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Re: [TowerTalk] Drones

To: towertalk@contesting.com
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Drones
From: Mike Fatchett W0MU <w0mu@w0mu.com>
Date: Tue, 21 May 2024 13:37:29 -0600
List-post: <mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
Thanks all for the comments.

Being able to carry a line would be a nice feature.  The price is not too bad for a used one.  My son in law has something he said I could borrow.  It is not a DJI.

W0MU

On 5/21/2024 1:26 PM, David Gilbert wrote:


I use a DJI Mavic Air 2 (the older version of the Air2S), which can be had for less than $450 used.  There are several on eBay right now that even include extra batteries.  It works great, is stable in the wind, and has a good 4K camera.

It also has a decent ability to carry a weight ... at least a pound.  I've used it with a 3rd party release mechanism to lift and drop a length of dacron line on the other side of of an existing wire dipole.  The drone has an LED on the underside for lighting up the ground when landing in the dark, and that LED can be triggered on and off via a button on the controller.  The 3rd party release mechanism straps around the body of the drone and positions a phototransistor over that LED.  A small motor powered by a rechargeable battery in the 3rd party release mechanism pulls a pin to drop the load when the LED gets turned on.

Here is the video of it. https://youtu.be/x97s4bHdYtc

I've also used the drone with a small crystal oscillator (strapped to the top) and a very short dipole (strapped to the legs) to plot the vertical pattern of one of my antennas.  The Mavic Air 2 controller constantly displays both height and distance relative to the takeoff point, so it is possible to keep the drone a constant vector distance from the antenna at various elevation angles.  The signal transmitted by the crystal oscillator gets read and measured in the shack from the antenna being tested.  It works.

I've used the drone to inspect my antennas on the tower but didn't save any of those videos.  For "playing around", check out these two videos I posted to YouTube.  They are in 4K, but YouTube sometimes makes you adjust the resolution in the Settings tab at the bottom right hand corner.

https://youtu.be/UZlVPDSbyfw

https://youtu.be/IuoHOWCXhMw

Dave   AB7E






On 5/21/2024 7:42 AM, Mike Fatchett W0MU wrote:
What are people using for their drones? The DJI has a mini drone for around $300.00  the Maviks are crazy expensive now.  So many choice but I know many of them are not very good.

I am mostly looking for something to do tower inspections and have some fun flying it about.

W0MU


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