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Sky Eye-30XZ is a 3-axis high stabilized gimbal with 1080P 30X zoom camera for drone inspection, surveillance, search and rescue applications.
The 30X optical zoom camera provides 1080P 60FPS full HD video streaming, which will enable you to see every detail you need in the air even you are far away from the object. High-performance 3-axis gimbal is using advanced FOC(field-oriented control) motor control technology which will enable you to get a 0.01 degree incredible precise control, so the gimbal will give you crystal clear and stable video footage.

Compact and lightweight
Sky Eye-30XZ weighs as little as 700 grams to help you meet your payload weight allowance.

Self-adjusting gimbal speed
Sky Eye-30XZ gimbal Yaw/Pitch speed is self-adjusting, which means the gimbal will adjust its speed automatically according to camera zoom value. This is very useful when you try to target the object in large zoom range.

Anti-pull lock mechanism 
Sky Eye-30XZ comes with an anti-pull mechanism for power and control signal cable, which will make the wiring very safe in the air, hard to pull out.

Cooling system
There is one little fan on the top of gimbal control unit, will enable the gimbal to work properly in the high-temperature environment.

Features

1) 700grams, lightweight
2) 1/3 inch CMOS SENSOR
3) 30X optical zoom, 1080P/60 HDMI output for video downlink
4) 1080P/30 MP4 video recorded for on-board TF card
5) S.BUS, PWM and serial command control
6) Anti-pull lock mechanism design for power and signal cable 
7) 3-axis high stabilized gimbal system
8) Self-adjusting gimbal speed

Product Photos

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What could be more fun than hacking an RTF quadcopter to fly with your own custom firmware? How about hacking with your own DIY Arduino-compatible 32-bit flight controller?  This tutorial shows how I did it. Advantages of using this controller include:

  1. Access to the huge selection of Arduino-compatible add-on sensors (distance, optical flow, ...)
  2. Use of the high-accuarcy SENtral Sensor Fusion IMU, freeing up computation cycles for other tasks.
  3. 3.3V signal levels, for adapter-free interfacing with Raspberry Pi and other single-board computers.
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Technically speaking there is no mention of any autopilot in my tutorial. But, as ROS (Robot Operating System) becomes more and more popular, I kinda felt like it was time to create a Tutorial for beginner that was actually fun to do (and watch, I hope).

So I decided to go for a real example. I had my Donkey Car (donkeycar.com) parked somewhere (too many things to do) and I thought that would have been a perfect robot to start with.

This video covers (it's long, but I wrote down the time marks in the description on YouTube):

  • setting up a Raspberry Pi 3 with an SD card image from Ubiquity Robotics, with ROS Kinetic installed. 
  • installing ROS on Ubuntu
  • ROS master, ROS_MASTER_URI and ROS running on multiple platforms
  • Packages installation and creation
  • topics and messages
  • writing a script (publisher and subscriber) in Python
  • lots of fun outdoor

You are all welcome to contribute with your own packages!

CODE: Find the code on Github

CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE VIDEO ON YOUTUBE

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Happy new year to all flyers. 

We want to update the progress made on an in-flight battery monitor. Initial revisions of the board were meant to capture accurate cell voltages for the flight batteries. However, lot of feedback was received to push the board towards a minimal Battery Monitoring System. Currently, most diy'ers and professional flyers use large battery packs after monitoring them with an external battery meter. We believe its advantageous to semi-permanently attach the monitor with the batteries as Batmon has cell balancing and minimal weight/power penalty. 

The features of Batmon are: 

  1. Inbuilt Coulomb counting for accurate power draw (and hence power remaining) for the cells
  2. Accurate monitoring of individual cell voltage ( precise to 50mV or better) 
  3. Onboard temperature monitoring + extra optional temperature probes for accurate measurement of battery temperature in harsh weather.
  4. 9gm weight 
  5. Connects to Pixhawk i2c bus with stock firmware to read total battery voltage, temperature, current. Custom pixhawk firmware enables monitoring cell voltages and many other battery parameters.
  6. Low current onboard cell balancing. 
  7. Switchable low-power led display for convenient display of battery vitals (~3mA / 40V with display on)

Batmon battery monitor measuring 10s

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Would love to get feedback. We will build ~100 boards end of March,2019. Please PM me for feedback/pre-orders.

