Last dance for traditional sUAS controllers?
Most sUAS are controlled via traditional RC transmitters and they serve their purpose well. A few UAS manufacturers, have created bespoke solutions but on the whole standard gear is used. This has the advantage of years of development by established companies leading to solid products that work. Experimental control systems and experimental aircraft don’t really mix well. Established transmitters have sliders and switchs built in which can be used for pan and tilt in cameras and triggering actions such as return to home with the autopilot. They also are very handy for hand flying a UAS when something unexpected happens!
All well and good, but without adding a data modem and taking a laptop out onto site the UAS operator is out of the loop with what is happening with the UAS. In sUAS a data modem carries the overhead of weight, for the unit, antenna and power. It also creates an extra layer of complexity integrating it with the autopilot. Currently the only autopilot that is addressing that issue in an integrated fashion is the OpenPilot and its Pipbee modem.
Modems and ground control systems will become easier to set up and autopilots will be able to handle out of condition airframes more effectively very soon, in fact some are there already.
But the single new feature being rolled out by the larger RC manufacturers, telemetry, will surely keep traditional controllers around for one last gasp. The advent of 2.4Ghz transmitters that monitor receiver status and frequency hopping allow a channel for information to come back to the operator.
The first sensors and display available came out 18 months ago and are produced by Czech company Jeti.
These have proved so popular that JR/Graupner now sell some of their legacy transmitters with the feature built in.
Now the summer season of radio launches is well under way and three significant manufacturers have jumped onto the bandwagon. All of them display sensor information on their inbuilt screens.
First the Spektrum brand which is owned by JR and its DX8
From HiTec the Aurora 9
The stand out in looks from Multiplex the CockpitSX
Interestingly only the Jeti and Hitec appear to have a GPS add on, which will of course show heading and groundspeed. As well as a handy feature looking for a lost UAS, position. Perhaps that is coming to the others.
In reality autopilot integrators will no doubt continue to modems to relay autopilot health and retask airframes.
Having telemetry coming back from an independent witness might be valuable reason to keep new legacy controllers.
