How FPV drones are prepared for combat missions
Oleksiy, platoon commander of the drones control engineers of the 2nd International Defense Legion of Ukraine, tells us.
Drone engineers are needed to test, modify, rework and reprogram the received FPVs to meet the current needs and realities of combat operations. They assemble batches of drones, sort them by size, control frequencies, and video signal frequencies.
“This is necessary to understand where everything is for further work with each drone. There are 5.8 GHz 'sevens' here, 1.2 GHz 'sevens' there, 5.8 GHz 'tens' there, and so on. 5.8 GHz and 1.2 GHz are the radio frequency range for video transmission. “Seven” and ‘ten’ are the size of FPV drones, measured in inches along the diagonal of the drone. Seven-inch drones have a diagonal of almost 18 cm, and ten-inch drones are a little more than 25 cm”, says Oleksiy.
The size of the drone and the power of the engines determine its payload and range. A bigger drone can lift a heavier and more powerful battery and, accordingly, a munition that can weigh up to 4 kg.
After the “props” were set, they went to the training ground
Before the drones are sent to the front line, engineers test them in the field: they install propellers and fly them around. This allows them to make sure that the UAVs have no hidden defects, or to eliminate them if they are found.
“We arrange various tests for the drones - for the flight range, for the cargo capacity. We check the engine speed. Sometimes, when you launch a drone, the propellers spin in different directions. Then it doesn't take off and flips over - and God forbid this should happen with an already installed munition, so it's very important to set the direction of rotation correctly”, explains Oleksiy.
In the International Legion of Ukraine every engineer is a good pilot, and every pilot is an engineer.
What is a “curtain” and a repeater?
The safety of pilots is guaranteed by the so-called “curtain” - a special program that blocks the video signal during the takeoff of the drone. It is used by the military to “close” the video on the screen when lifting the UAV into the sky.
To extend the radio range, repeaters are used, which are raised on a mast or installed on an auxiliary drone based on a quadcopter. It can rise to a height of several meters and significantly increase the range of radio signal transmission.
Source: armyinform.com.ua
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