What exactly is a drone or quadcopter?

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Hello, friends, this is my first article about What Exactly Is A Drone? I’m not gonna introduce me in here, you can know about me from reading about me section.

What Is A Drone?

A drone, in technical words, is an unmanned aircraft.

Because of that The drones are more formally known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or unmanned aircraft systems (UASes).

In my words, a drone is a lightweight aircraft that controlled from remote by a human.

In the past, drones were mostly used for military purposes such as spying on enemy bases from the air.

btw now drones used in a wide range of civilian tasks.

Let’s dig a little bit deeper, a drone is a word you see pretty often in today/s pop culture.

But drones seem to be an extremely diverse kind so what exactly is a drone?

A term that is more descriptive and does most people are referencing when they say the “D” word is “Unmanned areal vehicle”.

Essentially if it flies in a controlled way and there isn’t anybody on board is a drone.

Whether this controlled entirely buy computers in artificial intelligence or o the other end of the spectrum entirely controlled by a remote human makes little difference.

But most often when you see a vehicle described as a drone today it is a little bit of both, controlled by humans but capable of some degree of navigational on its own if necessary.

In the future, of course, this is likely to change just as drivers fewer cars race on the horizon.

 

The History Of Drones

The earliest unmanned aerial vehicle in the history of drones was seen in 1839, Austrian

s attacked Venice city using explosive-filled unmanned balloons.

After the invention of winged aircraft changed everything of unmanned vehicles.

A year later, an American alternative created ” Hewitt-Sperry ” Automatic Airplane.

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After an impressive test before representatives of the US Army, a more advanced mass-producible version was commissioned: the Kettering Bug.

drone history

The Bug was a marvel of 1918 technology, but it was developed too late to be used in the war and was never deployed in combat.

From exploding balloons to the Parcel delivering unmanned multi-copter, the history of drones is a fascinating topic.

 

Here are some tasks now a days these drones do-

  • Search and rescue
  • Areal mapping
  • Traffic monitoring
  • Weather monitoring
  • Firefighting
  • Photography and videography
  • Racing
  • Agriculture
  • Delivery services

Alright, guys, I think now you have some knowledge about Drones and It’s abilities.

Before learn to build the part you have to learn a few more things.

As I mentioned earlier, multi-copter is a kind of a drone and it is often used fixed-pitch propellers.

Radio-controlled multi-copters are increasingly popular for aerial photography, and land surveying.

More recently Drone Racing is a hot topic, where multi-copters are used in racing and freestyle competition.

There are many types of multirotor drones. As the name of it, Those drones were categorized by the number of arms+motors it has.

or example a four-motored drone is called a quadcopter.

Types of multi-coptors.

Bicopter

bicopter

  •  Bicopter Has two motors.
  •  All motors moved by servos to desired tilt angles.
  •  No need a ruder(tail motor as helicopter).
  •  Bicopter has more lifting power given than the helicopter because it has two motors.
  •  Not very popular configuration for hobbyists because it’s difficult to pilot from RC.

Tricopter

tricopter drone

  •  Tricopter Has 3 motors as the name “Tri”.
  •  Typically in a “Y” shape and “T” shape.
  •  Single arm with motor in backside act as rudder,can  tilt  left and right by a servo to turn the aircraft.
  •  

Quadcopter

drone quadcopter

 

  •  Most popular drone type in world.
  • Quadcopter Has 4 motors as the name “quad”
  •  Has simplest mechanical structure
  •  Widely used for racing, photography and arial filming.
  •  Quadcopter has two main configurations:( X , + , H )

The X configuration is more popular, because quadcopter can fix a camera front side of frame.

The H configuration is good is not popular but to a H type frame, can fit a camera perfectly.

Hexacopter

what-exactly-is-a-drone-hexacopter

  • *The hexacopter has 6 motors
  •  Very similar to the quadcopters
  •  Has more lifting capacity
  •  If one motor fails, can stay stable enough for a safe landing
  •  Little bit more expensive to build.
  •  Has two configurations: (X , Y).

Octocopter

octacopter

  • Octocopters has 8 motors
  • Similar to quadcopter and hexacopter
  •  Has more lifting capacity and redundancy.
  •  Very popular as aerial photography and lift heavy gears.

The number of motors and configuration changes flight’s performance and one and one has its advantages and disadvantages.

By the way, more motors increase its lift capacity because it has more rotors.

Also, a hexacopter can lift an SLR camera but in a quadcopter, it may be a little bit difficult.

The main disadvantage is a decrease in power efficiency and an increase in the cost of purchasing additional hardware and maintenance.

In the future, I’ll write an article on each topic.

 

Conclusion

Most of the multirotor drones I mentioned above can easily build by your self.

If you have more great drone facts be sure to let our readers know in the comments, and please drop us a line if this article has been helpful to you in some way!

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