Drone Talk Thread

[HKGuns]

Haven’t seen much if any drone discussion on here.

I picked up a Chicom DJI Mavik Air2 that shoots fantastic 4K video.

Any other drone pilots out there?

Any thoughts on the long term impact of the Chicoms basically owning the drone market?

Video example linked below, shot in 4K 60 FPS. Best viewed on a very large 4K TV.


https://youtu.be/04_r1H7Bpo0

[Alex V]

We bought a Mavic Pro for work. I got my drone license using my private pilot license as a back up to my boss taking the test.

It has since been lost in a drainage ditch. :-(

I wasn’t PIC at the time.

It does take fantastic video and the automation ability is really cool. I’m sure the Chinese have a copy of all the video we took

[BrigandTwoFour]

I really want a Skydio 2, but living so close to the DC no-fly zone is kind of a problem. I'm not sure how often I'd get out to BLM land to actually use it.

[TehLlama]

Any other drone pilots out there?

Any thoughts on the long term impact of the Chicoms basically owning the drone market?

I'm way deep into he DIY bucket on racing versions. The closest we have gotten to domestically making parts is winding up with some .gov sales compliant stuff that's way overpriced, and few oddball hobbyist answers where they're US assembled from chinese parts, and those still have knockoff copies coming out around the same time as the legit parts.

On the hobby side, the turnover on designs is so fast that I swear China is even losing money in 80% of the sector, but they're the only manufacturing base that can achieve the volume... and most of the time a crap iteration can be replaced with a few product cycles where the early adopters get used as the alpha/beta testers, and the fourth generation of the product can actually be quite good because the bugs have finally been worked out.

Even with a mountain of fun FPV ones, the Skydio is tempting for the Nate Hills application - just let it chase me while I ride bikes. That said, to me that's relatively expensive when I could probably bribe other FPV pilots to do the same with their gear and get a better result.

[TexHill]

Haven’t seen much if any drone discussion on here.

I picked up a Chicom DJI Mavik Air2 that shoots fantastic 4K video.

Any other drone pilots out there?

Any thoughts on the long term impact of the Chicoms basically owning the drone market?

Video example linked below, shot in 4K 60 FPS. Best viewed on a very large 4K TV.


https://hkguns.zenfolio.com/img/s/v-11/o808379449/c10000/p3959441336-200.mp4

I have a Mavic Pro Platinum and the DJI Goggles. I have really enjoyed flying it, but sadly the hobby won't last much longer because companies like Amazon are pushing the FAA to severely restrict single user, non-commercial drone use. One such tactic is the proposed requirement - "Remote ID" - that all drones have an active, real time "transponder" that will connect via cellular network and identify the location of the unit and operator as well as the personal information of the owner/operator. The FAA has proposed that the public will have unfettered access to this information.

This proposal would effectively kill the hobby because we would have to either A) buy new drones with the transponder already installed, B) retrofit our drones with a transponder if possible - I haven't seen anyone offering the kits to do so as yet C) be limited to flying within some designated areas that the FAA is "willing" to set aside for hobbyists that are unable or unwilling to comply with this mandate.

Another issue is the added cost. Hobbyists who do want to comply will have to subscribe to a service which will operate the network that the transponders will communicate with. I don't anticipate the subscription being cheap, and this added cost will stop a lot of people from getting into the hobby.

Personally I won't comply, but I also have stopped updating the firmware on my drone so they can't ground me permanently. I'll be flying illegally, but at least I'll be able to still fly.

https://youtu.be/C7xRp9e7W00

[FromMyColdDeadHand]

Haven’t seen much if any drone discussion on here.

I picked up a Chicom DJI Mavik Air2 that shoots fantastic 4K video.

Any other drone pilots out there?

Any thoughts on the long term impact of the Chicoms basically owning the drone market?

Video example linked below, shot in 4K 60 FPS. Best viewed on a very large 4K TV.


https://hkguns.zenfolio.com/img/s/v-11/o808379449/c10000/p3959441336-200.mp4

Bad link?

[ABNAK]

Since this is a "drone talk" thread, I am intrigued by something I've read called "drone swarms". Dozens of small drones with small explosive packages onboard that can overwhelm the defenses of a particular target (like an air base for instance).

