=== Let's Drone Out — Episode 438 ===
Title: LDO 438 - Now On YouTube!
Recorded: 2024-01-18
Hosts: Stephen "Belrik" Howell, Koel "Koala" Anderson, Andrew "Frank" Hyams, Jack "Brightontillifly" Nash
Guest(s): (none recorded)
Total audience: 1,002
Platforms: YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5C7Qr5_kt8); SoundCloud (http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/feeds.soundcloud.com/stream/1722339855-letsdroneout-ldo-438-now-on-youtube.mp3)
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#LetsDroneOut #LDO #FPVPodcast #DronePodcast #LongestStandingConsecutiveWeeklyyFPVDroneRelatedPodcast #WeShouldHaveaAWorldRecord

[0.0] Jack: Hello, and you're listening to what's drawn out and special thank you to our lovely patrons that help donate so that we can pay the editor to remove the swear words and silly things we say massive thank you to call us campus are folk now Sam Dharma on with the show.
[51.77] Jack: Yeah, so anyway, it was really itchy.
[56.45] Jack: Did you get an ointment for it?
[58.89] Jack: Well, yeah, the bit grudgingly, you know, they didn't really want me to use heroid cream on that.
[66.21] Jack: Oh, oh, I think the red button has, as it enabled.
[72.61] Jack: Hello, and you're listening to let's throw it out. Tonight, we are joined by a Lord and Savior. I just like Frank.
[79.93] Jack: Good evening.
[80.69] Jack: Oh, sporting a menace hat. I miss you, Greg. I doubt you'll see this. So what's the message? Menace and be like, I believe they just said, What about you on the audio? And feel free because that worked last time.
[99.29] Jack: grassing us up.
[102.13] Jack: The man with the moustache, Steven.
[104.41] Jack: All right.
[105.17] Jack: Hello, everyone.
[106.73] Jack: I'm my long range, long distance friend. Oh,
[112.49] Jack: howdy.
[114.09] Jack: No, I'm bright. So I fly. Hello. Or Jake. I'm from Steve.
[124.29] Frank: Well, well, well, Jack's doing some literal housekeeping. How about some metaphorical housekeeping?
[135.65] Frank: Anyone listening in podcast land after the live show, if you're listening on an Android, there's a fair chance you're using Google podcasts, which is not going to exist after April 2024. And you're going to be
[153.73] Frank: shifted across to YouTube music.
[157.65] Frank: So that's something to be aware of. Luckily, I noticed that. And YouTube music have thought about this and set up like a little podcast
[170.33] Frank: section, which is on I think pretty much every YouTube channel now. So this afternoon, I spent my lunchtime plugging in our podcast feed back into YouTube. What a
[184.85] Frank: nicely polished audio only edited audio podcast is now re uploaded as a video weirdly because that's how YouTube likes to do it. Don't really understand this. I just
[199.09] Frank: gave me an RSS feed and they've got captions. You got captions, transcripts. Yeah, you could go really nuts with it. Well done. Thank you. It also explains why if you go to the let's turn out YouTube channel, and go to the videos tab, it has been spammed with 435 audio
[224.41] Frank: episodes with just the same icon on the for every frame of the video. So that explains that. It also means all the episodes now appear in the podcasts tab on our YouTube channel. So you can go back through that. So even before we were on YouTube, when it was just like an audio recording podcast
[247.09] Frank: that went like just audio only, like before Google Hangouts before any of that, all of those episodes are now available on YouTube and YouTube music and whatever. But I would recommend not using necessarily YouTube music because YouTube are a bit weird and trying to kind of make their own little walled
[268.05] Stephen: garden of podcasts. If you like podcasts, I would recommend getting an actual podcatcher that has like an OPML, uses RSS feeds, downloads audio episodes. That would be my recommendation. I would suggest pocket casts because it's been around for years. Yeah, like Google who decided to change their mind and kill products every couple of years. I think I had pocket casts on my original Samsung Galaxy S. So it's been around for a long time. And
[297.89] Stephen: it's still basically the same and works just as well. Yeah. But if you're on Google podcasts, you probably don't care enough. So you'll probably end up on YouTube music, and it will still work and be fine. So there you go. The weird thing is that if I look under podcasts on Let's Drone out, I see there's like 434 episodes. But when I click play, it just plays the last one. And it's almost like they expect us to have multiple
[327.89] Frank: podcasts on the one channel. So it shows just a single show. And then it's like a playlist of 434 episodes in the single show. It's very odd. Yeah, I think they're still working on the EU. I'm pretty sure it even changed between lunchtime today and now. So probably by the time anyone actually looks at it, who's listening on a podcast, it'll have changed again. So we could go back to episode one, could we? Yep, you can go back to the pilot.
[358.41] Stephen: The pilot episode. Fantastic.
[361.97] Stephen: Oh, one of them's got a different icon. The Christmas special has a different icon somehow. I don't know. All this Oh, no heatwave special edition has a different icon as well. Yeah, something strange.
[376.21] Frank: I can't remember what it's got pooping on it. The funny RSS. Yes, there's there's some magic somewhere. I've forgotten how to do it. So we don't do it when I put in effort.
[388.77] Stephen: A girls night is is it pink because we don't know in any way pigeonhole anyone.
[395.17] Jack: Well, I've done that in retaliation to Tony.
[399.89] Stephen: What did Tony do?
[401.81] Jack: Other way just kind of I think he sort of thought he was running some sort of horse racing event or something. You know, ladies, make sure you have your fascinator on and stuff like that. And I was just like,
[417.73] Stephen: I wanted to just find everything around. Well, I'm going to go back and listen to the pilot show.
[424.85] Koel: Definitely. Yeah, you know what? On my on my long drives to to Toronto in the middle of the nights on the weekends, I find myself actually like, yeah, literally going back to the very, very beginning and listening to the first ones. And wow, it's
[440.53] Koel: it's it's it's interesting and it's so different. It's so the audio quality is considerably different.
[455.57] Frank: Yeah, well, it was back in a time when it was literally recorded in a room with like actual microphones in the mixing desk, right? So I imagine it was.
[465.81] Koel: I don't know. Yeah, it was it was. Well, I feel like it's weird because some episodes are I don't know. I mean, I listened like I would say maybe like a couple of handfuls of the early days ones. And sometimes it's it almost sounds like you guys are in like you guys did a lot of on location stuff. Did you not like you guys would actually all get together and do it in one place, right? Yeah, yeah, that's really cool. Like similar to what we did on the, I guess, seven
[496.05] Koel: year anniversary show when I was in the UK, which was pretty cool. Yeah, that was cool. Yeah. For the man, for the 10 year one, we definitely are going to have to do a little get together of sorts. Gotta do something. Gotta do something big. Yeah.
[515.15] Stephen: Has anyone been doing drone stuff this week?
[517.31] Koel: I've been I've been disassembling my drones and getting them ready to be packed up and stuff. That's about it. Yeah.
[530.83] Jack: Are you feeling about all that? In what sense? Like, do you feel confident in because you've
[540.35] Jack: you've only done some more testing? Like, yeah, I mean, I'm just like, or do you think because
[548.51] Jack: you haven't grown attached to the drone yet? It's gonna be easy to say goodbye. Yeah. Well,
[556.11] Koel: here's the thing. I, I trust crossfire. I trust kiss ultra v2. I trust analog video. And, you know,
[567.39] Koel: I'm gonna, it's gonna be a rubber band that I'm not going to stretch it all the way, you know,
[571.71] Koel: out first. It's gonna, there's still going to be some, some sort of, you know, testing phases,
[578.67] Stephen: even like before I really try to ease into it and really get yourself comfortable before you challenge
[585.55] Koel: yourself and go all the way. But I think the most annoying thing so far is just having to take off
[592.59] Koel: the 3d prints and then like taking off the SMAs that are attached to the 3d prints and then like
[598.75] Koel: having to redo that again. And I don't know, I still haven't heat shrunk my, my receiver in yet
[604.59] Koel: because I'm, I actually got a couple new 3d prints that I'm trying to decide how I'm going to do it.