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How We Flew A Winter Drone Show

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First of all, Happy New Year to all you DIY Drones users! 

Shortly before Christmas, we decided to bring a childhood dream alive and create Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer using drones. We created and flew a 50 drone show and would like to share with you the footage as well as our experience. Without further ado, here's the video:

And here's the flight at real speed:

Flight planning and drone control was done using our Drone Show Software. You can read more about it here: http://www.droneshowsoftware.com

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All drones flown were Pixhawk-equipped (Pixhawk 2 Cube or Dropix). They were also equipped with RTK GPS and LED modules. Wi-Fi modules were used for communicating between the drones and the ground station.

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To get the animation done we collaborated with one of the most experienced graphical animation companies in Latvia - baseMotion. This was the first animation they did for a drone show but certainly not their last. The animation was done using open source animation software Blender. Afterwards, it was converted to paths which were uploaded to the drones.

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The biggest struggle was the cold. It was about -5 degrees Celsius at the time of flying the show. So we had to think about keeping ourselves as well as the batteries in warmth. For batteries, we used special boxes and for ourselves sweaters, warm winter jackets and, most importantly, warm socks. 

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The outcome was breathtaking and certainly worth the effort. Seeing it in real life is far beyond anything that pictures or video can convey.

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If you have any questions or are interested in creating a drone show yourself, visit our website http://www.droneshowsoftware.com and drop us a message.

May you have a successful year!

Safe flights,
UgCS Team

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Tersus GeoBee - Cost effective CORS solution

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Ntrip server mode: use David GNSS receiver to create a base station. This temporary base or CORS are for surveying, agriculture, UAV, machine control, and so on. It is also ideal for deformation monitoring. 

The Tersus GeoBee is a dedicated and cost-effective solution to transmit or receive Ntrip corrections. With Tersus Ntrip Caster Service, Ntrip Modem and David Receiver, the GeoBee opens the possibility for users to transmit Real Time Kinematic (RTK) corrections via Internet (Ethernet or 2G/3G/4G) in a simple, user-friendly way, just using a SIM card or Ethernet cable without any need of a static IP. GeoBee can also work as GNSS Rover to receive RTK corrections from Tersus Ntrip Caster or any CORS service.

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Ntrip client mode: connect David or other Tersus GNSS receivers to Tersus Ntrip Caster or any Ntrip/CORS service.David is mainly used for surveying, and also used as a GNSS sensor in various applications, such as mobile mapping,UAV, machine control, agriculture,etc.

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Features,

  • Supports multiple constellations & frequencies(GPS L1/L2,GLONASS L1/L2,BeiDou B1/B2)
  • Support 384 channels
  • Supports RTCM2.3/3.x, CMR, CMR+ corrections
  • Supports 4GB internal storage
  • Rapid RTK integer ambiguity resolution
  • Supports stable, high-precision measurement output
  • Supports Ethernet is default while 2G/3G/4G is hot standby
  • Supports remote access and operation

GeoBee is a low cost CORS solution for customers worldwide. It is widely used in Land surveying, machine control, high precision agriculture,UAV application, and so on.

Please contact us for more detailed information if you have interests in our solution or becoming our dealers. Thank you.

Website: www.tersus-gnss.com

Email: yunxia.hu@tersus-gnss.com

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Hi fellows,

I would like to introduce you the Lychee.

Recently we started to Lychee project, now we are accepting pre-orders for the first batch (limited number of Lychee we will produce in this first batch) which will be ship in the second half of January.  

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LYCHEE-made for UAV development

Lychee is a compact size drone computer board with built-in Raspberry Pi CM3L for Cube flight controller. It allows developers to create drone applications in a very short time in Linux environment.

Broadcom BCM2837 CPU 1.2GHZ | 1GB RAM

Lychee has a powerful companion computer to develop UAV applications in a separate, powerful computer without affecting the flight controller which is busy by controlling the drone.

Thin and Sleek

Lychee packed in a low-profile case can easily fit even in very compact drones. Lychee is 100 x 48 x 15 mm.

Heat dissipation body

The genuinely designed metal bottom part of the body works as a heat sink and efficiently dissipates heat from the CPU.

