Unmanned Airborne Search/Rescue Platform (Civil Air Patrol)

Have you looked at the hobby zone aerobird? It's less then 200, foam, easy to fly and its made to play aerial laser tag and his the ability to drop parachutits (mini ones) Im sure you could easily mount a tiny light weight camera and transciever. The problem is tho a small plane like that would not be able to fly in bad weather, but im sure you can fix it to drop markers and camera and such.

Zane wrote:

Have you looked at the hobby zone aerobird? It's less then 200, foam, easy to fly and its made to play aerial laser tag and his the ability to drop parachutits (mini ones) Im sure you could easily mount a tiny light weight camera and transciever. The problem is tho a small plane like that would not be able to fly in bad weather, but im sure you can fix it to drop markers and camera and such.

Would it be weird to tell you I love you? hahah

That feuselage seems to be perfect...and if it has the capacity to carry additional "sonic combat pods" and "drop gear" (as stated by the product description), I'm sure it can handle a NavCam and bottom-facing survey camera in their place. The speed controller seems to have a wide range of engine output, from a slow crawl-glide to haulin' @$$. Worst case I have to upgrade the motor, but I was planning on doing that (along with increasing lift surface) with any kit I got anyway. From flight demo videos I've seen, it seems to be really stable and slow! Just what I need! WOOHOO! For around $100, it sure does make a great project craft. I'm sure after I throw a couple hundred dollars into it I'll have a successful product. Thank you very much, I can't believe I missed that.

Im going to have to throw some Air Force gray pain on there though. Theres nothing that'll get you kicked out of an RC complex faster then carrying around a neon feuselage

My favorite flight demo...really shows the capabilities of the craft. Once I'm done frankensteining it...it'll be a real beauty.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQlToj3il64

This is a BIT off topic but I love watching those onboard camera videos! Makes me want to fly!

By the way good luck with this project, it sounds awesome!

A fixed camera for navigation is good. But how are you going to be able to control the angle of your birds eye looking down on the ground?

Lone Wolf wrote:

A fixed camera for navigation is good. But how are you going to be able to control the angle of your birds eye looking down on the ground?

Throught flight manipulation. 3/4 of the guys I've talked to that have or are working on UAV projects for airsoft applications say not to invest in a "fly by camera" or pivot/toggle camera.

I honestly don't see the point then. The airforce uses two man elements to control a single UAV
one to work communications and birds eye, the other to fly.

All you have is a model airplane that you can fly out of your viewing limits. Unless you ran a wifi radar (which could also be used to triangulate like GPS), or thermal detection.

Lone Wolf wrote:

I honestly don't see the point then. The airforce uses two man elements to control a single UAV
one to work communications and birds eye, the other to fly.

All you have is a model airplane that you can fly out of your viewing limits. Unless you ran a wifi radar (which could also be used to triangulate like GPS), or thermal detection.

I have thought of the wifi/thermal options, but shot them down at this point for cost and weight. If I were to do anything extra, it would be thermal to help identify wreckage. Now, the pan and tilt camera would be practical if I were in incorporate a fly-by-camera system, like those used in law enforcement LUAVs, but I have operated other RCs using basic visual navigation like mine will and I do believe it to be a practical method. Really theres only one way to sort out necessity: field tests. All options you've suggested can be added later if the need arised.l

psh all you guys need is a really good sniper one that can give info make a shot and get outta there. like some famouse person said ''the smartest computer is the human mind'' which is right also take into consideration that all this fancy hight tech gear doesn't spot natral stuff (ie. plants trees, vines, rocks) think about that to.

lonesniper24 wrote:

psh all you guys need is a really good sniper one that can give info make a shot and get outta there. like some famouse person said ''the smartest computer is the human mind'' which is right also take into consideration that all this fancy hight tech gear doesn't spot natral stuff (ie. plants trees, vines, rocks) think about that to.

in 2014 it is estimated that at the current rate of research in computers. A super computer will be created that can out process the human brain.

By 2030ish there will be PC's that out process the human brain.

Scary?