[612.27] Koel: Whether or not I just have two SMAs that I can just easily take the antennas off and then leave
[616.27] Koel: the 3d prints on. And then the SMAs are or the pigtail to SMA or whatever still attached,
[623.15] Koel: but I don't know. I'm, I'll figure it out. And once I'm, once I'm where I'm going, you know,
[628.99] Koel: it's like, I'm still going to do testing. I'm still gonna, you know, do a few things. I actually
[634.03] Koel: ordered myself some batteries out there. I already, I ordered some to where I'll be staying because I
[641.47] Koel: don't want to, I don't want to travel with all my like old and tired batteries. So I'm like 100
[648.51] Koel: boss hours count. Well, exactly. It's like, I'm going to bring like three or four good,
[654.91] Koel: like my good freestyle packs. And then I ordered like three more and then I have two long range
[660.27] Koel: packs. So should be good. That's all I really need. I'm not, I'm not going to be like taking
[666.43] Koel: whole days out to fly. Right. So it's a, I feel like there's understanding wires and then there's
[674.35] Stephen: very understanding. Maybe an hour here or there to go to silly hoppy stuff. But yeah, totally,
[682.35] Koel: totally. I mean, I don't know for me, like, I don't know about you guys. I know Jack and I know
[689.79] Koel: Jack and Frank. I'm pretty sure you, when you guys go out and fly, you guys kind of, you know,
[693.71] Koel: you make a bit of a day out of it, right? Because for me, like, I've only ever had,
[700.11] Koel: you know, maximum, maybe seven batteries and I typically fly on my own. So it's always like,
[705.55] Koel: get out fly. I'm done in an hour or two. And then that's kind of it. The first thing you want to do
[710.51] Stephen: is pack a laptop and you want to prep all your firmware versions and make sure that everything
[715.39] Stephen: needs an upgrade, but you don't actually do the upgrade before leaving home. You get the laptop,
[720.35] Stephen: you get like a 4g little dongle and you just go for it, go to that field. You wait till it's
[726.67] Stephen: four or five degrees below freezing, get the laptop out, start upgrading firmware.
[731.55] Frank: That's just as you're about to leave, disassemble the laptop and then start upgrading that.
[741.47] Koel: That's what we are. Are we talking about, are we talking about things that Jack does before
[744.83] Frank: when he gets to the field? Yes. If anyone has gone flying with Jack, they'll recognize his
[750.43] Frank: experience. Yeah. I was like, this sounds oddly familiar. That kind of nagging kind of wonder it.
[756.91] Stephen: Is he playing a practical joke? Is he, is he actually going to fly a pack before we leave the
[761.55] Stephen: field? Or is this, is this just a really long wind up with a punch line that's going to hit me at
[766.67] Frank: some point? No, that's how it works. Sorry. There's, there's definitely been a day where
[775.07] Frank: me and Tony have been like saving our packs, waiting for Jack to turn up so that we could
[780.03] Frank: all fly together. Yep. And as soon as Jack turns up, he hands something over, like we have a little
[788.03] Frank: chat and he's like, oh, but I've got to go get hands something over to someone. I've got to leave
[792.35] Frank: now. He just immediately leaves and then we get to fly. Yeah. Well, you know, I mean,
[805.47] Koel: this is why I just fly on my own. It's like, or maybe, you know, the odd time it's like,
[810.03] Koel: I don't have to worry about anybody. I just have to put my antennas on my goggles, plug my batteries
[816.43] Koel: in, kind of chill out, be in the zone, and then be done with it. Yeah. But you know what,
[823.39] Koel: I will admit when I was in the UK and I did get to fly with you guys, I did quite enjoy that,
[828.91] Koel: that sort of group setting where you're with your buddies, you get to fly together. You know,
[833.31] Koel: there's, there's no real timeline. You're just kind of, you know, you're just chilling out.
[838.43] Koel: You're just having fun being kids again. Yeah. I guess hang out with people now and then,
[843.95] Stephen: but I think I, if I'm getting practice, I'm just going to go out on my own or like, you know,
[850.27] Stephen: take the misses. She can walk the dog or sit and she's taken to do whittling. So we go to the woods
[855.71] Stephen: and she like whittles bits of wood with an incredibly sharp knife. That's cool. That scares
[860.99] Stephen: off anyone. I fly pack after pack and that seems to work pretty well. Just dog walk around the drone
[869.39] Frank: and sort of stomping over towards you. And there she is with a knife. Just turn around and go back.
[876.51] Stephen: Yeah. I can't believe some little mermaid or a little bunny rabbit or something.
[880.75] Stephen: Yeah. I make the mistake of taking like the same amount of packs that I typically take
[885.95] Stephen: out to fly by myself with a group. I arrive with like 16 packs and I'm like, right, let's fly,
[891.87] Stephen: fly, fly. At the end of the day, I look and I'm like, wow, I flew like four or five packs and that's
[897.07] Frank: it. So what I like to do is have a really big field pack and then charge the appropriate batteries
[905.47] Frank: as I'm flying them. Like I have a few of each battery as I'm flying one, the next one's on
[911.07] Frank: charge and I can just go with what I need. The problem is I use the field pack for other things
[919.47] Frank: and then I have a little project going and have it plugged in on the bench and then forget about
[925.31] Frank: the field pack and then the field pack gets discharged and then is unhappy and then I have
[929.63] Frank: to make a new field pack. That's where I am. Oh, shoot. Just too low. It gets too low. And then
[935.79] Stephen: do you use just regular lithium polymer for field packs or do you go for weird, exotic,
[941.31] Frank: super cheap stuff? They're very, very cheap, light ion cells in that they were free because
[949.07] Frank: they were being thrown out. That's always cheap. Yeah. If it works, it works. You can discharge
[954.67] Frank: those lower and they're not as sad, I guess. Yeah. Well, I literally left it plugged into
[961.15] Frank: a back and just left it, forgot about it, went and did something else and came back to it like
[966.43] Stephen: a couple of days later. It seems that's not a week goes by without someone in my YouTube feed
[975.63] Stephen: trying to punt some sort of overpriced lithium ion carrier with the digital readout and a mains
[982.43] Stephen: outlet on it. So I've wondered, oh, maybe that's a good thing to get. They all look very expensive
[987.39] Stephen: and very heavy, but it would solve the whoopsie, I discharged it and killed it problem by having
[993.23] Frank: a good BMS in it. Yeah, there would be that. There would be that benefit. You can get a
[999.39] Frank: load of DIY BMSs that are fairly well recognized. There was even a marine cell I saw that had a
[1007.47] Stephen: Bluetooth BMS in it. So you could Bluetooth your phone and it would just give you a readout of
[1012.11] Frank: what the pack was doing without any other stuff. My last one did last me something like five years,
[1022.27] Frank: so I figured that's okay. I'll be all right without it. It'll be fine.
[1028.35] Stephen: You passed the main phase of grief then. Yeah, exactly. It did its job for long enough.
[1036.35] Stephen: What's everyone's take on the new iFlite drone, by the way? Have you seen this guy?
[1042.03] Stephen: XL10 or the Helion? Well, there's been the XL10 and then there was this two
[1047.47] Stephen: raw collaboration thing. Let me see if I can get a picture of it.