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Plug and Play connectivity

Lychee is reach with connectors from RPI and from Cube to make hardware installation super easy and fast. Lychee connectors are compatible with PH2 connectors with dronecode standard JST-GH

Connections from companion computer CM3L:

-3 x USB, Camera1/Camera2, UART, SPI, I2C, GPIO17/GPIO18.

Connections from the Cube:

-GPS1/GPS2, Telem1/Telem2, CAN1/CAN2, USB, ADC

-I2C, S.BUS, Spk-t, Serial5, Power1/Power2, 14 x PWM out.

We believe Lychee will bring many new possibilities to the drone industry,  applications with image processing, vision-based navigation, machine learning etc are the future of drones.

for more information visit LYCHEE

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StereoPi: preparing for the batch production

Since my last blog post on June, 29, we have a lot of news.

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1. We chose a factory for the batch production.

2. First factory 20 prototypes were assembled and passed all tests!

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3. We're also conducted some additional experiments:

  • Livestream 3D video over external videolink:

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  •  ROS depth map building

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TL;DR for ROS implementation is here

  •  YouTube stereoscopic livestream over LTE dongle

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  • Livestream to Oculus Go (3rd person view like in computer games)

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Oculus experiment details are here

  • Front view/rear view livestream from our crawler 

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  • 360 degree panoramic photo

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TL;DR step-by-step experiment description is here

4. We plan to start crowfunding campaign in the nearest weeks.

You can subscribe to our crowdfunding updates and campaign start reminder.

If you have any hardware or software questions, I'm ready to answer them. 

UPD> Thanx Tomas for reminder in his comment - I forgot to put a link on a project's site: http://stereopi.com

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We are delighted to invite you to CES 2019 where we showcase GET Air products based on distant wireless power technology – first time ever!

We are proud to present GET Air Turnkey Solution (http://getcorp.com/technology-overview/#tab-967):

  • Full scale Charging Station in product-ready design.
  • GET Air industrial class drones equipped with our wireless power receiving system and rapid battery pack.
  • Live demonstration of GET distant wireless charging.

Our key team members will be glad to answer your questions, give additional information and issue pre-orders!

Click ‘register now’ on http://getcorp.com/meet-us-at-ces-2019/ to get your pass!

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Team registration open for DroneClash 2019

 DroneClash 2018 was cool, DroneClash 2019 will be cooler!

Want to win 50.000 euro in prize money? Sign up your team! The DroneClash competition is the next-level FPV competition a 3D robowars. Teams will battle against each other like a real-life video game. Each team is allowed to use as many drones as they like, but they should bring at least one Fighter drone and one Queen drone. The main idea is simple: knock out the rival Queens. How? That’s up to the teams!

DroneClash 2019 will be held on March 16, 2019 at former airbase Valkenburg in Katwijk, the Netherlands  Six teams have already signed up for the second edition of the world’s best counter drone competition.  Teams who wish to take part in the competition are invited to register before January 16, 2019.  www.droneclash.org/teams

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Tersus GNSS Easy Kits

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Tersus GNSS Easy Kits

We have BX306 GNSS Kits and BX316 GNSS Kits (with heading function) for customers. 

1. The BX306 is a cost-efficient GNSS RTK board for cm-level positioning and providing accurate raw measurement output, which can be integrated with autopilots and inertial navigation units. The BX306 board supports three constellations (GPS L1/L2, GLONASS L1/L2, and BeiDou B1/B2) to improve the continuity and reliability of the RTK solution even in harsh environments. In-built 4GB memory supports data collection. It features compatibility with other GNSS boards in the market via flexible interfaces, smart hardware design, and commonly used log/command formats.2. The BX316 is a GNSS RTK board for providing accurate positioning and heading information. It supports multi-constellation (GPS L1/L2, GLONASS L1/L2, and BeiDou B1/B2) signals and can output continuous and reliable RTK position and headings, even in harsh environments. The BX316 commands and logging are compatible with NovAtel protocols. Ethernet, USB, LVTTL, RS232, CAN, PPS, and event mark are supported. In-built 4GB memory supports data collection. The BX316 offers real-time, cost-efficient, and cm-level positioning as well as flexible interfaces for a variety of applications, such as precision navigation, precision agriculture, surveying, and UAVs.

