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US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

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Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#41

Post by hga »

themagician wrote: post #21
bdamm wrote: post #3

Drones should be licensed and/or registered, much the same way as cars are. There are places where you can drive an unregistered car without a driver's license. And that will be true of drones as well. There will be places where you can fly them unlimited. Just not in the common space defined by the government as such. That's what the government is for. "Drone ranch" here we come. I am a private pilot, so I appreciat…

Yeah, we should regulate drones. Thing is, no one really flies "drones". People are just flying RC helicopters. But we call them drones and associate them with flying death machines and suddenly everyone is scared. RC has been around for the better part of 60 years and it's never caused a major problem. The only difference between then and now is that now they are much more controllable and a little cheaper, and so m…

but 250 people got shot yesterday and any legislation about firearms is off limits.

Further legislation is "off limits"; you're ignoring the "20,000" gun laws already on the books and the severe restrictions we gun owners are already living under. Something tells me you won't like getting a fraction of these applied to you.

Can't talk about registration or "tests" or anything

Why bother with that precursor to confiscation when Obama after Oregon and Hillary! during the debate called for mass confiscation of all handguns and semi-auto long guns?

(More generally, registration has gotten about as far as it's going to go short of sparking the 2nd Civil War, and the plaintiff's bar has what's covered by legitimate testing under control, as Remington is experiencing with their shoddy Model 700 rifle safeties.)

Meanwhile, in the time it takes them to draft their first proposal 7,000+ people will get shot. A few thousand will die.

Most gun fatalities are suicides; I'm not aware of suicide by drone existing, let alone being a major issue.

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#42

Post by truthermax »

frisco wrote: post #5

I'm actually a big fan of this idea. As a private pilot, I'm excited about a lot of cool possibilities enabled by drones that aren't possible in manned aircraft (high speed, low-level FPV racing!) or are made better (package delivery with relatively high power aircraft). But I'm anxious about touching drones at all right now because the rules are either undefined or unfriendly and I theoretically have a certificate o…

RC helicopters are not a threat.

Give me a break.

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#43

Post by tomswartz07 »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #38
matheweis wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, which is why I suggested this only for the mid-to-large "classes". I have flown several myself, all the way from the CX-10 ( 3kg range). The high end of that could handle an extra 100g without much fuss. The high end of that is also what the airlines are most worried about. Granted there is some grey area in the 300-500 size copters, where they are large enough to possibly cause some minor damage to an aircraft…

How about requiring a POV (persistence of vision) display on such a drone? At a cost of few additional LEDs (or even not, if you reuse onboard ones) and some CPU cycles you could have the drone flash its serial number in a way visible on cameras as the drone moves around.

That's still a large amount of weight to carry on a device.

There are 250 class quadcopters that are built for First Person View racing. Races are won and lost because of the difference in a few grams of extra weight.

Any extra weight you add to a device reduces the flight time of the battery.

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#44

Post by tomswartz07 »

There's a lot of vitriol and misinformation flying around (pun definitely intended).

Here's my take on the situation.

Large companies building 'ready to fly' multicopters need to have some sort of communication with the FAA and other agencies.

I do not own a DJI quad myself, but I'm very familiar with them, so I'm going to use them in my example.

DJI has frequently updated firmware for their devices. It would be very trivial for them to add in a 'default' setting on the device that prevents the device from breaking any of the already defined rules.

If the pilot so chooses, and most importantly, is authorized via a Section 333 exemption (or otherwise) can override those settings on the device.

As for all multicopters, I have no qualms about using a Dremel to etch in a registration number on my device. I do, however, have issues with those suggesting that I must add extra hardware and extra transmitters to my device.

Etching the registration code on the device will also allow someone to return my quad if it's lost.

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#45

Post by TeMPOraL »

tomswartz07 wrote: post #43
TeMPOraL wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about requiring a POV (persistence of vision) display on such a drone? At a cost of few additional LEDs (or even not, if you reuse onboard ones) and some CPU cycles you could have the drone flash its serial number in a way visible on cameras as the drone moves around.

That's still a large amount of weight to carry on a device. There are 250 class quadcopters that are built for First Person View racing. Races are won and lost because of the difference in a few grams of extra weight. Any extra weight you add to a device reduces the flight time of the battery.

I think that quadcopters used for FPV racing generally don't appear in the areas where drone identification would be a need.

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#47

Post by [deleted] »

tomswartz07 wrote: post #43
TeMPOraL wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about requiring a POV (persistence of vision) display on such a drone? At a cost of few additional LEDs (or even not, if you reuse onboard ones) and some CPU cycles you could have the drone flash its serial number in a way visible on cameras as the drone moves around.

That's still a large amount of weight to carry on a device. There are 250 class quadcopters that are built for First Person View racing. Races are won and lost because of the difference in a few grams of extra weight. Any extra weight you add to a device reduces the flight time of the battery.

[deleted]

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#48

Post by tomswartz07 »

dogecoinbase wrote: post #12
chroma wrote: post #11

The current and proposed restrictions on drones seem insane to me. To see why, do the reversal test.[1] Imagine if single-prop planes didn't exist, and drones were already used for productive purposes. Courier drones deliver packages in minutes. Construction drones monitor work sites and inspect structures for safety. Police drones scout and warn people near any crimes in progress. Ambulance drones alert drivers and…

This is a great example of how the reversal test is fundamentally question-begging -- you propose an idealistic version of the future (ignoring the reality of drones falling out of the sky and injuring people, preventing firefighting efforts, and invading people's privacy by hovering outside their apartments with cameras), and assert that it's desirable. Of course it's desirable, you made it up to support your point!

I see your point, and I admit that incidents have occurred where they have prevented firefighting efforts and have fallen, injuring people.

I'm not going to comment on the 'invasion of privacy' part, as it's a strawman; there are no cameras that are easily available on these devices that can 'hover outside someones apartment' and spy on them any more reliably than a cell phone on a stick.

However, and this is a very important distinction; these are the small majority of all RC flights by all amateur pilots.

I agree that there should be stiff fines for those that break the regulations. I do not agree, however, that everyone should be subject to some crazy ill-advised extra regulations.

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#49

Post by matheweis »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #37
matheweis wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not a pilot (although the right $$ would have me there in a an instant... wishful thinking), but I have been flying various remote control aircraft (including so-called "drones", now) for nearly 20 years. A sensible system seems like it would be three tiered: Very small stuff would remain unregulated - obviously there is no concern with things like the CX-10, right? I can't imagine a "drone" of anything near tha…

> Mid-tier stuff would be a world like Amateur Radio - modernized to be online or something as you've suggested. I generally agree with you, but I want to vent out about that amateur radio bit. Going on-line is something that makes it meaningless. Doing radio over real radio waves is playing with the limits physics throws at you. Doing it over the Internet is just throwing logs under your own feet because Skype isn't…

What I meant to suggest was that mid tier applications should be regulated like amateur radio; strict rules about what takes place, but anything goes within those confines.

By online I meant the testing process could be done online.

Re: US transportation secretary announces drone registration requirement

#50

Post by matheweis »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #45
tomswartz07 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's still a large amount of weight to carry on a device. There are 250 class quadcopters that are built for First Person View racing. Races are won and lost because of the difference in a few grams of extra weight. Any extra weight you add to a device reduces the flight time of the battery.

I think that quadcopters used for FPV racing generally don't appear in the areas where drone identification would be a need.

I agree, but others may not... White House lawn anyone?
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