Drones, overreaction or justified?
- Thread starter Felon
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That's very unlikely to be the case by any significant amount, but would be interested if you have any figures to show that. We do know the casual user segment has grown, I don't see how that can be denied, which I think is the hamsters point.
Soldato
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it may well have grown a little, drones being a stepping stone to the world of rc flight (and i'm not saying that's a bad thing), but you're right it's the massive growth of casual users that's the problem.
How do you know that though? Is there any evidence to suggest it's only casual users that act like bell ends rather than true enthusiasts? At what point does one cross from being a casual user to an enthusiast?
Soldato
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my evidence is the distinct lack of airports having to redirect flights prior to the mass commercialisation of easy to fly drones. despite the fact rc helicopters and planes have been around for a very, very long time.
Do they have the same level of travel that a drone has? Do they have the same features in the way of cameras etc.? There was no real reason for them to go anywhere near an airport.
Soldato
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of course they have the same level of travel, and they're just as big and often bigger than your average drone especially engine powered models.
and yes there's no reason for them to go near an airport, the same applies to drones except some of the people who fly them are plainly too stupid to realise that.
Surely it's harder to take something without a camera out of line of sight though? I also didn't think most model planes had the lift to hit the altitude that drones do! Helos maybe.
And yup, some people are definitely too stupid or self important.
Soldato
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fpv can be fitted as easily to an rc plane/helicopter these days as to a drone, plus larger planes/helo's are just as capable of altitude (think about it it's a plane, it has the same limitations as a real plane only the physics is scaled down), you can even get jet powered models (as well as a fascinating array of multi cylinder engines- take a look at the os engines catalogue for some of the crazy stuff you can get, although we're getting into the realm of mega bucks here)
the key difference between drones and traditional rc aircraft as i've been saying is the level of skill required to operate them.
Someone was flying one over my property the other day. If there weren't so many witnesses around I would have shot it down with an air rifle 
TBH they do need to start applying some of the rules to drones as planes/choppers are under. Mainly the ones about flying over private property, near buildings, roads and people.
Yes drones aren't anywhere near as fast and are super easy to fly, but they can still cause a lot of damage if they fall on something/someone. When flying RC aircraft you have to accept that it's WHEN, not IF that something will go wrong and they crash. Anyone who has as lot of experience flying them (especially RC planes) will have had more than a handful of crashes. But the strict rules are why people and property don't get hurt very often.
Most will go a lot higher than a drone since they tend to be far more powerful. But the laws limit them to under 400ft.
TBH they do need to start applying some of the rules to drones as planes/choppers are under. Mainly the ones about flying over private property, near buildings, roads and people.
Yes drones aren't anywhere near as fast and are super easy to fly, but they can still cause a lot of damage if they fall on something/someone. When flying RC aircraft you have to accept that it's WHEN, not IF that something will go wrong and they crash. Anyone who has as lot of experience flying them (especially RC planes) will have had more than a handful of crashes. But the strict rules are why people and property don't get hurt very often.
Most will go a lot higher than a drone since they tend to be far more powerful. But the laws limit them to under 400ft.
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Some of the RC aircraft actually require special licences, and many of them had run time on a par with most drones (or longer).
The big difference was with RC planes and heli's going back just 10 years or so they were complicated and required a fair amount of skill to learn to fly, so you usually ended up building and learning to fly them with an experienced person or as a member of a club where you not only learned how to get them up in the air (and down again in more or less one piece), but the rules and etiquette of flying them.
Thanks for the interesting and professional insight
I think I agree with pretty much everything you say really, I also agree that a ban is not the way forward, however my major worry is that neither the drone makers or the government will take real steps to prevent a disaster until it happens, at which point everything will just get banned.
Whilst it's obviously good that DJI build their drones to not fly within a certain radius of an airport, they're obviously only doing this because they make a premium product, there's no legislation being enforced to force all drones to conform to any such requirements - for example, making it illegal to own a drone that can power up and takeoff within a certain distance or height, around an airport. Technically, there's nothing stopping me from buying a cheap drone off Ebay with no such restrictions and flying it across Heathrow runway.
Then there's stuff like this; https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/21/15848344/drones-russian-software-hack-dji-jailbreak where you can hack a DJI drone to remove all the limitations and no-fly zones,
It seems as though technology has gotten to the point where it can outrun any reasonable attempt at control - the market gets flooded with cheap easy to use products, before the frankly crap, slow, monolithic legislative bodies can even bat an eyelid - before you know it, these things are finding their way into the glide path of a landing aircraft.
Some of the people I used to go with were real pilots and said RC planes were harder than the real thing lol. I stopped in about 2005 though.
I did once see someone split a ducted fan "jet" in two by hitting a flagpole at full chat. That was impressive.
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Interesting to know. I'd always assumed due to the wingspan and thus lift to weight ratio that they'd struggle.Someone was flying one over my property the other day. If there weren't so many witnesses around I would have shot it down with an air rifle
TBH they do need to start applying some of the rules to drones as planes/choppers are under. Mainly the ones about flying over private property, near buildings, roads and people.
Yes drones aren't anywhere near as fast and are super easy to fly, but they can still cause a lot of damage if they fall on something/someone. When flying RC aircraft you have to accept that it's WHEN, not IF that something will go wrong and they crash. Anyone who has as lot of experience flying them (especially RC planes) will have had more than a handful of crashes. But the strict rules are why people and property don't get hurt very often.
Most will go a lot higher than a drone since they tend to be far more powerful. But the laws limit them to under 400ft.
Deleted member 66701
Deleted member 66701
Also, RC planes and RC Helicopters are relatively difficult to fly but drones aren't.
There is a video of someone flying one at almost 16000ft using an onboard camera lol. Obviously it's big trouble if you get caught doing that. Also you can also quite easily build a prop plane that will top 100mph. With a jet you can hit around 2-400mph
Just see this example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Afvf6mRkSHM
If you loose control of something like that, your never going to see it again
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Aye, I've heard that a few times, from what I understand it's in part because when you're in the aircraft you can see/feel what it's doing (even without instrumentation), whilst if you're flying it remotely by eye you don't have that information instead you're trying to work it all out by eye and having to do things like swap left/right whilst doing it depending on which direction it's going.
You've also got the issue that they have a lot less mass than a full size aircraft so the weather/localised air currents can affect them more.
I remember reading (back in the late 90's) of how early gyro's and automatic correction systems designed for RC copters were making them far easier to fly.
I can imagine, some of the ducted fan craft move pretty fast