launched by hand or sling, to a mission of over one hour, at cruising speed of 55 – 75 km/h. At the completion of the mission Merlin automatically returns to a pre-designated landing point sized 30×30 meters, where it is retrieved by a parachute. Merlin is capable of operating with three types of payloads – daylight TV with an x10 zoom, day/night payload operating an uncooled IR camera, derived from the Felin PROGRAM, and a ECCMOS-IL day/night camera which was also selected for FELIN. The datalink used by Merlin operates at a range of 7 km, at a frequency of 5 GHz.