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Please let me know if you need more information. You can also send me email: yunxia.hu@tersus-gnss.com. Thanks.

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Aeromao Inc., celebrates its 4th year as an official partner of Pix4D offering the Pix4DMapper Aeromao edition and Pix4D related products.

The Pix4DMapper Aeromao Edition is a fully featured image processing software package bundled with an Aeromapper UAV system, that includes two perpetual licenses of the worldwide leader in photogrammetry software.

 

This bundle offers the additional advantage of resulting in a more affordable package than if either system is purchased separately. For example, the Aeromapper Talon (the flagship UAV system of Aeromao) is sold for less than $16,000 USD, including Pix4DMapper Aeromao edition. The Aeromapper Talon is a fixed-wing commercial turnkey UAV system for large area mapping, BVLOS (Beyond Visual Line of Sight) operations and optional PPK (post-processed kinematic) for survey-grade results, including a wide range of optional swappable sensors (thermal, multispectral and even surveillance camera packages).

However, these prices could be impacted after January 1st, 2019 due to policy changes.

 

Aeromao Inc,. additionally offers stand alone licenses, educational packages or volume discounts in a quick turnaround time.

Aeromao is also an official partner & reseller of Agisoft Photoscan since 2013 and all its related products.

 

About Aeromao Inc.

Is the Canadian leading UAV manufacturer, developer of the Aeromapper series of turnkey unmanned aerial vehicles for mapping, surveying, precision agriculture and remote sensing.

With exports to more than 45 countries since 2012, Aeromao Inc. offers a line of products that adapt very quickly to market demands and to unique client’s applications, where no other UAV manufacturer goes. The Aeromappers have been used by corporations, research organizations, universities and government agencies around the globe for a great variety of applications.

Aeromao extends its range of services to payload customizations, data acquisition services globally, flight training and operational support to its clients.   Find out more at www.aeromao.com

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Tersus RTK/PPK OEM Board

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Tersus RTK/PPK OEM Board

1. BX306 RTK BOARD Supports GPS L1/L2, GLONASS L1/L2, and BeiDou B1/B2.Supports in-built 4GB memory, which makes data collection easy.Up to 20Hz RTK solution and raw data output.Supports 384 channels.Pin-to-pin compatible with NovAtel OEM615.Log/command compatible with NovAtel protocol.Supports event mark and PPS.

2. BX306Z RTK BOARD Supports GPS L1/L2, GLONASS L1/L2, and BeiDou B1/B2.Supports in-built 4GB memory.Supports up to 20Hz RTK solution updates and raw data output.Supports 384 channels.Pin-to-pin compatible with Trimble BD970.Log/command compatible with NovAtel protocol.Supports PPS output and event mark input

3. BX316 RTK BOARD Supports RTK positioning mode or RTK positioning + heading mode.The two modes are software configurable.Command compatible with NovAtel protocol.Supports 20Hz RTK solution updates and raw data outputs.Supports 384 channels.Supports in-built 4GB memory, which makes data collection easy.Supports PPS output and event mark input.


4. BX316R PPK BOARD 
Supports measurements output (GPS L1/L2, GLONASS L1/L2, BeiDou B1/B2 from primary antenna.GPS L1/GLONASS L2 or GPS L1/BeiDou B2 from secondary antenna).Supports 384 channels.Supports in-built 4GB memory, which makes data collection easy.High integration System-on-a-Chip (SoC) solution.Supports PPS output and event mark input.Serial ports with LVTTL or RS232.External antenna inputs through SMA connectors.

5. BX316D RTK BOARD Supports RTK positioning mode or RTK positioning + heading mode, with software configurable modes.Up to 20Hz RTK solution updates and raw data output.Supports 384 channels.Pin-to-pin compatible with Novatel OEM617D.Log/command compatible with NovAtel protocol.Supports PPS output and event mark input.Supports in-built 4GB memory, which makes data collection easy.
Please check our website for more details: https://www.tersus-gnss.com/product/gnss-oem-boards. Thank you. 
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Some UAV projects from Dronlab

The Laboratory of Unmanned aerial vehicles (Labdron) located in the Engineering School of Extremadura University (Badajoz, Spain) have started novel activities to introduce our engineering students in the UAV environment.

