New Drone

[biltno]

This was in the local news today
New 'endurance drone' to fly five times as long as others

New 'endurance drone' to fly five times as long as others

(Via WTNH News 8)

 

[wings]

$7000. Hurry before they are gone!

 

[PatR]

Some will still complain of not having enough flight time...

 

[biltno]

Lol PatR
I agree 7000.00 is outrageous. Like everything else in 6-12 months it will be 3000.00, or there will be other manufacturers that have even better flight times. It’s likely the next biggest advancement in the drone world will be better batteries and / Or longer range

 

[PatR]

$7,000.00 is not outrageous at all. That cost falls squarely within the price range of a good RC aerobatic competition fixed wing aircraft that many have been flying for a very long time. What we pay for a consumer drone is equal to or only slightly exceeds the cost of a good, empty Giant Scale airframe before adding the engine and RC equipment. Just for giggles, their average flight time using gas or glow fuel is between 8 and 15 minutes. Longer times can be done with larger fuel tanks but they become heavy and aerobatic performance suffers. I know the costs and performance well as I have 4 of them.

Longer range has been available for years. Think in distances of 70 to 90 miles but your can’t legally fly long distance. We are still bound by LOS rules regardless of the number of people that violate them. Without FAA approval and a CoA issuance we can’t fly “long range”.

Next is affordability. Neither our auto pilots or ground stations are good enough to deal with long range ops. Also necessary for BLOS are things like transponders or other ID/position broadcast equipment. Having flown long range systems since 2005 I know the transmission equipment necessary reliable enough to be consistently effective is quite expensive and there’s a lot of it. Despite what we pay for our stuff they are still just expensive toys and not suitable for long range operations.

Few of us need to fly “long range”. Many want to but they don’t have a legitimate need to. However, those on the ground deserve and need to be safe from the antics of people flying RC and their safety has priority over our wants.

 

[AH-1G]

I want "Long endurance" as the post mentioned not "long range".

 

[PatR]

20 or 30 minutes is plenty. Multi-hour endurance with a multirotor doesn’t make a lot of sense when other systems of much greater efficiency carrying far better payloads have been operating a long time, even some with VTOL and hover capability. Performance costs money and one thing consistent with the majority of multirotor operators is they don’t want or like to spend the money needed to obtain elevated performance levels.

I forgot to include TCAS in my previous post. If people want to fly long range they will need to have real collision detection and automated avoidance equipment that can communicate with other aircraft and ATC in their aircraft, not the close in toy level stuff they have now. The point I’m trying to make with all this is that many simply don’t have any comprehension of what’s required to operate safely and effectively at “long range”, or the expense involved.

 

[FlushVision]

For me, long endurance is far more important than distance (I'm a LOS kind of guy) but even the endurance thing isn't my first priority, thou it would be nice to have. I usually average around 13 minutes in the air (I can push the time higher if I run my batteries lower) and that usually suits me just fine since I've found that there is only a certain amount of video I can take at one location without running into repetition issues. If I need to be in the air longer I just land and change batteries.

My first priority would be a reliable system that is steady in the air even in wind and has a good gimbal. The TH goes a long way towards ticking those boxes even though it does have it's foibles.

 

[KEITH KUHN]

For me, long endurance is far more important than distance (I'm a LOS kind of guy) but even the endurance thing isn't my first priority, thou it would be nice to have. I usually average around 13 minutes in the air (I can push the time higher if I run my batteries lower) and that usually suits me just fine since I've found that there is only a certain amount of video I can take at one location without running into repetition issues. If I need to be in the air longer I just land and change batteries.

My first priority would be a reliable system that is steady in the air even in wind and has a good gimbal. The TH goes a long way towards ticking those boxes even though it does have it's foibles.

I am with you on all counts

 

[PatR]

It’s hard not to love how well the H gimbal performs, and how well the H handles wind.

 

[Chefinthesky]

Hmm, sure the engineering is impressive but for that price I can buy three more H models, spare batteries for each, a new set of tires, a full tank of gas and a month's worth of Guinesss.

 

[DoomMeister]

Hmm, sure the engineering is impressive but for that price I can buy three more H models, spare batteries for each, a new set of tires, a full tank of gas and a month's worth of Guinesss.

I’ll have a pint with ya, bottoms up.

 

[Sureshot]

My first question is the same as it was for the Tesla truck,
What's the payload?

 

[BobW55]

You will find that endurance has its limitations. I have a fixed wind that can easily do 30 + minutes. By the time I add up the video transmitter (600MW) the 3 cameras, flight batteries, and autopilot, I am way over $1500 for it. While it can loiter for a long time, you almost get tired of flying it. I still have to figure out the Auto pilot that will make it fly grid patterns. But you still have to keep it with in VLOS, and Radio line of sight.

 

[FlushVision]

For me, at any rate, a prolonged flight risks me having a lapse of concentration...more likely to take my eye off the ball, so to speak. So I'm happier having shorter flights using multiple batteries. Between flights I can take stock of what I've achieved during the last flight and decide whether I need to do some re-takes of shots already done or move on to another scene. So it is, then, that even if I had over 30 minutes endurance in the battery I would still probably land half way through.

 

[biltno]

I flew my h yesterday for a brief time
Haven’t flown in a while. I was too paranoid to put the second battery in just to bring it off a full charge because of so many having issues flying it seems after changing the battery. I am real aggressive installing it too. I push it in hard and make sure it’s flush. The battery my Q came with didn’t last long at all and gave no sign of failure. I was at a 30 foot hover went to 50 feet and all the sudden I had battery failure and I got real lucky getting it down. I couldn’t land it smoothly and only broke 1 prop. Hopefully buying a good charger will give me a hint that my battery’s are getting weak.