4 ms·
Tethered drones are quite interesting. I fly one for our company but we have yet to get much interest in getting it adopted by first responders or LEO. The "un
by btreecat 7y ago
Tethered drones are quite interesting. I fly one for our company but we have yet to get much interest in getting it adopted by first responders or LEO.
The "unlimited power" comes with some major asterisk from my experience although it is with a different system.
* Tethered power works great when plugged into a stable AC source, generators can be less than ideal.
* Weather conditions limit your altitude even more so, higher wind requires more power to stay up.
* The tether often works against a lot of the stabilization systems built into the drones, so flying them can be a handful under certain conditions
* The tether can get bound up on the spool
* The higher you go the heavier the tether is
Overall though, it's awesome technology with interesting potential. I have kept ours in the air for over 3 hours continuously and only landed so I could take a break.
- slowhand09 7y agoOffshore racing sailboats use untethered drones frequently as there is rarely a helicopter available for publicity and action photoshots when 1000km out. I would think tethered would be great for them as they don't want to risk loosing a moneymaker with lots of potential remaining.
- mvid 7y agoWell if it goes into the water, tethered or untethered, it likely won’t be usable anymore
- slowhand09 7y agoTrue, but in windy conditions, losing or leaving it behind might be a more likely scenario. Being able to retrieve it by pressing as button on a windlass or remote, then being free to attend to other things would be valuable.