We have prepared courses to explain how to program UAVs and we have planned some seminars to introduce students in different technologies, such as UAV simulators, raspberry pi/arduino integration, UAV sensors, communication mechanisms and so on.

We have just finished several interesting projects:

  • The first one is focused on controlling one quadcopter (pixhawk) using a robotic glove. This device is integrated different types of sensors to detect finger movement, and also hand position and its acceleration. This glove has also a wireless connection to send mavlink commands to the quadcopter in order to move it as desired. You can see a demonstration presentation here1,

  • The second provides a system to control UAVs using only the voice. The project is also focused on quadcopters (pixhawk) although it can be used with any other type of UAVs. A smartphone receives the voice, then it identifies the specific command through artificial intelligent, next a corresponding mavlink command is generated, and finally, the package is send to the UAV. You can see a demonstration video here.

  • The third one tries to detect obstacles using ultrasonic sensors controlled by an arduino device. Sensors send an a specific sound which bounces in an object. When this sound is detected by the sensors, arduino device estimates de distance of objects. At this point, if there is any object in its vicinity, Arduino sends a command to stop or even to move in the opposite direction. You can see a demonstration video here.

I hope you enjoy this projects.

Jose Luis Herrero

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Tdrone----Open source coaxial drone!

In recent years, multi-rotor aerodynamic aircraft have been widely used in consumer UAVs and some special industries. Mention of hovering aircraft, the first thing we have in mind is multi-rotor, which ignoring the potential of other hovering aerodynamic configurations. There is no denying the fact that multi-rotor occupied most of the market share, while UAVs should not only has one form. It is necessary that a flexible choice of pneumatic layout for different applications and scenarios.         

In this context, we have developed a coaxial two-propeller UAV Tdrone. This article provides a complete information and an open source solution to share this. I hope you are interested in  this kind of aircraft,even make one by yourself!3689736472?profile=original

Why Coaxial drone

he flight principle of coaxial twin-propeller aerodynamic configuration aircraft is similar to that of our common helicopter. Unlike helicopters, the coaxial twin-propeller aerodynamic configuration cancels the common tail rotor on helicopters and uses two propellers with the same diameter and coaxial arrangement. Like helicopters, swashplate are used as pitch-changing mechanisms to control the pitch and roll degrees of freedom of aircraft. The following video describes how the swashplate  works:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kWhNi-MZAM&t=3s

For a small coaxial twin-propeller aerodynamic configuration, a single-layer pitch-changeable structure is usually adopted, that is to say, only one rotor can be pitched in the upper and lower layers, while the other is fixed-pitch. The advantage of this layout is to simplify the mechanical structure to the greatest extent, which is conducive to the manufacture and later maintenance of aircraft. Of course, if we pursue better performance, we can also design more complex double-layer variable-pitch structure to achieve better flight performance.

The advantages of coaxial twin-propeller over multi-rotor aircraft are as follows:

1. Coaxial twin-propeller aircraft has larger rotor area and higher flight efficiency under the same working size (in flight).

2. The coaxial twin-propeller vehicle has larger payload under the same working size (in flight).

3. Under the same payload, the rotor speed is lower than that of multi-rotor, which results in less noise and better silence.

4. When generating pitch and roll control moments, the main rotor does not need to be accelerated or decelerated frequently, which reduces the energy loss. Especially in the case of large aircraft size, this advantage over multi-rotor will be more obvious.

5. The propeller can be folded and accepted conveniently without the complicated folding and locking mechanism of the multi-rotor aircraft arm. The folded fuselage is more regular and easy to carry and transport.

The disadvantages of coaxial twin-propeller compared with multi-rotor aircraft are as follows:

1. Comparing with multi-rotor aircraft, the mechanical structure of coaxial twin-propeller aircraft is relatively complex, resulting in lower manufacturing cost and maintainability than multi-rotor aircraft.

2. Flight mode is more complex than multi-rotor, which has some challenges in flight control design.

Any aircraft is designed for target use and use environment. There is no absolute difference between different aerodynamic layouts. Not only on Earth, but on other planets our theory still holds true

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https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/mars-helicopter-to-fly-on-nasa-s-next-red-planet-rover-mission

more than 100 years after the Wright brothers completed their first manned flight using fixed-wing aircraft, we are hopeful to witness the first use of UAVs on planets other than Earth, which is a coaxial drone!

