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If you didn't know this existed now you do; I thought others here might want to know about this.
Here is the link http://spins.fedoraproject.org/fel/
MERSEYSIDE police made the first ever arrest in the UK using a flying drone to catch a suspected car thief in thick fog.
It swooped into action in Litherland to find a suspect who was hiding at night in poor visibility.
The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) acts as a flying CCTV and thermal imaging camera.
It was deployed on January 26 when it was reported that two men had stolen a Renault Clio in Bootle.
After a police car chase the suspects bailed out of the Clio.
Officers were able to detain one of the suspects, but struggled to find the second man in the dark.
But using the UAV's onboard thermal imaging technology, its operator was able to use live images of the suspect’s body-heat to direct patrols to the spot by the canal where he was lying.
The force became the first in the UK to trial the drones in 2007, and since then has used them to assist in search and rescue operations, search warrants and to crack down on anti-social behaviour.
They are operated by the force’s anti-social behaviour task force and directed from the ground by remote control, providing the force with a cheaper alternative to the police helicopter when aerial surveillance is needed.
"There is little that current technology can do to mitigate this problem, with the exception of complex directional antennas used in military applications.
Sat-nav receivers will be blinded for tens of minutes, probably a few times a year at the solar maximum."
Doesnt bode well.....
Rotors pitched to induce nose-up pitch and counter-clockwise yaw
I am beginning to think that this is do-able. it looks very heavy, and i need to do the math to figure out how much thrust I can get out of my brushed motors. I reduced rotor diameter, added a horizontal stab, and added a canopy so it looks more fly-able.
The fun part is almost over, as I need to start diving into the math to make sure this will fly.
From RobotLiving:
"Coming April 10 – 18 is the first National Robotics Week in the US. It is being launched by an alliance various academic and non profit organizations.
Look for events in your area. Shown below are only some the exciting events coming in April.
Boston, Mass.
- New England Botball Regional Tournament and New England Botfest, University of Massachusetts Lowell, April 10
- Robot Block Party, Museum of Science, April 17
Pittsburgh, Pa.
- Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute 30th Anniversary Open House
- Announcement of the Class of 2010 Robotics Hall of Fame Inductees
- Carnegie Science Center Café Scientifique Event
San Francisco, Calif.
- Young Innovators Day, The Tech Museum in Silicon Valley, April 11"
- Robot Block Party, Stanford University, April 14
- Robots in Action, Adept Technology, April 16
Wrote up a wind estimator today. It is based off of a simple model which requires very little inputs from sensors.
psi - true heading (not course over ground)
theta - pitch
airspeed
GPS lat and long
It is a simple model. The wind model has no dynamics which helps simplify the solution. This asusmption is mostly true beings the wind direction and velocity doesn't change all that much for a given flight. The filter starts off by assuming the soltion is a zero wind scenario and then moves towards reality. It takes about 2-3 seconds to converge.
The non-linear state update equations are as follows:
Pn_dot = Vair*cos(psi)*cos(theta) - Wn
Pe_dot = Vair*sin(psi)*cos(theta) - We
Wn_dot = 0
We_dot = 0
Notice the filter resolves on a wind velocity of 15 ft/s and 090 deg heading.
Pretty slick how quickly it finds a solution.
Taipei - Taiwan police have arrested two men accused of using a toy helicopter to search homes before burgling them, a newspaper reported on Sunday.
Taipei police arrested Chang Chen-cheng and seized the model aircraft, plus stolen goods, at his home, and are searching for his partner in crime Ah Hsiang.
The pair have allegedly committed a dozen burglaries using the toy helicopter, the Apple Daily said.
According to police, Chang and Ah Hsiang would ride motorbikes in North Taiwan to search for suitable victims, then release the toy radio-controlled helicopter.
The helicopter would fly to the window of an apartment, take photos of the inside of the apartment, and send the images to a computer inside the car.
If the photos revealed there was no one in the apartment, Chang and Ah Hsiang would allegedly break in and carry out the burglary, the Apple Daily said.
The helicopter was powered by a battery and measured 21cm and could remain airborne for 12 minutes - with little noise.
- SAPA
I'm in the process of making a mold for a easystar fuse. I used the replacement foam fuse from the local hobby shop and mounted it to a board, filled the pushrod channels and servo holes on the outside. Fuse plug is painted and waxed.
I must decide where to install hatches (if any). I still have the removable canopy as a seperate part, and will mold the wing insert seperately.
DIYDrones got a brief mention in an article in Spectrum, the magazine of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). The article is about first-person-view (FPV) flying, but the author mentions he read about FPV here and at FPVPilot.com.
