Calgary Police are testing the Dragan X6 multirotor. Excerpt from the article:
"The key in expanding the service's use of the technology is going to be proving the images hold up in court, Engele said. The X6 was used previously by the Ontario Provincial Police to photograph a homicide scene in rural Ontario and could be used in tactical or surveillance operations, he said."
Compared to flying a crewed helicopter, $17k is very cheap. And if Honeywell was selling it, the cost would be $85k. As Peter notes, the customers are not technical and they are looking for a turnkey solution. I wish these guys the best of luck in opening the market. If they succeed, it becomes a lot easier down the road for less expensive competitors.
Hello Mr. Crossfire.
I've seen MikroKopter and it looks like it could do the job alright. But if the notion of the UAV is to be taken seriously by the various differant Government bodies that might be interested in them then would it not be better to approach them with something like the X6 with seems to have had a huge amount of R and D thrown at it.And it looks it too. When you pull it out of the case it'l be ohs and ahs all round ( slight exageration
here but you know what I mean). If you can impress them with this think on the ground then you have their
full attention from the word go. If you pull out a UAV that looks like you built it on you kitchen table I think
it'l be treated as such. These are busy people, they'l only give you half of their attention and the other
half will be arranging a round of golf with the other. The X6 is safe, high on the list for such bodies, easy to fly, cutting training costs, and ready to go from a one stop shop. All the R and D is already done. I know it's expensive but it seems to be quite genuine.
You can buy a MikroKopter that does the same thing for under a thou. You can build your own for under $500. But unlike you, government departments don't have to make money. They make money no matter what they sell. If you don't think $17,000 is worth it for AP, well you can't just walk out of the government AP store without paying.
Hello Xelax
Could you give an example of "the open source stuff coming out of Europe". The main reasons I was looking at the X6 is the ease with which it can be flown, launch time, and, most importantly, it looks serious. That might sound a bit shallow or downright stupid but if a client is paying for the hire of this kind of unit its important that it looks like a serious piece of kit. The cheapest I've seen any alternative is 18.000 euro compared to 19.000 euro for a fully loaded X6 and they seem somewhat lacking in comparison.
The X6 is a massively over priced toy!
It has less capability than much of the open source stuff coming out of Europe at less than 1/20th of the price!
Really small payload capacity too.......
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I sent you an email
I've seen MikroKopter and it looks like it could do the job alright. But if the notion of the UAV is to be taken seriously by the various differant Government bodies that might be interested in them then would it not be better to approach them with something like the X6 with seems to have had a huge amount of R and D thrown at it.And it looks it too. When you pull it out of the case it'l be ohs and ahs all round ( slight exageration
here but you know what I mean). If you can impress them with this think on the ground then you have their
full attention from the word go. If you pull out a UAV that looks like you built it on you kitchen table I think
it'l be treated as such. These are busy people, they'l only give you half of their attention and the other
half will be arranging a round of golf with the other. The X6 is safe, high on the list for such bodies, easy to fly, cutting training costs, and ready to go from a one stop shop. All the R and D is already done. I know it's expensive but it seems to be quite genuine.
Could you give an example of "the open source stuff coming out of Europe". The main reasons I was looking at the X6 is the ease with which it can be flown, launch time, and, most importantly, it looks serious. That might sound a bit shallow or downright stupid but if a client is paying for the hire of this kind of unit its important that it looks like a serious piece of kit. The cheapest I've seen any alternative is 18.000 euro compared to 19.000 euro for a fully loaded X6 and they seem somewhat lacking in comparison.
It has less capability than much of the open source stuff coming out of Europe at less than 1/20th of the price!
Really small payload capacity too.......
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