[1051.79] Stephen: Yeah, I think it's the Helion 10-inch, is it not? No, no, no, that's the old new one. The new one
[1057.87] Stephen: has just come out. After burner? After burner, yeah, that's the one. They've put up a little
[1063.15] Stephen: promo piece as well, which looks super swanky. Obviously, people who just happen to be flying
[1070.11] Stephen: through the most spectacular scenery in the world because that's how they always advertise this.
[1074.75] Stephen: Here we are introducing after burner. I'm sure we can play this because it's advertising anyway,
[1080.51] Stephen: so it's unlikely to get us into trouble. But I'll just show this. From the other week when we played
[1089.87] Frank: the DJI ad, we got loads of messages from YouTube being like, loads of people are using your content.
[1098.51] Frank: Do you want to issue them copyright strikes? That's funny. Well, those are some weird looking arms.
[1106.27] Koel: Yeah, yeah, look at this business. Ah, typical. What the heck? Yeah, there we are. That's some
[1112.27] Stephen: really weird looking. That's a good one. Yeah, so they've taken the kind of stuff I used to build
[1118.83] Stephen: where I'd have like a single plate X frame, not with the vertical arms, but just like a giant
[1125.95] Stephen: toothpick type of thing with a digital camera. Yeah, literally light.
[1132.59] Jack: Should we let fossil know that there's a... I'd end up with stuff like that. So that's the type of
[1139.31] Stephen: stuff I used to fly, but just with a one piece base plate. And obviously they've gone for something
[1144.35] Stephen: way more sophisticated with these vertical arms that are probably much better at doing vibration.
[1148.43] Stephen: Isolation. And they've put the stack. I think the stack is in the top part under the plastic bit.
[1155.79] Stephen: And the air unit being the expensive part gets sandwiched between the carbon plates.
[1160.99] Koel: Yeah, that's a really, really strange form factor. And then like the the wire route,
[1166.51] Koel: the motor wire routing on the sides and yeah, I don't know. It kind of looks like a weird turtle
[1172.51] Koel: it's kind of shaped thing. I don't know. It's funky. Apparently it's like
[1177.87] Stephen: kind of 20% smaller footprint than a typical five inch because obviously you can have the arms way
[1183.95] Stephen: closer together if you kind of have a really tiny little canopy like this. So it's much shorter,
[1190.91] Stephen: but you're forced to use an action cam even though they sell it with an O3. The O3 is effectively
[1195.87] Stephen: rendered useless because yeah, it's right in the middle of the prop line. And maybe you
[1202.43] Stephen: could get the props out of you, but you need like a 60 degree tilt and no one's flying cinematic with
[1207.23] Koel: 60 degree tilt. But it's kind of a cute line. It's interesting. I am a fan of the black on black,
[1215.95] Koel: which isn't really important at all. But at the same time, like working on it, it's like
[1223.55] Koel: you have to like take off the shell. I guess it's like taking off a top plate, but it's
[1228.67] Koel: it does seem interesting. I mean, it's I don't know. They're trying something out obviously.
[1233.23] Stephen: It could be much more accessible because you've only got a couple of screws holding down that
[1237.31] Stephen: plastic shell. What it says to me is like iFlight has got a lot of R&D budget compared to the
[1243.63] Stephen: typical quad manufacturers because no one else is going out of their way and doing these molded
[1248.83] Stephen: plastic parts. It's quite costly to do plastic models, I think. I'd be interested to know how
[1254.11] Frank: they're making it because it might be that it's maybe vac formed rather than injection molded,
[1258.11] Frank: in which case it's not going to be like that expensive to do at a reasonable scale. But
[1266.03] Frank: alternatively, it could be like SMS or something if they've got a really cheap industrial 3D
[1272.19] Frank: printing service available. Maybe they're finding a way to do it that way. It'd be interesting to
[1277.39] Frank: know how they're making it. You would have thought they maybe would put like a fresh hero
[1285.07] Koel: 11 mini on instead of like a scratched up one for their promo content. I'm not sure how durable it
[1290.19] Frank: is. It's more durable than the GoPro. You can crash it loads of times. So it's got the arms
[1297.55] Frank: are made out of a couple of vertical plates at a bit of a funny angle, right? And that's that's
[1304.51] Frank: been done like Jack was saying on the fossil stuff revos. But this is a slightly different
[1312.99] Frank: way of doing it. But I mean, usually it's been done for like racing to minimize drag. Yeah,
[1318.91] Frank: this is definitely this is specifically not right. Yeah, exactly. It's interesting to kind of use
[1325.31] Frank: that same idea, but for a Cine Lifter. It's kind of in between isn't it? It's a five inch. It's not
[1332.59] Stephen: quite as any Lifter. I think it was coming up to 500 grams, like just without the action camera as
[1339.87] Stephen: well. I think Mads did a review of it. And I remember thinking, wow, that's heavy. Like,
[1344.43] Stephen: I thought it was going to be a real lightweight sort of lean efficient machine, but it's not as
[1348.51] Frank: light as I was expecting it to be. Yeah, looking at that, just that frame in that video there,
[1353.15] Frank: to me, that looks like SLS or MJF that has been died. It's given me that sort of vibe.
[1362.51] Frank: I mean, this might be a prototype, so this could just be. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.
[1366.91] Koel: It also, it has a racing, it almost has a racing type of look to it, right? Like Stephen was saying
[1372.75] Koel: with almost like the toothpick style, or I mean, I don't know the right term for those types of
[1377.39] Koel: drones, but where everything's just kind of like, you know, the stack goes so high up and it's just
[1383.47] Koel: in the all in the middle. Is there a proper name for that style of drone or? Oh, I don't know.
[1392.34] Frank: We used to call them kind of toothpicks style. It's like a central stack type kind of thing.
[1403.14] Frank: But it's interesting because yeah, it's also, it's not ducted. So for a Sydney type
[1411.06] Frank: quad, it is a very racy Sydney type quad. I wonder what they're aiming it for.
[1417.54] Koel: I always think it's kind of funny when like people are putting the term
[1421.54] Koel: cine on like a quad because any quad, any drone, anything could be used in a quote unquote
[1429.38] Koel: cinematic way. So like, I mean, a cine lifter, okay, that makes sense. It's going to carry like
[1434.82] Koel: a cinema camera or something like that. But like you could fly a five inch cinematically.
[1440.82] Koel: You could fly a little drone cinematically. Like it's, it's, it's more so how you're flying it
[1447.22] Koel: opposed to like the build, I would say, or like the style of the quad, I guess. I don't know.
[1453.7] Frank: I guess the name should give it away, right? It's afterburner. So it's meant for going fast.
[1458.26] Frank: That's what they're aiming this for.
[1460.58] Stephen: That's the language they used. But then if you look at the shots, all they're doing is
[1465.7] Stephen: cinema flying, but it's kind of just typical freestyle flying. Well, light freestyle,
[1472.26] Stephen: but you're doing a few dives, but you're not really pushing the aerodynamics of the frame.
[1476.26] Koel: You just want smoothness, I guess. Yeah. Oh, which I guess, like, if everything's kind of like
[1482.34] Koel: in the middle, then the center of gravity would be kind of nice on this style of quad, I'm guessing.
[1487.46] Koel: So I don't know if, if that means anything. Yeah, it should be really well balanced.