So what exactly is your goal with this? Becouse for search and resq this doesnt have a practical purpuse as most search and resc occurs during adverse weather and this wont be able to fly very long. If your looking for daylight search and resq as for when people get lost or some such your going to need to keep the bird up for an extended period of time. Your best bet then is to look into a glider with a large wing span, or design a solor powered glider such as the one below:


Or

(Shown without solar cells)

Thats a fairly old plane and the the solor cells were only about 2% effeciaqnt when it was made so could decrease the size. Downside is your going yo need light to fly this unless you have a battery on board as well.

Zane wrote:

So what exactly is your goal with this? Becouse for search and resq this doesnt have a practical purpuse as most search and resc occurs during adverse weather and this wont be able to fly very long. If your looking for daylight search and resq as for when people get lost or some such your going to need to keep the bird up for an extended period of time. Your best bet then is to look into a glider with a large wing span, or design a solor powered glider such as the one below:


Or

(Shown without solar cells)

Thats a fairly old plane and the the solor cells were only about 2% effeciaqnt when it was made so could decrease the size. Downside is your going yo need light to fly this unless you have a battery on board as well.

Well my goal was to have something for use in the field that will work to 'overview' foot-search grids. Terrain is often extremely rugged during SAR ground operations and the ability for a RC-UAV short range 'extension' would allow ground teams to deploy for small-grid searches in areas untraversible by foot. With a little work, the radio systems could be updated to fly at over a mile away and battery capacity could be greatly expanded by using a leak li-poly...and possibly through use of solar when I do some more research. I'll be doing 'extreme weather' tests with the airframe once completed. Stability problems can be solved through tricky flying but there are also mechanical solutions. At this point endurance flight isn't really a priority, but that may change after a few prototypes.

Well Durkee im starting to think what could you do with a stationery devices. Not worry about motoion at all.

Create like a 3d fish finder grid.

Quote :

Well my goal was to have something for use in the field that will work to 'overview' foot-search grids. Terrain is often extremely rugged during SAR ground operations and the ability for a RC-UAV short range 'extension' would allow ground teams to deploy for small-grid searches in areas untraversible by foot. With a little work, the radio systems could be updated to fly at over a mile away and battery capacity could be greatly expanded by using a leak li-poly...and possibly through use of solar when I do some more research. I'll be doing 'extreme weather' tests with the airframe once completed. Stability problems can be solved through tricky flying but there are also mechanical solutions. At this point endurance flight isn't really a priority, but that may change after a few prototypes.

Yeah for that I would suggest using somthing with a large wingspan, you could easily rig it to fly for well over a mile and using..err forget the name but its transmitting video over radio waves..its in the ARRL general class book I think. You could use that for video, using a repeater at your CAP base you could easiliy increase your range. The large wing span will give you greater stability, longer range and the ability to carry a larger payload. If your just looking for somthing to launch out of a backback the aerobird thing will be perfect.

Zane wrote:

Quote :

Well my goal was to have something for use in the field that will work to 'overview' foot-search grids. Terrain is often extremely rugged during SAR ground operations and the ability for a RC-UAV short range 'extension' would allow ground teams to deploy for small-grid searches in areas untraversible by foot. With a little work, the radio systems could be updated to fly at over a mile away and battery capacity could be greatly expanded by using a leak li-poly...and possibly through use of solar when I do some more research. I'll be doing 'extreme weather' tests with the airframe once completed. Stability problems can be solved through tricky flying but there are also mechanical solutions. At this point endurance flight isn't really a priority, but that may change after a few prototypes.

Yeah for that I would suggest using somthing with a large wingspan, you could easily rig it to fly for well over a mile and using..err forget the name but its transmitting video over radio waves..its in the ARRL general class book I think. You could use that for video, using a repeater at your CAP base you could easiliy increase your range. The large wing span will give you greater stability, longer range and the ability to carry a larger payload. If your just looking for somthing to launch out of a backback the aerobird thing will be perfect.

Ya at this point I don't have the resources for a large scale project (I lost my job a couple weeks ago)....so I'm just focusing on a simple system that can be deployed from a pack, but the system you described is a goal of mine that will be further persued after I gain some support.