959 karma · joined January 7, 2014
Pennsylvania; Physics, Computer Analyst
http://twitter.com/tswartz07
A commercial quadcopter motor typically runs at 1000KV, meaning that it spins at 1000 RPM per Volt. Most batteries are 12-14 volts.
Even for little plastic bits, if they're spinning at 12,000RPM, theres a lot of kinetic energy behind them.
My opinion is that the vast majority of the issues are caused by people who buy a drone off the shelf and take it up as high as it can go on their first flight.
This move will help stop general folks who have no idea about the rules and regulations from flying where they should not.
It's not going to stop the folks that (arguably) should know better, but it's an exellent start.
Here's a relevation that I only, just now, realized.
Python is named after the Monty Python gang. This I knew.
IDLE is a play off of Eric Idle. How have I never realized this before?
> Proceeds to make a great quality device
I'm not going to comment on the 'invasion of privacy' part, as it's a strawman; there are no cameras that are easily available on these devices that can 'hover outside someones apartment' and spy on them any more reliably than a cell phone on a stick.
However, and this is a very important distinction; these are the small majority of all RC flights by all amateur pilots.
I agree that there should be stiff fines for those that break the regulations. I do not agree, however, that everyone should be subject to some crazy ill-advised extra regulations.
Here's my take on the situation.
Large companies building 'ready to fly' multicopters need to have some sort of communication with the FAA and other agencies.
I do not own a DJI quad myself, but I'm very familiar with them, so I'm going to use them in my example.
DJI has frequently updated firmware for their devices. It would be very trivial for them to add in a 'default' setting on the device that prevents the device from breaking any of the already defined rules.
If the pilot so chooses, and most importantly, is authorized via a Section 333 exemption (or otherwise) can override those settings on the device.
As for all multicopters, I have no qualms about using a Dremel to etch in a registration number on my device. I do, however, have issues with those suggesting that I must add extra hardware and extra transmitters to my device.
Etching the registration code on the device will also allow someone to return my quad if it's lost.
There are 250 class quadcopters that are built for First Person View racing. Races are won and lost because of the difference in a few grams of extra weight.
Any extra weight you add to a device reduces the flight time of the battery.
Just like when there's a drought, municipalities enact a 'burn ban', charging those who have open fires with heavy fines.
I would assume that in the midst of a serious drought, there would also be heavy fines associated with using non-necessary 'luxury uses' of water; such as filling a swimming pool or watering the lawn.
We've been using Packer and Vagrant with Windows builds for the better part of a year now and it's been rock solid.
We actually leverage it into our Windows Deployment Server to create automatically updated OS Images to be deployed to production machines.
However:
3 years ago, my department went with Acer V5-571P laptops. Every single one has been broken and destroyed from casual use. We've found serious manufacturing defects and other flaws, and Acer is not interested in fixing it.
5 years ago, however, we had a small batch of Lenovo E430 devices. These devices are in much better shape than the devices two years younger than them. We have a few other groups of 'incremental updates' that have the exact same results. Lenovo devices hold up much better.
Say what you will about Lenovo's shady practices, but their computers are built like tanks.
Heck, a good number of years ago, this is what a wild banana looked like: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/eb/In...
If some enterprising farmers can figure out how to minimize the seeds and other less useful qualities, then there's a good chance this will be a new staple.
Makes you wonder what the other 14% were doing at the time...
Running a processor at an extra (grossly exaggerating here) few watts + an extra 5-10 watts for fans, LEDs, etc don't amount to much. Especially when you consider that all electricity is paid for by the Thousand-Watts/Hour.
I wish we could fire teachers for using their computers for Facebook and Amazon shopping during the day.
My buddies do the same sort of stuff I do and make 1.5x my salary.
A ball point pen works great too. :)
DJI, to their credit, have been trying to integrate some form of safety into their products.
One of these such features are the 'FlySafe', which does exactly what you describe; it lights up a GPS light and/or will prevent the multicopter from even taking off if it's in a dangerous area.
Yes, the chemical reactions are pretty vigorous, but it takes quite a lot of special cases to get it to burn.
1: Collecting parts, soldering them together, programming and tuning a device, learning about how it all works, failing sometimes, then being able to fly 100'+ in the air
and
2: Buying a pre-built quad and skimming the FAA regulations. Unbox it and walk outside. Crank the throttle all the way to max and stare with glee as GPS keeps it at 10,000 feet right over your house.
Incidentally, I don't intend to knock the whole of all DJI owners (the Inspire is an amazing piece of hardware), it just seems to be the stereotype that DJI owners are more fast and loose with the regulations.
The majority (by quite a large margin) of these 'close calls' are caused by regular Joes buying a $1000 DJI Phantom and running it with the throttle all the way open to see how high they can go.
Sure, it makes for a cool shot with the camera, but it's wayyyyy far outside of the AMA and FAA guidelines of 400' altitude ceiling.
Personally, I'm glad that the FAA is documenting it. I just hope that the incredibly daft actions of a few don't ruin it for the rest of us.
Fugitive allows you to perform almost all of these actions while still in Vim; I'd say it's almost a must-have for anyone who uses Vim and Git.
I didn't necessarily mean a free-standing object that was anchored at only the base.
Another commenter pointed out a project very similar to what I was thinking: StarTram: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StarTram
It has supports and launches the vehicle using maglev; basically a big, tangential, spaceship cannon that launches into orbit using fixed structures.
Instead of a vertical structure, as pretty much every single space elevator contains, why not make one that is tangential to the surface of the planet?
Yes, it will be substantially more materials, but if made such that the 'tail' of the elevator is trailing the rotation of the planet, it might be partially self sustaining. (Think of a string attached to the edge of a merry-go-round whipping outwards)
One would literally pick a point on the planet and build due west. Due to the curvature of the planet, after X number of miles, you'll be several miles up in the air.
Is this not anymore farfetched than a 100km tall tower?