[1493.3] Stephen: If you're going to put a heavy action camera on it. So then the only one I saw before was
[1499.38] Stephen: Chris Rosser, who had this on his ultra light seven, which is pretty much the same style of
[1504.82] Stephen: arm design. Oh, wow. Totally. It's like identical. Coincidence that I've like cut some of Chris
[1512.98] Frank: Rosser's frames. Who knows? And yeah, I mean, just sort of looking at the pattern in the arms as
[1522.9] Frank: well, the cutaways like you, you can see it's definitely the same shapes. But you can also see
[1532.98] Frank: like from what he's got there on the AOS UL seven. But the way that's lining up with the weave of
[1545.46] Frank: the carbon and the carbon is following the lines of what he's cut versus the afterburner, where
[1553.22] Frank: it's kind of it's halfway through a weave. And I don't know, I, you know, I haven't, I haven't looked
[1560.26] Frank: at that very carefully. I've looked at it for 30 seconds. But my God, anyway, after a long period
[1567.54] Stephen: of nothing much happening in the hobby, it's interesting to see people mix it up. Yeah,
[1574.18] Koel: I would say I like personally, you know, this is opinion based, but I think it is.
[1581.78] Koel: I don't know. I like the traditional style or like frame design. I don't know. There's something
[1587.62] Koel: about the like sort of off kilter or sort of like off the beaten path style of stuff that
[1594.42] Koel: maybe they're maybe they're great. And I'm sure they are. I mean, it seems like if you can build
[1600.02] Koel: a quad and you can have it tuned well and you can get it flying, it doesn't really matter what
[1604.1] Koel: the shape or the form factor is, but I don't know. It, it does look different. I guess you could say,
[1610.66] Stephen: yeah, I think they had a very specific use case first. It's not clear immediately what it was,
[1615.78] Stephen: but yeah, I'd say the same cold, you know, you've got a good flight controller. You can make an
[1620.98] Stephen: apex fly just fine. And then you're putting maybe a GoPro hero 11 or something even better on it.
[1626.5] Stephen: You're not going to have problems with a little wobble here and there.
[1630.02] Stephen: No, no, especially for flying. Even if you're flying kiss ultra. Yeah.
[1639.7] Koel: Yep. Especially if you're flying kiss ultra.
[1647.22] Stephen: Ah, like that. So anyway,
[1649.7] Stephen: I'm watching cat videos. I volunteered to do a lightning talk on quad copters at work this week.
[1661.22] Stephen: Wow. I don't know why. I think that someone got wind of the fact that I have a hobby and
[1668.02] Stephen: saw that they were doing a kind of everyone have a share session and they're like, oh, quick,
[1673.22] Stephen: get this guy to talk about his hobby to fill some time. So it sounds like,
[1679.06] Stephen: Yeah, wonderful. But they're all software developers. So that all kind of and hardware
[1683.86] Stephen: engineers, actually, we've got a fair few people who kind of think they make PC hardware. So
[1690.02] Stephen: they're pretty interested in it. And a lot of guys were remembering their prior ventures when
[1694.98] Stephen: they came close to this hobby in one way or another. And one guy worked with a Beagle bone
[1699.38] Stephen: black and mini we, which appeared to be I couldn't find mini we for longest time until I found an RC
[1706.5] Stephen: groups thread from 2011. And it looks like an Arduino based multi week controller that was out
[1712.9] Stephen: in 2011. We're 16 megahertz Arduino, separate gyro and accelerometer chips. And yeah,
[1721.38] Jack: right up my street, you got a link for that.
[1724.82] Stephen: Mini way. I'm sure I can find it. Yeah. Was that mini weeds? Mini we
[1731.7] Jack: was like back in the day, we used to take Nintendo we num chucks apart.
[1740.18] Jack: Yeah, the gyro out of them. And it was like the cheapest, cheapest way.
[1746.5] Stephen: I'll show you what it is. So it. Yeah, multiple details here.
[1753.06] Stephen: Multi we mini way, a small cheap six degree of freedom flow, six degrees of all degrees of
[1759.38] Stephen: freedom. Running a colossal 16 megahertz up upgraded from the basic eight megahertz
[1765.46] Stephen: Arduino. I mean, this guy screaming along 16. It's going to enjoy it in the chat and
[1772.58] Stephen: an Alexa or meter, which is pretty amazing. Wow.
[1779.54] Stephen: They even included LDOs on it for that's drawn out. They got let's drawn outs on there.
[1786.18] Stephen: Wow. Very cool. And that's okay. It's friendly. They've included the FTDI pin out, but you're
[1792.9] Stephen: going to have to solder all the other pins off the chip yourself. Because I think at this point,
[1799.7] Stephen: yeah, you know, unless you know what you're doing, GTFO was basically what they're saying.
[1806.5] Stephen: Yeah. There you are. That's what we're talking about.
[1811.86] Stephen: Yeah, makes some of Jack's hardware look a bit flashy, doesn't it?
[1820.1] Frank: It's like the easy, easy route out there.
[1823.54] Stephen: Yeah. Well, you know, he just doesn't try. He's not really, he's not really one of the OGs.
[1832.1] Koel: Drone Droid said, mini we isn't that what happens when you thought you had to go but didn't.
[1836.58] Jack: Prostate. I've got a multi-way flight controller. Don't make me get it out, Stephen.
[1845.14] Koel: Whip it out, Jack. Whip, Jake.
[1847.94] Frank: You haven't really built a quad until you've like soldered the individual transistors together,
[1853.38] Stephen: right? The guy at work had connected this thing to like a Linux SBC. And he got something that
[1859.7] Stephen: was similar to a Raspberry Pi. And he was connecting that to this flight controller.
[1866.34] Stephen: Not a clue what that looked like. It must have been
[1869.06] Stephen: like a plate of flying spaghetti, I'd have thought, with all that wiring.
[1874.9] Koel: Well, according to, according to Alexander Fedorov, it had integer math for PID controller,
[1881.06] Koel: which is groovy, which I have no idea what any of that means, but A plus.
[1886.02] Stephen: It's one step above an abacus for a PID controller, I believe.
[1890.82] Jack: Yeah. No floating integer.
[1894.18] Stephen: No floating points, no. So the move from 8-bit to 32-bit brought a whole load of things like
[1902.34] Stephen: from basic integer math to floating point math. And it's still a little bit expensive on some of
[1907.14] Stephen: the new chips, but they can do it. It gives you way more precision. 8-bit stuff is, well,
[1913.14] Stephen: if you can imagine the only values you have are 0 to 255. Yeah, you don't have a ton of precision.
[1921.46] Koel: No. Interesting. Very interesting.
[1926.26] Frank: Anyway, that's, so yeah, stumbled across some bits of history, which is always fun.
[1950.5] Frank: And the RC wanted us to make some corrections after the episode where we were talking about
[1964.26] Frank: nitro without knowing what we're talking about. So Andy's got in touch.
[1968.5] Stephen: It is methanol, so we were roughly in the right ballpark, right? It is methanol, which is a
[1975.06] Stephen: banned substance, but apparently not if you mix it with other dangerous fuel stuffs, in which case,
[1979.78] Stephen: it's completely fine. Nitro methanol plus castor oil and synthetic oil, I believe.
[1988.42] Frank: So it used to be castor oil, but now it's, yeah, now it's got synthetic oil in there as well.
[1993.86] Stephen: Except the synthetic oil, so they still have to use castor oil.
[2001.54] Stephen: And apparently the risk of the throttle being locked on maximum never happens at all,
[2006.18] Stephen: according to Andy, except when it does, because Frank's seen it happen. So yeah.
[2014.58] Jack: It was the talk of Futaba. If you've got Futaba written on it, it's fine.
[2019.78] Stephen: Yeah, I think you've got to find the guy, the jetty transmitter,
[2022.82] Stephen: because you know, he's the best pilot in the field. So it works.
[2029.06] Koel: Warm memories. Yes. Not any of my memories, but memories of sorts.
[2036.82] Frank: It's a borrowed nostalgia.
