Elephant in the room - Quadcopters...

[grindz145]

I know they're worthless from a practical point of view, and it has nothing to do with transportation but...
I didn't see anyone mention quadcopters yet in this topic.

I see alot of people have the skills here...

http://hackaday.com/2010/01/15/aeroquad ... uadcopter/

a few Kw-h of LiPo and some 4 RC motors and you can have a military style drone of youre own....

I can imagine an automated-flying courier that can outrun any car/bike whatever:D

[AmpEater]

Based on 150lbs for the vehicle, 250lbs for the rider, you'd need about 400lbs of lift to get off the ground. So 100lbs/thrust per rotor, plus some headroom for takeoff and maneuvering. A WAG based on hasty extrapolation of a "120watts to produce 16 ounces of lift" pulled from a RC plane discussion shows (120watt x 400lbs = 48000w) or 48kw needed. A 45lb brick of turnigy lipo can do that easily, but only for about 3 minutes. That leaves 100lbs for frame and motors, which doesn't seem unreasonable.

Cons - failure of any single component is an issue. You don't just fall out of the sky if you do it right, but you do loose lift and start to spin. You don't have the option to glide down like a fixed wing craft.

Edit - I assumed you were talking human-size quadcopters. RC scale has been done 1000 times by now, even open source projects with hardware available. That doesn't keep me from wanting one, of course. I have a thermal camera that would be awesome to get airborne, but is outside the payload of most smaller quads.

[grindz145]

I'm not saying I'm not interested in human-sized quadcopters...

I just think they're cool and no its not really transportation, but if you could fly an autonomous vehicle to the store to pickup a loaf of bread for you, instead of a car, it might be in the spirit of ES...

OK I just think they're cool...

[mace1934]

"if you could fly an autonomous vehicle to the store to pickup a loaf of bread for you, instead of a car, it might be in the spirit of ES"

Amen.

[ce555]

Mace,

These guys are working on it !
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvRTALJp ... re=related

[TylerDurden]

[LockH]

Hehe... per ES Bible "Search found 335 matches: +drone"... and this thread popped up. (Bad Boy hasn't read thread but thought ya might like this vid "DRONE video shows Artic landscape during dogsled race:")
http://www.theweathernetwork.com/videos ... 6222771001

[parajared]

I fly quadcopters and I think its a really bad idea to have those finger chopping buggers in close proximity to people.

My little copter can heft about 200 grams and it has a noise level a little under that of a weed-eater. A certain devilish part of me delights at the thought of how people would react to a quadcopter big enough to heft a gallon of milk flying through the supermarket.

[LockH]

BURP So, they didn't show scenes where they were anywhere "close" to animals?

[Ykick]

I would agree UAV’s shouldn’t be flown in close proximity to people who’re frightened and/or concerned for their safety/privacy. It’s an intense amount of energy to release via prop wash.

However, they don’t all have to be finger choppers as evidenced in this video:


exoskeletons or "cages" seem to be another approach to avoiding serious injury/damage if things come into contact with the UAV.


I realize this is an old, old thread but I try to avoid the "D" word.

[nutnspecial]

Informative and sexy first link- sold-
one of each please!

There's gotta be some great action footage of these things by now. (yeah, no, I know about porn, I meant the drones) Doesn't that guy from russia mount uavs with shotguns that shoot silly puddy?

[TheBeastie]

Yeah I got some for my Quanum nova which is just the Cheerson-CX 20 re-labled.
The brakets were cheap but I spent $10 at least on screws because I was too fat and lazy to work out what size I exactly needed. M3 x 12Mm seems to have fit well, there in but I haven't flown it since adding them yet.
*edit* this is the wrong size screw, killed my motors..
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cheerson-CX-20- ... 5b0ab348fe
http://www.ebay.com/itm/360800564758?_t ... EBIDX%3AIT

When I got my quad I took it to my local park for my first fly and what I found secretly amusing was how I could barely control it since I barely knew what I was doing but folks would walk right past it with out the remotest inkling of fear and little interest, they just all assumed I knew exactly what I was doing, I did try to at least look like I did know what I was doing. I wonder how secretly amusing it would be for me if I took someones eye out.
Nothing like that ever happened though, one time I crashed into some tree branches then hit the ground with a decent thud and these dogs ran down and stood guard around it like real troops and waited for me or at least someone to arrive, wish I had that on video was funny as they were quite visually most concerned about the situation.

[Ykick]

My dog loves "hunting" our small multi's but keeps his distance from the large and powerful Phantom. He barks at it launching/landing - too funny!

