Comment by dydx on April 19, 2011 at 7:48pm

Yes, does look interesting and very polished. But the setup time..... Surely an airframe that small can be hand launched??

Comment by Ravi Gaddipati on April 19, 2011 at 7:59pm

Any idea on cost?

Comment by Mauro Rodriguez on April 19, 2011 at 8:59pm

50k euros (without the soft to process the images), I saw it in a seminar in Chile

Comment by MarcS on April 20, 2011 at 12:20am

Hmmm, another overpriced picture taking System??

And I think dydx is right. Why not hand launch? A system (Airframe/Autopilot) in this size should be able to handle imperferct throwing. Best Example:RQ11- Raven.

And what if you get the direction of the launch wrong in the planing tool? Should be automated, too.. Less options -> less problems :-)

But seing the video (especially at 2:16) the AP used seems to be micropilot which could be an explanation for the catapult... THe system needs quite stable starting conditions. Additionally you can see at this point a typical drawback of this AP. Takes long to catch up with lines (mode fromto). It´s really not designed for small area survey ( I had chances to use it, so first hand experiance).

All in all, does not seem to be a completely well desgined solution. And how many Cesna-hours do you get at the price... Will be hard for such a system to be competitive if it does not find a niche...

Comment by Lojze Miklavčič on April 20, 2011 at 1:06am

50K€! For this I can get 30-50 of helicopter hours with LIDAR (>10 pt/m2 and less than 10cm images). If we are talking about 10k€, then it can be contender, but not with 50k€.

Comment by MarcS on April 20, 2011 at 1:37am

A typical appliction would be a stone pit or a huge construction site with massive earth movement to control.

If the system can be operated legally, by one of the construction workers (no additional staff needed), is robust (lasts several 100 flights without needing maintenace), can be operated daily and the post-processing is FULLY automtic (Result something like change-map and excel sheet with volumes)...

Then it can be worth the 50k because after two months the helicopter flights would have been more expensive...

But I don´t see this or any other system meeting these requirements right now, especially the legal and simple operation/maintenace part...

 

 

Developer Comment by Max Levine on April 20, 2011 at 1:51am

by looking at how it lands, one landing can kill your camera, and after few more of those bangs, lens will be useless, but what is 500$ lens in 50
sorry but,
once again overpriced and useless :(

Moderator Comment by Sebastian Gralla on April 20, 2011 at 6:01am

look at 2:33 that are no reflections on the lens!

Comment by Stefan Olofsson on April 20, 2011 at 7:04am

At 2.33, the lens is totally busted....Pause the movie and take a look :-)

Comment by Rory Paul on April 20, 2011 at 8:14am

The reason they have gone with a catapult is to eliminate operator error during launch. The AP detectes movement and starts the motor depending on a preset airspeed (in Cat mode). You can also launch "manually" but the motor would need to be up and running and having that spinning in your face would not be pleasant.  The catapult also reduces the risk of  inadvertently inverting the aircraft after initialization and messing up the gyros causing the plane to crash.

 

I must agree with MarcS in my opinion the system is way too expensive. Also it has been pointed out that their design "rolls like crazy" and there is no camera stabilization. The automated image processing may be automatic but I have been told that it can still take days to perform processing depending resolution and number of images.

 

I get the feeling that their biggest success has been getting start up capital from somebody that did not know enough about the GIS / Aerial imaging industry. I predict that this system will be sold at $20-30K  within 18 months.

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