[2041.3] Koel: It's funny because when you go down the, you know, the history memory lane or whatever,
[2047.62] Koel: it's I hear all these things that I have no clue what they're about, but like,
[2050.66] Koel: I want to know what you guys are talking about, but I just don't. I wish I did, but yeah.
[2059.06] Stephen: I think that, so I looked at this hobby a long time ago and I looked at all this stuff,
[2063.7] Stephen: and to me, it just had, it's not ready yet, written over it during this phase.
[2068.58] Stephen: Maybe if you're a hardware developer, it was great, but if you weren't a hardware developer,
[2072.5] Stephen: yeah, just put your feet up, wait a little while until it's cooked.
[2078.18] Jack: Yeah, not ready yet. Like the dinosaurs, we are.
[2083.94] Jack: Oh no, I was bringing memories back.
[2092.82] Stephen: Well, then you end up with like muscle memory, like Jack of, oh yeah,
[2096.5] Stephen: and the first thing you do is like put your foot on the quad before arming it,
[2099.86] Stephen: because you think it might just fly to the moon. It might get stuck to the ceiling and
[2104.18] Stephen: you'll have to explain that to your landlord, why there's bits of plaster and paint missing.
[2110.1] Jack: I had a fun experience, KISS V1, the work experience kid. Why had the motor output
[2124.26] Jack: completely wrong and probably put it as beta fly instead of, you know, one, two, three, four.
[2133.76] Jack: And he left his quad and the bosses like test it, so I plugged it in, put it up, armed it,
[2143.2] Jack: and then as soon as I armed it, it just flew back past my head towards the glass window,
[2151.44] Jack: and somehow I didn't smash the window and fly out the car park. It was just like,
[2157.52] Jack: yeah, if you're wondering what the camouflage net was about, and that's what that was about.
[2167.36] Stephen: One of the first things I learned was when I set up every single quad I set up,
[2173.2] Stephen: I always look at what the radio values are and make sure that the right order,
[2178.64] Stephen: they're where I expect them to be. Just kind of like, what does the firmware
[2184.08] Stephen: think that the radio is sending me?
[2188.32] Koel: Yeah, I've definitely seen Jack do the foot trick a few times.
[2194.32] Koel: The first time I saw it, I was like, Jack, why are you stepping on this quad?
[2200.88] Koel: I was very confused as to why he was seemingly standing on it. I'm like, is this right?
[2208.16] Koel: But it all makes sense to me, my friend.
[2212.24] Jack: That's how we did stuff back in the dinosaur days.
[2217.28] Jack: Or would it be iron age by that point, Stephen? The dinosaur days, like, where you're actually
[2222.88] Jack: burning dinosaurs in order to get to the, in the sky?
[2226.24] Stephen: We get the dinosaur age of being largely eaten by dinosaurs, I think, to characterise that.
[2233.52] Jack: That's no way to talk about the BMFA.
[2237.68] Jack: I didn't bring you my membership this year.
[2241.52] Jack: Yeah, but you watched your competency test.
[2244.88] Stephen: Yeah, I feel...
[2246.64] Stephen: Commission complete, right?
[2247.6] Stephen: No reason to make it any further.
[2252.16] Jack: I remember you being like, you know, yeah, that will be a value thing to do.
[2257.28] Jack: And I was like, mate, it's pointless talking to them.
[2260.88] Jack: I've got a certificate.
[2262.08] Stephen: No.
[2262.96] Stephen: Yeah, it was stressful.
[2265.92] Stephen: Talking to people.
[2266.4] Stephen: I can print you out a certificate if you want.
[2268.8] Jack: Yeah.
[2270.8] Stephen: It's the online present for lack of it, and it's all quite a few.
[2274.08] Jack: Mate, I need your best friends with me.
[2280.0] Frank: Speaking of BMFA briefly, there was some news the other day about the
[2288.56] Frank: Headcorn show, so the Sudden Model show, which is another one of the big RC model shows in the UK,
[2296.4] Frank: that they are not holding one this year, 2024, but they will be back in 2025.
[2303.6] Frank: That was one of the first shows I saw X-Class actually flying at.
[2310.48] Frank: So, you know, it's kind of a bit sad that they won't have one this week, this year rather,
[2315.12] Frank: but it does mean that Wings and Wheels is still going to be one of the most
[2323.28] Frank: Southerly RC model shows this year, which is entertaining seeing as they moved
[2328.4] Frank: quite far north for us.
[2332.56] Frank: Yeah, so there's like Pop'em, and then you've got Wings and Wheels,
[2338.56] Frank: and Western Park, I feel like the big three this year.
[2342.8] Frank: But yeah, no better news then.
[2346.24] Stephen: So Caroline Tyler saying she moved her 7-inch quad to INAF and had to rewire the ESC because
[2353.28] Stephen: she couldn't do motor remapping.
[2356.0] Stephen: I'm kind of surprised they haven't changed that.
[2357.92] Stephen: I remember Powell talking about it a few years ago, and I think that at the time he was like,
[2365.12] Stephen: oh yeah, you just build your own target as though this is something anyone can do.
[2369.68] Stephen: As kind of the lead developer of the project, he obviously found it pretty straightforward.
[2373.76] Stephen: I'm surprised they haven't found an easy way of doing that by now.
[2378.72] Stephen: I guess no one else is using.
[2379.92] Stephen: Is anyone else using INAF?
[2381.76] Stephen: I think I've got a tank running INAF, but I haven't got any aircraft running INAF.
[2386.32] Stephen: Well, I don't have any aircraft running INAF.
[2389.68] Koel: No, although everywhere that I look up, as far as GPS return to home stuff, it's like
[2396.72] Koel: INAF is kind of like really good with that.
[2403.92] Stephen: The targets are a bit harder.
[2405.6] Stephen: There's not as many boards supported and you can't remap resources.
[2409.36] Stephen: So if you need to do that for motors, it's a bit challenging.
[2414.88] Jack: I've always been impressed with INAF.
[2419.28] Stephen: Easy for planes.
[2421.12] Jack: Yeah, I've always, you know, it can be a bit sort of like daunting,
[2432.24] Jack: moving from like, you know, beat a fly to INAF.
[2439.44] Stephen: Have you got any planes then, Jack?
[2441.52] Jack: Yeah, yeah, I've got it on wings, all my wings, in fact.
[2447.6] Jack: Oh, cool.
[2448.24] Jack: But yeah, it's just been, it's been good.
[2451.76] Jack: You know, I mean, even back in the day when I was like,
[2455.92] Jack: flying that wooden copter.
[2459.52] Stephen: Did you ever have to do relapping stuff or do you just like,
[2462.72] Stephen: find the right pins and just experiment until you've soldered it right?
[2467.68] Jack: Yeah, basically.
[2469.68] Jack: Yeah, read the manual, look at the legend.
[2473.36] UNKNOWN: RTSM.
[2474.08] Jack: Yeah, it was all right, you know.
[2479.68] Jack: But yeah, that first, I mean, back in the day,
[2481.84] Jack: even like when Constantine was still like running it
[2485.28] Jack: and just how it returned to me, no problem,
[2488.8] Jack: came, turned around, landed right in front of me.
[2492.0] Jack: I was like.
[2492.96] Jack: That's cool.
[2493.92] Jack: That's really cool.
[2494.4] Jack: Yeah, pretty, pretty neat.
[2497.76] Jack: You know, especially, I mean, I'll always remember that day
[2500.64] Jack: when me and Tony were flying at the beach
[2504.0] Jack: and someone come down with their like real fancy pants.
[2508.08] Jack: Bloody, like, you know, Phantom 4 or Fat 3 Pro or whatever.