Would these be flown en masse most of the way and then split up to attack from various directions at once? Can one guy fly the "flock" and then do individual guys have to take over once they split up for the final attack run? I've read where Iran has been practicing this. Not sure if the Russians or ChiComs have plans to utilize this strategy, as they would have more technologically superior weapons available since they're near-peer with us.

[TehLlama]

Since this is a "drone talk" thread, I am intrigued by something I've read called "drone swarms". Dozens of small drones with small explosive packages onboard that can overwhelm the defenses of a particular target (like an air base for instance).

Would these be flown en masse most of the way and then split up to attack from various directions at once? Can one guy fly the "flock" and then do individual guys have to take over once they split up for the final attack run? I've read where Iran has been practicing this. Not sure if the Russians or ChiComs have plans to utilize this strategy, as they would have more technologically superior weapons available since they're near-peer with us.

Since my day job deals with exactly this - they're semi-autonomous, basically all you need it to plug them in. Doesn't require an immense amount of processing power to achieve, nor is the hardware cost prohibitive. If you wanted a ghetto-swarm out of COTS stuff with multiple pilots, sure, but that's not the simplest answer, just set up whatever is around with spoofed RTH coordinates and try to cause some chaos.

It wouldn't necessarily put them on peer status, but practically in asymmetric warfare it's a major cost/benefit tool that aids our adversaries because most of our solutions to deal with that suck (kinetics and RC jamming aren't complete solutions). Ditto on unfriendly ISR capability

[signal4l]

I've been considering getting my FAA drone license and purchasing a drone. The Mavik seem to be extremely popular. I would prefer a different brand. Didn't the DOD order military personnel to not install Mavik software?

Are the Autel drones a decent alternative?

[n517rv]

I'm a fixed wing pilot and also have my Part 107 license. I have a DJI Mavic Pro and a DJI Phantom 4 Pro as well as a several a few FPV quads I've either purchased or built.

Patiently waiting for the Mavic Pro 3.

I'm also getting into some fixed wing FPV running iNav soon.



Sent from my Pixel 4 XL using Tapatalk

[TehLlama]

I've been considering getting my FAA drone license and purchasing a drone. The Mavik seem to be extremely popular. I would prefer a different brand. Didn't the DOD order military personnel to not install Mavik software?

Are the Autel drones a decent alternative?

You don't need the Part 107 to fly one of those - you can get the Mini (<250g) and no registration is even needed, that's actually a remarkably capable little unit.


All the DJI stuff that runs their firmware has the security liability baked in - frustrationg, but dumb.

I'm probably going to have to start learning iNav in earnest, just using the limited GPS RTH capability in Betaflight (and helping how I can with improving aggressive flight performance).

[markm]

Our buddy brought a nice drone out Sunday. Not sure the make, but I was impressed with the image quality. He paid $2k for it. We were able to check on the status of our downed target at 1300 yards without driving out to it.

[HKGuns]

Bad link?

Yeah, fixed it for you.

[HKGuns]

I've been considering getting my FAA drone license and purchasing a drone. The Mavik seem to be extremely popular. I would prefer a different brand. Didn't the DOD order military personnel to not install Mavik software?

Are the Autel drones a decent alternative?

Pretty sure Autel is Chicom as well.

The only viable option from a company based in the US is Skydio as far as I can tell, but it is probably made in China.

Really hard to understand why they lead this market without a lot of competition from US based companies.

[TehLlama]

...probably made in China.

Really hard to understand why they lead this market without a lot of competition from US based companies.

Comes down to $/SMD placement. The clever companies succeed by condensing a lot of the logic into chips that can then be encrypted and store all the data - the PCB designs, assume that a Chicom competitor is going to buy (or steal) one example, machine away every later, and reverse-engineer that to make their own... but ultimately the hardware cost (and sensors, etc.) plus assembly is about half the price in dedicated China factories, and the government will continue to subsidize this at a loss because it's bringing them into the economic discussion as both a GDP throughput and whatever miscellaneous technology they can lift along the way... in a lot of regards I'm impressed that capability has persisted elsewhere, but those applications are too important, and keeping an industrial base outside of Guangzhou is somewhat critical for other industries.