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Lily – Drone camera

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Lily – Drone camera

#261

Post by lsaferite »

Phlarp wrote: post #259
dharma1 wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it can still drop from the sky, you are just getting a bit more redundancy on motors/props but doesn't help if they all stop due to something else

Once you have redundancy in the powertrain, getting redundancy from a flight computer is relatively straight forward. At that point 3 rotors on one side of the craft or multiple computers have to all fail simultaneously to cause a real loss of control, and even then algorithmic changes can be made to the flight computer to allow semi-controlled landings with multiple prop failures.

I would think a multi-FC voting system, like what the shuttle used, would be the way to go for FC redundancy.

Mix that with a dual power system and 6 or 8 motors and I think you get MUCH better redundancy and fault tolerance.

And while you are at it perhaps a disconnected drogue chute that deploys if a watchdog signal is lost. Not something that is large, just enough to slow the decent to non-dangerous speeds.

Re: Lily – Drone camera

#263

Post by dpark »

reverend_gonzo wrote: post #193
nine_k wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want 99.9999% reliability and strong safety guarantees as a feature of cars, bikes, and can openers, too. Unfortunately, currently we probably make do with a few less nines on all these items.

Cars and bikes are directly controlled by humans, and in the case of an emergency, then can perform necessary maneuvers to reduce the damages. Not saying that always happens, but for the most part it does. A drone that loses an engine falls out of the sky and lands on top of anything that is below it, and as of right now, there are no evasive maneuvers that can be executed. Especially for drones that are being used t…

The front fork on your bike is almost certainly not six-nines reliable. If it breaks, you're not doing any evasive maneuvers. Ditto for car electronics. I'd wager that cars fail at a rate higher than 1:million, potentially leaving the driver effectively with no control (literally no control if drive-by-wire, no effective control for many people if power steering and breaking cut out).

Re: Lily – Drone camera

#264

Post by nailer »

themodelplumber wrote: post #144
rubicon33 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a big, big worry of mine. I'm considering doing commercial work with drones, and the major thing holding me back is the risk of injuring others with these things. The DJI Phantom, and Inspire, could kill someone if they fell from high enough. And I can tell you from personal experience, the software is simply not even CLOSE to bug-free enough for me to be worry free. The more I think about it, the more I thin…

Seems like a good place to put Extreme Drone Crashes - Compilation 2015 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9rnTk6FBzs hehe

Reddit's defaults, for some reason, includes 'wtf' which frequently has gore pictures. One of which was someone whose face encountered a drone.

Re: Lily – Drone camera

#266

Post by 0xdeadbeefbabe »

rubicon33 wrote: post #138
bglazer wrote: post #131

This is really, really cool. That said, flying objects are inherently dangerous. I was at a bike race and a guy was following the pack with a DJI drone. One motor suddenly failed and the thing plummeted to the ground from 40ft and broke into a bunch of pieces. Luckily, it didn't hit anyone but it would have been a major incident if it had. There's a lot of excitement about the cool, flashy features of these drones (f…

This is a big, big worry of mine. I'm considering doing commercial work with drones, and the major thing holding me back is the risk of injuring others with these things. The DJI Phantom, and Inspire, could kill someone if they fell from high enough. And I can tell you from personal experience, the software is simply not even CLOSE to bug-free enough for me to be worry free. The more I think about it, the more I thin…

When I did RC planes, not even automated drones, the common repeated expression was, "spectators are almost always a bad idea."

Edit: which makes for a lonely hobby.

Re: Lily – Drone camera

#267

Post by crimsonalucard »

sean-duffy wrote: post #159
stinos wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One motor suddenly failed Maybe drones need to start to incorporate parachutes to slow down the fall in case of problems like these, or maybe even airbags to ease the crash. Not that it would make it 99.9999% reliable, but it should be better than nothing. And also won't completely thrash your drone when it crashes. edit seems nine_k already commented with a similar idea

Drones of this size are cheap enough that the extra weight and cost of engineering of safety devices generally isn't worth it. It's easier to fix or replace parts.

Not if the safety device is reusable.

Re: Lily – Drone camera

#268

Post by TrevorJ »

baddox wrote: post #199
krschultz wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you factoring in your personal liability for killing someone in that equation? The comment that mentioned parachutes was talking about how a drone crashed at an event and almost injured people. My personal homeowners liability policy covers things like hitting someone with a shopping cart in the grocery store and hurting them, it probably would also cover a drone, but if you don't have insurance it could expensiv…

It's very unlikely to kill someone, or even seriously injure them. You should be at least as worried about playing baseball or riding a bicycle around people.

The battery packs on those things have quite a bit of heft to them, hit anything at terminal velocity and it's gonna be pretty devastating.

Re: Lily – Drone camera

#269

Post by dpark »

chrischen wrote: post #230
GigabyteCoin wrote: post #209

Just a personal gripe, but I hate it when websites don't work without the pointless www. in front of their domain. I just text a friend to visit https://lily.camera and he'll never see it, because it doesn't exist.

While I agree they should make www redirect, its not pointless. If you serve sub domains or plan on serving them, www as your primary helps differentiate cookies.

> its not pointless

It is entirely pointless to not redirect. There's no reason the URL posted shouldn't redirect to the www version.

Re: Lily – Drone camera

#270

Post by markman »

mod wrote: post #236
ssmoot wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think a device that weighs over 2lbs falling from 40' could kill someone? And that seems like it's being pretty generous. In most "quadcopter crash" videos I've seen on YouTube the drone was much higher. Sometimes even hundreds of meters.

Even if it's possible, it's incredibly unlikely compared to an automobile accident. If there were as many drones (of that size & rotor size) overhead as there are vehicles on the road, I'd still expect to have zero to single-digit fatalities from drones every single year--at least from "falling out of the sky onto people's bodies." Perhaps there are more likely cases where the drone is the indirect cause, like breaki…

We live in a society with motor vehicles. They are here to stay. It doesn't matter what their safety record may be or under which parameters they are operated. Drones are an entirely separate issue. We do not live in a society with drones. Period. Now if we would like to introduce them into our society it doesn't matter what laws or regulations are established for their safe operation without on-board fail safes their introduction is unlikely. How do I know? I'll just pose this question: Are you OK with any drone dropping out of the sky and landing on top of your new born infants soft little squishy skull? Find me a person that will say yes to that question.
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