[2514.96] Jack: And, you know, basically, you know, I landed by his,
[2519.12] Jack: well, John has landed and it's like, this is made of wood.
[2522.88] Jack: And he was like, you know, I've spent like a thousand pounds.
[2530.0] Jack: And you've got one that's made out of a tree.
[2535.12] Jack: That going back, landed.
[2536.8] Jack: And he was just like, I mean, he had a gimbal.
[2539.68] Jack: It was pretty good though.
[2541.6] Koel: Was that the copter?
[2542.72] Koel: Was that that wooden one?
[2543.6] Koel: Was that the one you were trying to use the Lexmoss gimbal thing?
[2548.32] Jack: No, no, that was that one was made of carbon fiber.
[2553.28] Jack: Okay.
[2553.76] Jack: But yeah, just never got around to, you know, doing that.
[2559.68] Koel: Yeah, it seems like the whole sort of, you know,
[2563.68] Koel: three axis gimbal thing isn't it never really seemed to take off
[2567.44] Koel: too much with FPV.
[2568.96] Koel: It seems like although there is with a Medlin drones guy,
[2574.24] Koel: I think is what it's called.
[2575.44] Stephen: Medlin drone with very expensive cameras now,
[2579.04] Stephen: but it was never enough to make up for bad flight performance.
[2583.44] Stephen: I think everyone secretly hoped that because it looked quite rough
[2586.72] Stephen: when they bolted a camera to the frame.
[2588.88] Stephen: Somehow a three axis gimbal would improve that.
[2591.84] Stephen: And it really just introduced another linkage
[2594.96] Stephen: that would bounce and roll around.
[2597.04] Stephen: Didn't really help any.
[2599.04] Koel: And, you know, I was actually totally wrong.
[2600.48] Koel: That Medlin drone guy is actually just a,
[2602.56] Koel: I think it's a head tracking tilt and tilt thing for the GoPro
[2607.84] Koel: opposed to it's not a, it's not,
[2609.6] Koel: I don't think it's necessarily like a stabilizing gimbal.
[2613.2] Jack: Yeah, the, like, yeah, the other thing that kind of like
[2618.48] Jack: really cemented the death of Alex Moss was, you know,
[2625.12] Jack: it all got super cloned by, you know,
[2631.2] Jack: the thing like to like banged or Ali Express or whatever.
[2635.52] Jack: So then it never, you know, there was no more money
[2639.6] Jack: going back into it.
[2641.52] Jack: And the reason, like it was selling on within the market
[2646.48] Jack: was because the Phantom two didn't have a gimbal, you know,
[2652.48] Jack: like, or any way to hold.
[2655.28] Jack: Oh, yeah, that's right.
[2657.04] Jack: You know, a GoPro, you know, people were wanting,
[2662.16] Jack: you know, the, you know, GoPro footage.
[2665.12] Jack: So there were, you know, as soon as, as soon as DJI like,
[2670.32] Jack: you know, built a gimbal on the Phantom three,
[2674.8] Jack: that that source of income stopped.
[2677.84] Jack: And then it was cloned, you know, and then that was another
[2683.68] Jack: revenue of like, well, if you want, if you want good footage,
[2688.88] Jack: you might as well, and no about you might as well just get
[2692.56] Jack: a phantom, you know, for the money, you couldn't you
[2695.92] Jack: couldn't build something yourself that worked as good as
[2701.12] Jack: good as like the Phantom three for less, less money.
[2706.4] Jack: So it's pointless to point the stars get ready made.
[2709.84] Koel: Yeah.
[2710.24] Koel: Well, you know, that was that was my first quad or drone,
[2714.08] Koel: I guess, whatever you want to say, was a Phantom three SE,
[2718.56] Koel: I think is what it was called.
[2720.56] Koel: Um, and that was literally my, that was my start into the hobby.
[2726.8] Koel: I don't know.
[2727.12] Koel: It was called a Phantom three 4k, which they ended up
[2729.36] Koel: changing it to SE and it had basically little to no range.
[2734.16] Koel: Um, but, uh, I got that and I was, I was basically hooked
[2739.44] Koel: on drones, but I was hooked on GPS DJI drones.
[2743.12] Koel: And yeah, then it was like, it was, you know, Jack saw me
[2746.48] Koel: playing around with those and everything.
[2747.84] Koel: And he's like, I see him, you know, tinkering with all
[2750.88] Koel: this crazy electronics.
[2751.92] Koel: I'm like, man, I would never do that.
[2753.68] Koel: That's too crazy.
[2754.56] Koel: Like, I don't know.
[2755.12] Koel: I could never do that type of stuff.
[2756.56] Koel: And then, yeah, lo and behold, here I am.
[2761.36] Jack: Well, it's just like, you know, uh, what was, what was that
[2765.28] Jack: sort of like turning point for you where like you, you wanted
[2769.2] Jack: to get into it.
[2770.16] Jack: You're really interested.
[2771.6] Jack: DJI FBV had come out and you were looking at that.
[2775.76] Jack: And then I sort of like made the argument of like, you know,
[2779.36] Jack: those things like you crash them, you break it's $200 and, you
[2785.44] Jack: know, the repair schemes only for a certain amount of time or
[2788.16] Jack: whatever, what were the main factors that made you like hop
[2791.68] Jack: ship, but you, you know, what kind of made you go, actually,
[2797.44] Jack: I'll learn electronics.
[2799.52] Koel: Well, so I think that's a really good question actually,
[2802.88] Koel: because I have to think about that because it's like, I knew
[2808.32] Koel: that I want, like, okay, I liked, I liked drones.
[2810.8] Koel: I liked getting cool footage, yada, yada.
[2813.28] Koel: But at the same time, it was like with DJI drones, it's kind
[2817.44] Koel: of like boring after a while.
[2818.88] Koel: You can only do so much with them.
[2821.28] Koel: You can go up, down, side to side, spin around forward
[2824.08] Koel: backwards.
[2824.64] Koel: And that's basically it.
[2825.92] Koel: And you can still get cool shots and whatnot.
[2828.32] Koel: But I wanted to get to that next level where, you know, you're
[2831.76] Koel: seeing all these guys, you had been doing it for years.
[2835.44] Koel: And I, you know, it's crazy to think that I actually made
[2839.04] Koel: the intro theme music for the LDO podcast while I didn't
[2843.04] Koel: even really know much or give a shit about FPV drones back
[2847.76] Koel: then.
[2848.32] Koel: That was would have been like at least eight years ago.
[2850.88] Koel: Right.
[2851.28] Koel: So I didn't even know what you were exactly what you were
[2854.8] Koel: into back then as how deep into it you were.
[2857.36] Koel: But when I kind of clued in and like what the possibilities
[2860.96] Koel: were.
[2861.68] Koel: And then I was like, okay, I'm looking at the DJI FPV.
[2864.64] Koel: But then it's like, it's not robust.
[2866.8] Koel: It can't handle a crash.
[2868.48] Koel: It's really expensive.
[2871.92] Koel: And I think that was a huge factor was A, that it was
[2874.64] Koel: really expensive and B, that it like, you know, it's not going
[2877.76] Koel: to take a beating at all.
[2879.12] Koel: I had crashed some Mavics before or like Phantoms and, you
[2882.8] Koel: know, very expensive repairs.
[2885.04] Koel: Half the time you get a repair back, it doesn't even work
[2887.2] Koel: properly.
[2887.92] Koel: Or there's an additional issue that wasn't existing,
[2891.6] Koel: you know, prior to that repair or whatever.
[2896.88] Koel: I don't know, man.
[2897.52] Koel: It was you did kind of beat it into me a bit.
[2900.88] Koel: I would say like you kind of like you kind of showed me
[2904.48] Koel: the way and you were like, here's the thing.