Tdrone

The Tdrone UAV was developed in October 2015, and by April 2016 the first generation of Tdrone had initial flight capabilities, as shown in the video. Tdrone uses two modified 1806 brushless motors as power, two steering motors to control the swashplate and differential control for yaw. Flight control uses CC3D flight control. It is equipped with a two-axis stable platform and a motion camera. The duration is about 10 minutes.

Manufacturing methods and materials:

Tdrone is manufactured by 3D printing technology. All parts are optimized for 3D printing, which can be printed directly. The printing materials are made of ordinary ABS plastics. Aluminum tubes are used in the central core. 98% of the parts are fixed by screw, which is convenient for later maintenance and replacement.

See the Open Source page for details:

https://github.com/ShenZhenAccelerationTechCo/Tdrone

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3D Robotics

Ion drive drone -- NO moving parts!

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From Ars Technica. I played with ion drives a long time ago, but never got anything this large to lift. Great work!

The Johnson Indoor Track at MIT probably won't go down in history in the same way as Kitty Hawk has, but it was the scene of a first in powered flight. A team of researchers has managed to build the first aircraft powered by an ionic wind, a propulsion system that requires no moving parts. While the flight took place using a small drone, the researchers' calculations suggest that the efficiency of the design would double simply by building a larger craft.

Ionic wind

In conventional aircraft, air is pushed around by moving parts, either propellers or the turbines within jet engines. But we've known for a while that it's also possible to use electrical fields to push air around.

The challenge is that air is largely made of uncharged molecules that don't respond to electric fields. But at sufficiently high voltages, it's possible to ionize the nitrogen and oxygen that make up our atmosphere, just as lightning does all the time. The electrons that are liberated speed away, collide with other molecules, and ionize some of them as well. If this takes place in an electric field, all those ions will start moving to the appropriate electrode. In the process, they'll collide with neutral molecules and push them along. The resulting bulk movement of atmospheric molecules is called an ionic wind.

Calculations done decades ago, however, suggested that it wasn't possible to generate a practical amount of thrust using an ionic wind. Given advances in batteries, electronics, and materials, however, a team from MIT decided the time may have come to revisit the issue.

Doing so requires navigating a large series of trade-offs. For example, the lower the electric field strength of an ionic wind drive, the more thrust you get for a given power. Of course, if you drop the field strength enough, nothing will get ionized in the first place. Since the thrust per unit area is small, a more extensive thruster system makes sense—other than the fact that it will add to the drag and slow the craft down.

Still, after playing around with different thruster designs, the researchers found that it should be possible to generate sufficient thrust to get something airborne: "This level of performance suggested that steady-level flight of a fixed-wing unmanned aircraft might be feasible but at the limit of what is technologically possible using current materials and power electronics technology."

Finding a balance

The design they chose has a thin wire as its leading edge, where nitrogen and oxygen get ionized. Trailing behind that is a thin airfoil covered by the second electrode. This can both provide a little additional lift and allow the generation of an electric field that accelerates the ionized molecules from the wire to the foil.

But this design had to be integrated with the battery and electronics that make it work, as well as the wing and body that turned the whole thing into an aircraft. Some of those ingredients weren't even available until the team set to designing them.

"Weight constraints necessitated the design and construction of both a custom battery stack and a custom high-voltage power converter," the researchers write, "which stepped up the battery voltage to 40 kilovolts." To handle the aircraft's body, they fed a computer algorithm with a list of their constraints and had it optimize these to allow for stable flight with a limit on the potential wingspan.

The resulting hardware included a five-meter wing with a thin body containing the battery and electronics suspended below it before trailing off to a tail. On either side of the body, hanging off the wing, was a series of the wire/airfoil ionizers (two rows from front to back, both in a column of four for a total of eight). The whole thing weighed just under 2.5kg.

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Looking around for an inexpensive, almost-ready-to-fly brushless-motor quadcopter to use a basis for indoor flight-control research, I was delighted to come across the  Altair Aerial Blackhawk.  With its extra-long extension legs and GoPro mount (which I plan use for additional sensors), the Blackhawk really fit the bill.  

