Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

baesystems.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 188 posts

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#11

Post by bencollier49 »

vinw wrote: post #8
bencollier49 wrote: post #5

It feels like they're paying ludicrous money for these. Can someone in the know explain what differentiates these from shop-bought or scratch-built drones? As per this article below, the Nano 1A UAV Quadcopter Bug drone sells for £4,500 (a tenth of the price of another model, the Black Hornet Nano): https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/drone-nano-b... I appreciate that this is probably a variation on the o…

It's probably because of the low volume. They've only sold 30 so far, and the R&D costs need to be recovered.

If the selling point is stability in a storm, then the differentiation is in software, which is interesting. You'd expect the price of things like this to tumble.

One could imagine great dark clouds of these things in battle over perhaps Eastern Europe or the South China Sea in ten years' time.

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#12

Post by PeterisP »

dfsegoat wrote: post #4

> "It was the only nano-UAV able to cope with the uncompromising weather during a recent Army Warfighting Experiment (AWE) event" I hadn't thought too much about how UAVs of any class will need to cope with adverse weather conditions. Seems like that will become an even larger variable in military planning, as UAVs etc. become more prevalent. E.g. it might be hard to totally replace a manned surveillance platform wit…

The recent Azerbaijan-Armenia war saw extensive use of UAVs, and yes, weather (e.g. fog in the mountains or the lack of it) was an important factor mostly because of its impact on UAV usage.

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#13

Post by intricatedetail »

bencollier49 wrote: post #5

It feels like they're paying ludicrous money for these. Can someone in the know explain what differentiates these from shop-bought or scratch-built drones? As per this article below, the Nano 1A UAV Quadcopter Bug drone sells for £4,500 (a tenth of the price of another model, the Black Hornet Nano): https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/drone-nano-b... I appreciate that this is probably a variation on the o…

My guess it is built with military grade components which are more expensive and has got embedded emphasis on reliability. That probably includes custom molds that can be insanely expensive for small runs. I can imagine the firmware must conform to a higher standards than consumer grade firmware.

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#15

Post by epicureanideal »

bencollier49 wrote: post #5

It feels like they're paying ludicrous money for these. Can someone in the know explain what differentiates these from shop-bought or scratch-built drones? As per this article below, the Nano 1A UAV Quadcopter Bug drone sells for £4,500 (a tenth of the price of another model, the Black Hornet Nano): https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/drone-nano-b... I appreciate that this is probably a variation on the o…

From the article:

"It boasts a stealthy low visual profile and the ability to fly even in strong winds of more than 50mph. It was the only nano-UAV able to cope with the uncompromising weather during a recent Army Warfighting Experiment (AWE) event hosted by the Ministry of Defence’s Future Capability Group."

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#16

Post by intricatedetail »

throwaway4good wrote: post #3

Reminds me of the DJI Mavic Mini. How much does it cost?

If it could take 50g of cargo, that would be just one run over the border to pay it off, if you know what I mean. I guess cartels would be all over this "bug".

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#17

Post by realmod »

Drones are integral to current warfare and will continue to become even more important. And as we've seen in the Caucuses, the nations with the most effective drones will easily conquer other countries without or with worse drones.

Aside from that, we've come really far with drones which are amazing technology-wise. We have small drones like these with a 2km-range and large drones that can carry huge payloads, i.e. payloads in the tons of kg, while also having ranges in the thousands of kilometres. Although it is remarkable technology-wise, I believe it foreshadows a horrible future for humans that we have such advanced murder weapons. And especially now that drones have become cheap to produce.

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#18

Post by bencollier49 »

epicureanideal wrote: post #15
bencollier49 wrote: post #5

It feels like they're paying ludicrous money for these. Can someone in the know explain what differentiates these from shop-bought or scratch-built drones? As per this article below, the Nano 1A UAV Quadcopter Bug drone sells for £4,500 (a tenth of the price of another model, the Black Hornet Nano): https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/drone-nano-b... I appreciate that this is probably a variation on the o…

From the article: "It boasts a stealthy low visual profile and the ability to fly even in strong winds of more than 50mph. It was the only nano-UAV able to cope with the uncompromising weather during a recent Army Warfighting Experiment (AWE) event hosted by the Ministry of Defence’s Future Capability Group."

> It boasts a stealthy low visual profile

The one in the article's picture looks like a flying brick. A lot of money to be made in this field - there's a low barrier to entry in the market.

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#19

Post by adamnemecek »

Cool! Almost makes me forget that BAE Systems defrauded the American public by bribing Michael Chertoff to buy full body scanners from BAE Systems for $3B. Chertoff then joined BAE Systems as a Chairman of the Board.

http://www.allgov.com/news/controversies/chertoff-joins-defe...

https://www.aofs.org/2010/04/12/secretary-michael-chertoff-b...

Re: Bug drone for UK army that weights 196g, has 40 mins autonomy and 2km range

#20

Post by epicureanideal »

Daniel_sk wrote: post #7
chillax wrote: post #2

See also: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Hornet_Nano

"Although the Army is seeking a mini-drone for use by individual squads through the Soldier Borne Sensors (SBS) program, the individually handmade Black Hornet is seen as too expensive for large-scale deployment, with a unit costing as much as US$195,000"

But just the fact that this exists at any price means that it will eventually become ubiquitous, unless something even smaller and more capable takes its place. That price was in 2016, so who knows if it's already down to $100k or below. In 10-20 years, these things will be priced like laptops and be far more capable than the current models.
Post reply on HN