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  #31  
Old 12-04-2013, 06:06 PM
Scorch Scorch is offline
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I heard Doug is selling his Cub and buying a drone to use for spotting deer and wild pigs. Much safer than that "flying" stuff and cheaper, too ... There really is no downside.

Might be just a rumor...
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  #32  
Old 12-05-2013, 04:26 PM
Echo Tango Echo Tango is offline
 
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I, for one, welcome our new drone ovelords.


Really, though, the range on the civilian RC drones are fairly low (about a mile for a few thousand bucks) which will price most people out of the market. Most anything else would be deemed illegal under FCC regulations without a HAM radio license. Now let's get into weight. Your average hobby drone is around 10 lbs. A turkey or goose? A little heavier, and there are millions of those flying around. I don't really see the issue until these things start having onboard maps and inertial navigation where they can fly "free" from a radio tether and to high altitudes. Which would kind of take the fun out of FPV (first person video) rc flight.

As far as the amazon drones go... i'm sure they'll be restricted to something below 500 AGL and restricted outside of areas within so many miles of known flight paths/airports. color me unconcerned.
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  #33  
Old 12-05-2013, 04:49 PM
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Mike S Mike S is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Echo Tango View Post
I don't really see the issue until these things start having onboard maps and inertial navigation where they can fly "free" from a radio tether
Read it and weep.

http://www.xheli.com/05p-flightcontrol-mega-mx.html

Quote from linked page "It allows the user to turn any fixed wing, rotary wing or multi-rotor vehicle (even boats and car) into a fully autonomous vehicle capable of performing programmed GPS missions with waypoints"
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  #34  
Old 12-05-2013, 07:46 PM
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Low Pass Low Pass is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike S View Post
Read it and weep.

http://www.xheli.com/05p-flightcontrol-mega-mx.html

Quote from linked page "It allows the user to turn any fixed wing, rotary wing or multi-rotor vehicle (even boats and car) into a fully autonomous vehicle capable of performing programmed GPS missions with waypoints"
This is already here and common with the quad and similar electric copters. Friend of mine has one that can find its way home and land where it originally took off. Autonomous flight, I believe they call that.
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  #35  
Old 12-05-2013, 08:20 PM
Echo Tango Echo Tango is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike S View Post
Read it and weep.

http://www.xheli.com/05p-flightcontrol-mega-mx.html

Quote from linked page "It allows the user to turn any fixed wing, rotary wing or multi-rotor vehicle (even boats and car) into a fully autonomous vehicle capable of performing programmed GPS missions with waypoints"
NEAT! And potentially dangerous, but I'm still skeptical. 99% of the people flying these "drones" are FPVers, where the allure is not sending something out on a mission, it's flying the mission. I'm sure there is a very small community that would be interested, but it's not very exciting (from where I'm sitting).

for those not familiar: FPV is the term used to describe drone pilots who wear goggles (or use a tv monitor) and use radio to pilot RC aircraft with a first person view (they have HUDs with airspeed, signal strength, altitude, HDG, etc...) via a radio data link and video feed. as stated earlier, the ranges are fairly short and there is usually a spotter.


If the autonomous community starts growing in size similar to the FPV guys, I'll be worried. But I don't think that will happen. And anything on a large scale will be fairly regulated (I friggin hope).
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  #36  
Old 12-05-2013, 08:25 PM
Echo Tango Echo Tango is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Low Pass View Post
This is already here and common with the quad and similar electric copters. Friend of mine has one that can find its way home and land where it originally took off. Autonomous flight, I believe they call that.
that could just be what is commonly used in FPV, known as a RTH (return to home/base) program where the thing will come back home if it loses the data link. as far as i know, there isn't much of an autonomous flight community
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  #37  
Old 12-05-2013, 09:16 PM
BillL BillL is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Echo Tango View Post
that could just be what is commonly used in FPV, known as a RTH (return to home/base) program where the thing will come back home if it loses the data link. as far as i know, there isn't much of an autonomous flight community
Well, maybe not, but the Universities have been putting out many engineers with deep expertise in autonomy for more than 15 years. Quite an amateur robotics community too. Autonomous flight is easier than navigating roads, obstacles and traffic. Much easier if you ignore traffic.

When I arrived as a research engineering manager, a couple of my new reports took me out to ride in an autonomous compactor. You know, like to compact a land fill or prepare a parking lot? It used GPS for an electronic fence, sensors to see and identify people or large hazards to be avoided and ran an efficiency algorithm to plot it's compacting path. I rode in this thing in a huge parking lot with nothing more than a big red (OS) button and some yellow ribbons. It would stop and turn very precisely, and it was eerie to ride in. Two guys built and programmed it in 6 months. They had MS degrees and 2-3 years experience. There were not enough projects like this to keep them busy, so they moved to other companies where controls development was still interesting.

This kind of expertise with ready access to small, powerful processors and friends could generate some very capable quads without much money or effort.
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  #38  
Old 12-06-2013, 01:01 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bill_H View Post
Not only "drone-hunting" but also "hunting with drones" may occur. Spot the prey and herd it towards you.

I know a gentleman that does this already, with an organic carbon-based drone aka Harris' Hawk.
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  #39  
Old 12-06-2013, 01:02 PM
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walkman walkman is offline
 
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Originally Posted by flyboy1963 View Post
and then there's the 'other' guys.....
around here, I hate to say, certain people will be hiring high-skool kids to fly these over all of their multiple mountainside grow ops to provide security...and then they can dispatch an interdiction team should they see their crop being disturbed, or law enforcement getting too close.
...and you can bet you won't get a NOTAM about those!..nor will they be follwing the 'rules'.
Well, hopefully pretty soon the grows will be legal operations
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  #40  
Old 12-06-2013, 08:52 PM
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mvidalr mvidalr is offline
 
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Not-so-long time ago, in a galaxy far away, I started a drone business in my city (Mexico).

This is my drone, drone meet VAF:


It flies up to 88 minutes, weights 11lb, ranges up to 1 mile on R/C, 25mi on programmed gps, and has a ceiling of up to 13,123ft.
It costs more than a fully assembled and airworthy RV-8.

Mexico airspace is still unrestricted for this things. Of course, as both a real and a drone pilot, I always notify local ATC about my operations, and always keep both an eye out and an Airband transceiver handy monitoring local fqs.

I do take a lot of care and safety in my operations, and my philosophy is to never "drone" into civil airspace, away from airports, and never higher than 3,000 ft with clear skies, as well as never into a cloud or IMC and always within sight. I also make to myself sort of a "drone flight plan", a preestablished, preprogrammed and mission-oriented gps flight path, as well as always monitor local Wx and area NOTAMS (should there be any).

BUT THERE WILL BE non-pilot/non-aviation folks and businessmen who will become my competition and start flying this things recklessly. No questions asked. They are the ones who we will -unfortunately and undoubtedly- have to keep an eye on.

My drone has many fail-safe functions and will never astray by itself, but human error makes up for 60% to 80% of aviation-related accidents, right?
My fear is what will be that human error percentage in drone-aviation-related accidents?
*goosebumps*
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Last edited by mvidalr : 12-06-2013 at 08:55 PM.
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