[2907.04] Koel: I'm smart enough to know that I don't know anything.
[2910.72] Koel: So like, I do tend to listen to people that have been doing
[2914.56] Koel: things that I want to do for longer than me.
[2918.08] Koel: If that sentence even makes sense.
[2920.16] Koel: But yeah, I don't know.
[2923.68] Koel: It was just it got to that point where I was like, I don't
[2926.56] Koel: know, man, I wanted to do it.
[2929.36] Koel: I didn't want to spend thousands of dollars.
[2932.16] Koel: And I also didn't want to have to send stuff off to get
[2934.8] Koel: fixed if I if anything broke.
[2936.96] Koel: So it was basically like, okay, I have no other choice.
[2940.88] Koel: I got to get into this.
[2943.52] Stephen: I thought about DJI, but I wanted something sportier.
[2946.24] Stephen: So I ended up with this really dodgy hub sand thing.
[2949.76] Stephen: I had FPV on it and no gimbal.
[2952.08] Stephen: I thought it was sporty.
[2953.52] Stephen: And I was not yet.
[2956.0] Stephen: So I'd learned line of sight originally, like I flew line
[2959.44] Stephen: of sight with the small hub sands.
[2961.36] Stephen: And that's how I got into quads.
[2964.56] Stephen: And then I got this guy that it came with a little video
[2967.2] Stephen: transmitter that does has an FPV screen in it.
[2971.2] Stephen: It's going to have an order of one solution.
[2972.72] Stephen: And I wanted to fly it low and fast.
[2976.32] Stephen: And this thing just, I think it was 3S.
[2980.0] Stephen: No, was it 2S?
[2981.76] Stephen: 2 or 3S.
[2982.88] Stephen: And it did not have enough power.
[2985.28] Stephen: It was like 18 or something motors with gigantic,
[2989.76] Stephen: like eight inch props, very low power to weight ratio,
[2993.28] Stephen: very low to the point where it would have that awful feeling
[2998.16] Stephen: when you put it into a hard bank and you realize you're
[3000.56] Stephen: losing altitude because when you're in a hard bank,
[3003.04] Stephen: you don't get the upwards components of the thrust vector
[3006.48] Stephen: anymore.
[3007.12] Stephen: You're not even anywhere near like knife edge.
[3010.08] Stephen: You still like at 45 degrees and you're sinking because all
[3013.12] Stephen: of a sudden you haven't got enough thrust upwards.
[3016.24] Stephen: Yeah, it was rough.
[3018.16] Stephen: So I tried to do the time of flying.
[3020.8] Stephen: I wanted to do with that for a while.
[3024.56] Stephen: And I sensed I was getting pretty close to destroying it.
[3028.48] Stephen: A couple of landings was surprised it survived
[3030.96] Stephen: and I had to clip the case back together.
[3032.56] Stephen: And so I just, yeah, I said enough is enough.
[3036.32] Stephen: And I moved on.
[3036.96] Stephen: Retired it.
[3038.08] Stephen: Got carbon fiber stuff.
[3039.44] Stephen: Got the proper gear.
[3041.6] Koel: Well, you know what?
[3042.32] Koel: Another thing for me too was I had the like the OG Mavic Pro
[3046.32] Koel: and it had a setting in it had an FPV setting,
[3051.68] Koel: which it's not FPV in the terms of you're wearing goggles,
[3055.44] Koel: but it would bank roll or it would do it would do instead
[3059.36] Koel: of you just going straight or doing like this where it keeps
[3061.68] Koel: the horizon like it would kind of do like coordinate the turns
[3066.0] Koel: a bit a bit except for the fact that the gimbal when you
[3070.0] Koel: would do it, it would like start like doing all weird stuff.
[3072.48] Koel: If you got to a certain angle.
[3074.32] Koel: So like like I remember I was like I like climb to the random
[3079.12] Koel: top of this like hill on a construction site the one day
[3081.52] Koel: and I was like flying the FPV mode thinking I was like
[3085.12] Koel: super cool and then I'm like I was in sport mode flying FPV
[3088.88] Koel: mode and I was like, okay, this sucks like I this is not
[3095.12] Koel: anything close to what I'm seeing on the internet.
[3098.48] Koel: Like as far as like footage people are getting and yeah,
[3102.56] Koel: and I think after that it was like I think that was actually
[3105.52] Koel: that may have that very well may have been the turning point
[3108.24] Koel: where I was like, okay, I'm getting a little beta FPV light
[3111.84] Koel: radio 2 SE I'm going to try out the simulator and I think
[3116.72] Koel: that actually was around the time does that sound about right
[3119.84] Koel: to you, Jack?
[3121.28] Jack: Yeah, yeah, well that's yeah, you need to figure out
[3124.56] Jack: whether you liked it first.
[3126.72] Stephen: Yeah, so yeah, I'd had that experience with a parrot
[3130.4] Stephen: al drone before that that kind of when you try and push it
[3134.64] Stephen: and the flight controller allows you to select flight modes
[3138.16] Stephen: where you could do acrobatic flying and then just freaks out
[3141.28] Stephen: when you try and do something acrobatic because it thinks
[3143.84] Stephen: that it's lost control when you try and push it beyond
[3147.52] Stephen: about kind of 30 or 35 degrees angle.
[3151.52] Stephen: It's like, oh yeah, something bad's happening.
[3153.6] Stephen: I'll just fail safe and the parrot al drone used to like
[3157.68] Stephen: get to a kind of about 40 degree angle and then it would
[3160.96] Stephen: just fail safe and just the motors would just stop and it
[3163.84] Stephen: would just down like a brick and you hadn't done anything.
[3167.6] Stephen: It had just decided that it exceeded its maximum tilt angle
[3171.2] Stephen: and instead of like leveling out or doing something remotely
[3174.8] Stephen: sane, it would just fail safe.
[3177.28] Stephen: It was just like, no, well, nothing can be done now.
[3179.44] Stephen: We're all going to die.
[3180.4] Stephen: I give up.
[3182.16] Jack: But the DJI like turning people using that, the turning it over
[3187.92] Jack: to like shut it off.
[3189.92] Jack: It's like, oh, everyone will see that.
[3192.4] Jack: It's like, that should not be a thing.
[3195.6] Stephen: It's not what you want.
[3196.24] Stephen: It's not what you want.
[3197.28] Stephen: You want to be able to flip it upside down in a gust of wind
[3200.08] Stephen: and then just have the gyro kick back in and push it back.
[3204.72] Koel: Yeah.
[3204.96] Koel: It's like an auto shut off basically.
[3206.8] Koel: Right.
[3207.04] Koel: And it's like, oh, but I guess it's, it's, it's created
[3211.44] Koel: and it's programmed and it's whatever to fly a certain way.
[3214.16] Koel: So anything out of those, you know, guidelines sort of speak,
[3217.84] Koel: it's like, Nope, turning off.
[3220.4] Koel: That's it.
[3220.8] Stephen: It's like golden path in programming.
[3223.44] Stephen: What you want to really avoid as a system that only works when
[3226.8] Stephen: you follow the golden path.
[3228.64] Stephen: This set of conditions that are all, you know, the sun is out.
[3233.28] Stephen: It's a nice warm day.
[3234.88] Stephen: No one is messing with you.
[3236.24] Stephen: Everything's going according to plan.
[3238.0] Stephen: You test it and that you don't just ship it at that point.
[3240.72] Stephen: You've got to test when things go wrong.
[3242.88] Stephen: You know, when, when the day isn't so great, when things are a little bit
[3246.24] Stephen: iffy and make sure it still works then.
[3248.88] Stephen: And yeah, those first drones, they were not tested for anything but the golden path.
