Meghan and Erin with our drone.
On Sunday, October 4th, we had our first experience with flying quadcopter vehicles. Collier brought down the test copters used in his class from last semester. These test quadcopters are a third of the size of the actual drone quadcopters we are using in our class, so it was a good first step in flight.
We took turns flying the vehicles, and found them rather difficult to control. On the controller, there were two control throttles: the one on the left was for altitude adjustment, and the one on the right was for vehicle pan movement. To control both in real time proved difficult, but none the less exciting.
Kate with practice quadcopter the week earlier.
When class began on Wednesday, October 7th, we were presented the opportunity to fly the real drone quadcopters in a space provided in the second floor of X-Labs. The space was small, but was enough to grasp the sensitivity and control of the drone. The flight controller was very similar to the test copters we flew the Sunday previous, and only had a few more switches. The primary controls were that of altitude control and yaw control, which I referred to as pan movement.
Flying the drone created some anxiety in the beginning, primarily because of the threat of shattering the vehicle. For most, take off wasn’t as bad as expected. Keeping control of flight felt smooth, and maneuvering the drone was not as sporadic as the test copters. Though the added weight to the real drone helped steady the movements, it made it that much more difficult to save it if it got out of control. We actually had a crash during the test flight and chipped a couple propellers, but luckily nothing expensive or irreplaceable was damaged. This just means we can learn from our mistakes and practice more with the small quadcopters.
Kevin and our full size drone quadcopter on practice day.
For most of our group members the flight testing went well. It’s just a matter of being patient and controlling your own train of movement.
Though we won’t be flying our drone manually during data collection, controlling the drones flight during testing in class gave empathy as to how sensitive and magnificent the technology is. It’s hard to believe, but the experience only supported the notion that we are living the future.