UAV control via iPad

Scott Plunkett April 4, 2010 at 8:29pm

@ Andy Schwarz - Very cool conceptually, but as someone who has dealt with the military and their specs / requirements...the iPad will never hold up to virtually ANY of their field ruggedness specs...are you planning on doing a casing of some sort to add both the Tx/Rx AND the rugged requirements? Either way, I applaud the concept of having extremely intuitive UI and physical interface.

Andy Schwarz April 4, 2010 at 5:45pm

Btw, the T-28 is just a temporary solution. We are investigating to build a battle-field mini UAS.

Andy Schwarz April 4, 2010 at 5:44pm

Hi, I am the developer of this software. We are not using 3G or WLAN for the communication interface. It's all based on a special hardware interface that docks on the standard Apple Port. The hardware transmits the data on UHF (2.2-2.3 GHz) and we testing a currently 5.8 GHz.FHSS. The whole system is very experimental at the moment, but what you see on the picture is a screenshot from the live system (using an PZ T-28). The software runs currently on Windows XP, but we are using a special designed Framework which runs the code on both platforms.

The goal is here to create a proof of concept UAS which is ready to use within 5min and an intuitive ergonomic ground station. Basically every soldier on the battle field should have one of these packages :-)

The project is not commercial but also not open-source (at this time). If it ever becomes reality than probably as military application only.

Thanks,

Andy

Scott Plunkett April 3, 2010 at 5:57pm

This is an interesting idea...but Gary hit the mail on the head - how does it send and receive data to the UAS...it would have to be via the WiFi or the 3G signal...but I doubt seriously this would work over 3G, so it must be some sort of server side application, then fed over some other broadband, then across the WiFi.

3D Robotics

Chris Anderson April 3, 2010 at 1:49pm

Nope. I don't have an iPad SDK. I'm actually planning another project with the Parrot AR.Drone, which is an add-on Arduino board that allows you to add any sensors you want and use them to control the quad, with the outer loop running on your laptop. Just struggling a bit with the lack of desktop code; there's nothing for Windows or Mac yet (just Android, iPhone and Linux)