[3253.84] Jack: The Swiss cheese when the holes line up.
[3257.68] Jack: No, I don't know when the cold cold.
[3262.0] Jack: Do you know about Swiss cheese?
[3264.64] Stephen: I mean, I'm part of your West cheese, but I don't know what you're talking about.
[3272.64] Stephen: Another type of cheese, the dark cheese that no one talks about.
[3276.16] Stephen: We're spending about in hushed circles.
[3279.52] Koel: The only thing I know is that there's holes in it.
[3282.56] Frank: Yeah, but that's kind of like the inverse of what Stephen was talking about.
[3290.96] Frank: Nevermind.
[3292.32] Frank: The Swiss model is the idea that if you're trying to make something safe or reliable,
[3299.36] Frank: you should have multiple levels of redundancy so that if one of them has something wrong with it,
[3305.12] Frank: i.e. a hole in a slice of cheese, it doesn't line up with another slice of cheese behind it.
[3311.36] Frank: Ah, yeah, still holds up.
[3314.24] Frank: The problem is you cut the slice of cheese from the same block of cheese,
[3318.32] Frank: you end up with holes that line up.
[3320.24] Koel: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
[3322.72] Koel: That's funny.
[3324.16] Koel: See, now all I'm thinking about is Swiss cheese and I'm like,
[3327.12] Koel: how do they get the holes in it, man?
[3329.44] Stephen: Oh, of course, the old cold.
[3333.12] Stephen: If you're in North America, molds with special patterns in them,
[3337.36] Stephen: because if you're buying cheese, that's a perfect choice.
[3342.64] Frank: Oh, no.
[3345.84] Frank: Cloring the subject vaguely back on track before we finish the show.
[3350.48] Frank: I know, I know it's not on brand at all.
[3355.92] Frank: There's a reminder for people in the UK that on the 27th and 28th of January in Birmingham,
[3364.96] Frank: there is the Birmingham International Race Days, or BIRD,
[3369.84] Frank: event.
[3370.24] Frank: So that's the Woot Race.
[3371.6] Stephen: For more details, please refer back to our episode, BIRD is the word.
[3376.0] Frank: Exactly, exactly.
[3377.92] Frank: But, yeah, so that is coming up.
[3380.64] Frank: They've sold out all the race tickets, I believe.
[3383.2] Frank: But, you know, if you want to go and spectate, that's still an option.
[3387.84] Frank: And the drone sucker UK people are, I think, planning on being there.
[3396.48] Frank: I don't know whether they're going to be demonstrating or what the deal is,
[3400.24] Frank: whether they're just going to be there to chat to, but they're planning on going, I believe.
[3404.72] Frank: So I'm hoping that we can get them on the show sometime later this year when they've
[3412.24] Frank: set themselves up a bit more.
[3413.44] Frank: But, yeah, it'd be good to kind of hear how they're getting on as well.
[3418.8] Frank: Sweet.
[3419.6] Koel: Yeah, and that is episode 431, if anybody wants to go back and let's drone out.
[3426.64] Frank: And if anyone is joining us here tonight, because YouTube algorithm recommended them
[3432.24] Frank: LD episode 318, then welcome.
[3436.72] Frank: Thank you for joining us.
[3439.44] Frank: There's many of you.
[3440.4] Frank: I don't know why that particular episode, but you're welcome.
[3445.36] Frank: 318?
[3447.2] Frank: I think it was 318, somewhere around there.
[3451.36] Frank: All of a sudden, very, very popular.
[3454.08] Stephen: Interesting.
[3455.84] Stephen: Does anyone remember this awful old drone, by the way?
[3460.56] Stephen: Oh, wow.
[3462.88] Stephen: This was the thing to have.
[3468.24] Stephen: It was at CES, I believe.
[3470.08] Stephen: It was everywhere.
[3470.96] Stephen: There was like a media frenzy around this thing.
[3473.52] Stephen: And I got one thinking it would be amazing.
[3476.56] Stephen: In case you can't appreciate the scale, these props are about like 10 or 12 inches.
[3483.2] Stephen: And that is expanded pole styling.
[3487.28] Stephen: Those are geared motors.
[3490.08] Stephen: So there's a gear underneath each of them.
[3492.16] Stephen: So they've got like zero torque.
[3494.48] Stephen: And the connection is via Wi-Fi.
[3498.16] Stephen: And it's not autonomous.
[3500.0] Stephen: So you have to control this via Wi-Fi.
[3503.2] Stephen: Using a touch screen.
[3505.12] Stephen: This is like Wi-Fi back in what year?
[3508.48] Stephen: Back in around 2014, 2013.
[3514.64] Stephen: Nice.
[3515.52] Stephen: Yeah, so A to 11 B Wi-Fi.
[3520.93] Frank: Yeah.
[3521.17] Frank: That's Wi-Fi 3 now, right?
[3524.21] Stephen: No, no, A to 11 B by the IEEE standards.
[3529.89] Stephen: So yeah, it was spectacularly rubbish.
[3534.29] Stephen: It would fly for quite a long time, but it was on Wi-Fi.
[3537.09] Stephen: So obviously the range was just like an optimistic shrug.
[3544.45] Stephen: You flew it until you didn't.
[3547.49] Stephen: Maybe it was 20 meters.
[3548.85] Stephen: Maybe it was 30 meters.
[3550.61] Stephen: Who knows?
[3551.09] Stephen: It might just be five meters and then have a bit of a moment.
[3555.33] Stephen: Yeah, interesting.
[3556.93] Frank: Like you say, brushed motors, right?
[3558.93] Frank: And.
[3559.57] Stephen: Brushed geared motors.
[3561.81] Stephen: Not even direct drive.
[3563.25] Stephen: Geared motors for the ultimate prop control.
[3567.41] Frank: Yeah.
[3567.89] Frank: And, and, you know, efficiency as well.
[3571.57] Frank: Lots of AR drone.
[3574.69] UNKNOWN: Yeah.
[3574.93] Stephen: Wow.
[3575.49] Stephen: More of a speeder than a drone.
[3577.49] Stephen: You could unclip the polystyrene hull and lose maybe 150 grams,
[3583.09] Stephen: at which point it would fly only like.
[3589.97] Frank: Do you remember what batteries it has?
[3591.73] Frank: I bet they were like two C-rated.
[3594.53] Stephen: I don't think, yeah, I don't think battery power is really a problem
[3597.81] Stephen: with gear brushed motors there.
[3600.05] Stephen: And the amp draw was probably about two, I would guess.
[3605.89] Stephen: It's quite a long time, so long as you stayed very close to yourself
[3611.28] Stephen: and didn't exceed about 30 degrees tilt angle.
[3617.2] Jack: Bloody hell.
[3618.64] Stephen: Anyway, there we are.
[3619.84] Jack: Yeah, very cool.
[3622.32] Jack: Unfortunately, that is all we've got time for.
[3625.36] Jack: A massive shout out to our lovely Patreons who keep this show on the road.
[3631.84] Jack: We have been joined by the lovely Andrew slash Frank.
[3636.4] Frank: Bye.
[3637.44] Jack: The wonderful Steven.
[3639.36] Jack: Cheers.
[3640.08] Jack: Thanks to Frank for sorting out the podcast.
[3642.08] Jack: That's cool.
[3644.08] Jack: And as always, Cole.
[3647.44] Jack: See ya.
[3648.48] Jack: I've been somewhat bearable.
[3652.08] Koel: Thanks for tuning in, everybody.
[3657.68] Jack: Thanks.
[3658.08] Jack: Bye.
[3659.28] Jack: Bye.
[3661.28] Jack: Telemetry loss.