As I have posted this in other forums - wasn't sure I should repeat t here, but here it is...
Hi Guys I thought I would share something I just wrote to a supplier. Hope its ok to post it.
Have been reading about fly aways and various aircraft and manufacturers.
After our discussion I thought I would give you a view of what I am seeing and believe is occurring in the area.
As a background I do not have “Major” experience in the RPA area and am still learning myself, this never really stops.
I have over 100 hours of flight time of which some 60 or so hours are logged on three different types of RPA.
With some 300 plus hours of flight time on RC planes. (Given that was many years ago.)
I also have over 10 years of maintenance on FAA 18 Hornets and was a qualified Aircraft Mechanic Electrical in the Civilian area.
First off there are no restrictions on anyone – ALL makers of Remotely Piloted Aircraft suffer from “Fly Aways” ALL of them.
All of them also have other issues – some of which are “Slowly” being addressed.
If you read all the forums everyone has had issues of some kind.
Some may argue that one or another company have more or less than the other, personally I believe them all to be on par.
What can cause these to happen ? Or indeed cause any failure of an RPA ?
Here is a small list - not limited to any or all.
ESC Failure
GPS signal induced Failures – Fly Aways etc …
Poor Battery Maintenance
Losing Line of sight
Propeller Failures
Motor lifing issues
Bad soldering and construction
To name a few….
On the Pilot side many of these can be attributed to Poor Aircraft Maintenance in general and a real lack of understanding of what the pilot actually owns –
An Aircraft.
This is an item that many people fail to come to understand.
In that I mean – it is an electrical / mechanical item made by a person that will at some stage fail.
Parts wear out, people treat the item badly and fly them when they should not and expect them to just fly, without any care, forever.
In some cases we have the weekend guys that fly as a hobby or someone that has bought something for general fun, for themselves or their kids.
These guys can have some knowledge and with the serious hobbyist indeed quite a lot of knowledge, gained over many years of experience.
But the general user, weekend or otherwise almost never have a running log of maintenance checks or even preventative checks in any way.
They almost always just take the RPA out on a whim and almost never do research into what they will be doing or where and when they will fly.
For instance:
The GPS signals on an RPA can be interfered with if the K index is too high .. 7 or more can be a bad day to fly.
Essentially this is a magnetic storm / flare from the sun that can cause disturbances in the ionosphere.
During a storm the GPS signal an RPA gets from the satellites and then uses in its receivers can be “bent”, you can lose locks on satellites and your RPA can drift.
Some would say this causes only a minor drift … 100ft or so I’m not sure 100ft is minor and if the RPA loses enough signals in succession I believe it can get lost and possibly fly away.
However this comes back to the pilot keeping an eye on the weather – K index – Maintenance and other variables.
Do you know what the K index is before you fly ?
What about the area you are about to fly in ?
The manufacturer should supply an RPA in good condition to start with - then the Pilot should maintain it and do due diligence on the day of the flight.
With all conditions in mind, area, weather, safety K index, pilots readiness(Tired etc) and other variables.
After all this the pilot should actually have those facts in his / her possession, copies of the area they are flying in the weather, K index, a printout of the flight area / google map, log of battery usage and voltages etc.
Then if an RPA has a fly away or accident it can be presented to the manufacturer and perhaps it can be shown to be a firmware fault or aircraft issue that warrants a replacement etc.
Simply ringing a supplier and saying hey my RPA flew away and it wasn’t my fault really is not good enough.
Was the aircraft at the right height – did the pilot override the height restriction, were the winds at the op height too much for the RPA ?
Was the K index insane that day ?
Did the Pilot charge the batteries enough ?
If so how long have you had them and have you charted the use and voltages ?
You consider a near new battery ok for a 20 min flight. Then you go out one day expecting 20min.
You fly close for 10min … then fly at range for 5 min – expecting another 5 min to come back – and it doesn’t make it.
If you track the battery you will see a degradation over time and get less flight time as you go on.
This is normal wear and tear, the same for motors, Blades and other items on your RPA.
What I do task with is the fact manufacturers will not supply a maintenance sheet for their RPA
Nor will they give out an expected means between failure for the motors and other equipment on the RPA.
************
Simplistic Example: The following is only made up numbers.
I understand if company A gives you an expected life of say 250 hours for a motor and it dies at 249 hours - the client screams warranty …. It was 1 hour short of its life expectancy.
The company has to the replace X motors.
************
Seriously how hard would it really be for a respectable company, that wants to share our airspace and consider itself a safe operator for the protection of all airspace users to actually sit down and make a decent Maintenance manual ?
And on the other hand - the people that buy these, aircraft spend thousands of dollars on them – not including the extra batteries and other gear they buy for them, a serious investment and then do NO maintenance or data tracking of their own equipment.
That is insane. You buy a car and get it serviced and checked.
Flying around with an item that can cause damage and that so many people seem to be worried about – and yet you do no due diligence at all ?
I’m not sure whom, I feel for more ?
The manufacturer that can resolve these issues, work with the pilots and actually show they care for not only their product and their user is the one we should respect and support.
Regards.
Doc Baldwin
www.52Photos.com |