As soon my Blackhawk arrived, I removed the cowl covering the fuselage, revealing the custom flight controller / receiver board shown below. I unplugged the LED leads for the headlight and four arm lights, carefully snipped the soldered-on wires with a diagonal cutter, and unscrewed the board from its mount, leaving me with the ESCs and battery leads shown in the second picture below.

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The Blackhawk with its original flight controller

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Original flight controller removed

As you can see, the inside bottom of the Blackhawk didn't provide a flat surface on which to mount a new controller. So I used Tinkercad to design a 3D-printable mount that I attached with E6000 adhesive.  The mount has the standard hole spacing for a 36x36mm flight controller and power distribution board (PDB).

3689736297?profile=original3D-printed mount for PDB and flight controller

Once I'd printed out the board on my Lulzbot Mini, I added some M3 nylon machine screws and spacers:

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Then I glued the mount to the Blackhawk with a bit of E6000:

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Next I secured the PDB to the mount with another set of spacers, soldered a new pair of heavy-gauge wires from the power supply to the PDB, soldered some female jumper leads onto the control wires going into the ESCs, soldered a pair of female jumper wires to the auxiliary power supply, and soldered the ESC power wires to the PDB.  Double-sided VHB tape helped re-secure the ESCs firmly in place:

3689736386?profile=originalFor the flight controller, I chose the inexpensive Flip32 Ominbus F3.  Its onboard battery-elimination circuit (BEC) allowed me to connect the power wires directly from the PDB, and its DSM connector made it easy to plug in my favorite receiver

For the flight-control firmware, I decided to with my own C++ Hackflight  system (which also works on Arduino-based flight controllers, as well as a flight simulator I built with UnrealEngine4.)  After testing the IMU, receiver, and motors, I attached the propellers and was ready for the maiden flight:

3689736351?profile=originalAs you can see, the LemonRX receiver fits nicely into the front of the fuselage, leaving plenty of space to attach a "companion board" like the Raspberry Pi Zero W,  NanoPi, etc. – as I hope to show in a future post!

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3-axis 30X drone zoom camera with object tracking

Sky Eye-30HZ-S is a 3-axis high stabilized gimbal with 1080P 30X zoom camera for drone inspection, surveillance, search and rescue applications. The camera block is SONY FCB-EV7520, which provides 1080P 60FPS full HD video streaming and up to 360X zoom capability, which will enable you to see every detail you need in the air even you are far away from the object. High-performance 3-axis gimbal is using advanced FOC(field-oriented control) motor control technology which will enable you to get a 0.01-degree incredible precise control, so the gimbal will give you crystal clear and stable video footage.

Compact and lightweight
Sky Eye-30HZ-S weighs as little as 848g to help you meet your payload weight allowance.

Easy for integration
Sky Eye-30HZ-S comes with an amazing advantage that the gimbal can not only be controlled via PWM signal, but also the serial command. Also, gimbal data(like Yaw/Pitch/Roll angle, zoom status etc) can be obtained by sending the serial command to the gimbal via its serial port, which is really useful for precise gimbal control and system integration.

Object tracking and geotagging function
2 useful features are available on Sky Eye-30HZ-S. The first one is tracking, which will enable the pilot to track an object freely during daytime or night time. The second one is geotagging, that means the gimbal will geotag the gimbal position on video streaming or photo that you currently choose on screen, and GPS coordinate will be displayed on the screen too.

Clean and simple wiring
Sky Eye-30HZ-S provides an outstanding wiring hub design for RC receiver and video output port(AV and HDMI), which makes wiring pretty easily. Also, the gimbal offers 2 smart speed modes: FAST speed and LOW speed. Fast speed mode is used for small zooming range, which makes the gimbal control sensitive and quick. LOW-speed mode is used for large zoom range, will enable you to target the object more accurately.

Features
1) 848grams,lightweight
2) 1/2.8 inch 2.13MP CMOS SENSOR
3) 30X optical zoom,1080P/60 HDMI output for video downlink
4) 1080P/30 H.264 video recorded for on-board TF card
5) Auto object tracking
6) Geotagging
7) PWM control and serial command control
8) Convenient wiring hub for RC receiver and video output
9) 3-axis high stabilized gimbal system
10) Adjustable control speed d: SLOW speed for large zoom range, accurate. FAST speed for small zoom range, sensitive and quick

Camera photos

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