UAV operation makes you responsible for any damages/injuries caused by your aircraft. Yep, take an eye out, slice somebody open, crash a windshield, damage a roof, etc. It’s all on the owner/operator. But to put things in perspective - most 2lb UAV direct hits would likely do little more damage than that of a softball off a bat in public park.

However, if you join the AMA (Academy of Model Aeronautics) and follow their published safety rules/guidelines, you’ll also be covered under a $2.5M liability insurance policy.

[nutnspecial]

this may be the craziest drone vid I've seen, but haven't seen much envelope-pressing in a few years.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNPJMk2fgJU

[LockH]

Newsweek special report: The future of aviation
http://europe.newsweek.com/future-aviation-328518

... and final section headed "Drones are here to stay".

[TheBeastie]

Yeah I got some for my Quanum nova which is just the Cheerson-CX 20 re-labled.
The brakets were cheap but I spent $10 at least on screws because I was too fat and lazy to work out what size I exactly needed. M3 x 16Mm seems to have fit well, there in but I haven't flown it since adding them yet.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cheerson-CX-20- ... 5b0ab348fe
http://www.ebay.com/itm/360800564758?_t ... EBIDX%3AIT

It looks like I ruined 3 of my motors when I installed my fender brackets, screws were a tad too long and went into the motor.
Don't think I can fix them, will have a try, they kind of make a kind of clunky sound trying to turn, seems like this guy did the same thing to his as well.
http://www.banggood.com/Cheerson-CX-20- ... 17965.html
This is what he says in the comments "Well. I knackered 2 motors. I bought prop guards and they came with the wrong length screws...about 1mm too long. I was too stupid to notice and the coils were damaged."

[spinningmagnets]

The larger varieties are actually doing quite a good business as a camera platform. The clients I keep reading about are farmers, real estate agents, police, firemen, and of course...the military.

http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewto ... 14&t=70283

[Joseph C.]

The newer DJI models will have collision avoidance so you can put a safety perimeter around people and animals.

[TheBeastie]

Gather around everyone, worlds biggest looser right here...
I cut through the wires on all my motors, going to cost $100 USD to get 4 new motors.
Can see all the carnage here..I took photos with a phone microscope lens gadget... Which was the only upside to this whole problem since I hadn't found a use for it yet and with the naked eye I couldn't see any damage.
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id= ... sp=sharing

The prop guards didn't come with screws and the thumb screws that come with the legs are same thread..
I did wonder if I could ruining my motors by screwing in my prop guards with screws too long but I thought there is no way they would ever allow someone to ruin the motors in such an easy way, boy was I wrong.

Here is a pic of the screw with the prop guard on going through the bottom all the way into the motor winding wire.

[Ykick]

Oops Beastie. You're not the 1st person to do similar. Some Phantom pilots have punctured their batteries from too long of screws when mounting Gimbals.

Other than high-end properties and/or large acreage, real estate agents simply aren’t into AP (aerial photography) enough to pay anything for the service. 50’ telescoping pole mount can get most anything a real estate agent thinks they need.

Farms, agriculture, search & rescue, life-guards, county assessors, vacation rentals, etc. - they’re the real early industry adopters of UAV’s.

[LockH]

[Ykick]

[TheBeastie]

Incredible Drones | Biggest Enemy of Humans / Rise of the Drones youtube video

Man that is an entertaining documentry, I decided to seek a higher quality one and I did on youtube...
I found a technically more legal and higher quality version of that documentary Rise of the Drones here below. PBS Nova so this appears to be directly from the source...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnhPWC9XG1Y ... 720p quality...

[LockH]

Sorry Folks. Maybe should have put this "new development" into this thread "The hovorbike that aims to take flight":
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewto ... 38&t=71151

Maybe these two threads should be combined... somehow.

[whatever]

I'm surprised small quads haven't been used in the military area, they would be ideal for close combat, using viewing goggles and an armed quad, would be damn hard to shoot one on the move, even if very close to the enemy.
If you could combine a very small winged aircraft with ability to glide with large quad setup or similar, I would think quite possible for human carrying vehicles very possible. Seems there is no end to what is possible. Another use for quads which hasn't as yet taken off is beach patrol for sharks, its been trialled here and there but I think that area has potential.
Another area ( not really quads but related) is if you have an online webcam with tilt/pan options, it means it is possible to set up whatever mechanical device you like and control it remotely ( using the pan/tilt controls), so you could be anywhere in the world and still be able to control your device via the net, that opens up all sorts of possibilities for the imaginative.