Com-Central.net

Forget the RC forum, this is too good to get lost down there....

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b8XhpYBkZo

Them suckers are getting huge

Are you freaking kidding me!

I loved the video of it with 2 Bf109's as well.

- JG300-Stoopy

Are you freaking kidding me!

I loved the video of it with 2 Bf109's as well.

We need two of these...with remotely operated 12 ga. shotguns in the pods. And some hills.

- JG300-Ascout

We need two of these...with remotely operated 12 ga. shotguns in the pods. And some hills.

Oh hell yeah....BIG, steep hills with narrow valleys. I like the way you think!!!

As a matter of interest, do they have to register with the local Air Traffic Control?

- Shades

As a matter of interest, do they have to register with the local Air Traffic Control?

Nice little graphic on that subject here:

aviation.stackexchange...-in-the-us

Das is gut info.

When I was an AMA member flying R/C, there was no interaction with the FAA, even in the highly safety-conscious clubs with self-important hall-monitor safety officer dudes with yellow Sam Brownes. Even more so, one club site I flew at in So Cal was at an abandoned airport (Fontana, with paved runway but closed to real air traffic) where it was easy to conisder the fact of an aircraft using it in an emergency, and two AMA club fields here in Virginia are at privately-owned grass strips that also serve as operational airfields, with the club using the field under the owner's permission. I've flown at one of them (29VA in Bealeton VA) and they actually do occasionally have real planes enter the pattern for landing, believe it or not - when that occurs, the planes are spotted long before they are in the pattern and become at risk, and anyone in the air is scrambling to get their bird on the ground ASAP while the plane is approaching. It's quite a sight the first time. The other field nearby has a club that operates "giant scale" R/C which I believe takes a 90" (226cm for those who only understand 10-base numbers) wingspan or greater to qualify as such - nowhere near the size of that B-25 model of course. I've been present when small planes have entered the pattern there as well and it's the same story, they clearly have the right of way and everyone does their absolute best to avoid any chance of risk. All the more so since the guy in the plane is usually the owner of the property they are flying on.

Matter of fact, here's an old thread in the Pigsty section which shows a real J-3 cub landing on the grass strip that the giant-scale club uses...the text is hosed from forum updates I guess, but scroll down and you'll see the yellow cub landing while the R/C guys have cleared the runway:
com-central.net/index....ic&t=14207

That would also explain the 400' altitude rule in the info that Ascout posted, since FAA regs here in the states are such that a 500' minimum altitude must be maintained at all times except when in the pattern. So we get a 100' (30m) safety margin... as long as no pilots bust the minumum and no R/C fliers exceed the maximum, which of course happens all the time, especially since R/C guys don't have very good radar altimeters in their eye sockets.

And this is at AMA-sanctioned club sites where everyone behaves, not to mention the maverick non-club fliers who just want to find an empty field and tear holes in the sky.

BUT - this is all small potatoes compared to friggin' drones. The thing that's relatively harmless about R/C aircraft is that they all operate on line-of-sight basis to the R/C pilot, so getting terribly high or far away so as be a threat to aircraft is a relatively rare occurrence. With drones having GPS programming and autonomous flight modes that don't require operator control, it gets pretty scary. We'll be seeing more and more attempts to legislate and control that I'm sure, but sadly the tech exists that if someone is intent on abusing the capabilities, they'll be able to.

NAV lights, beacons/strobes and all that need to be implemented and enforced IMO... but until it's a serious enough affair for the drone operators to have a serious chunk of their own @ss on the line if things go wonky, I'm not sure what will help.

- JG300-Stoopy

NAV lights, beacons/strobes and all that need to be implemented and enforced IMO... but until it's a serious enough affair for the drone operators to have a serious chunk of their own @ss on the line if things go wonky, I'm not sure what will help.

Either through malevolence or stupidity, that day is not far off, I'm afraid. There have already been some conflicts between property owners and drone operators and it's only a matter of time before we see someone going ballistic (one drone has already been shot down for peeping in on someone's teenage daughter in the backyard pool). What with all the laser incidents, we can soon look forward to some serious drone mischief, I fear.

- JG300-Ascout

Either through malevolence or stupidity, that day is not far off, I'm afraid. There have already been some conflicts between property owners and drone operators and it's only a matter of time before we see someone going ballistic (one drone has already been shot down for peeping in on someone's teenage daughter in the backyard pool). What with all the laser incidents, we can soon look forward to some serious drone mischief, I fear.

Yep, we've had pillocks flying and filming over government, military, and private property.

D'uh!
Nobody's stupid enough to think that couldn't be a security issue.
There have been warnings on TV and radio to advise fliers of the limits which they still ignore.
The answer is to shoot the drones and then the owners/fliers.
I bet we'll all be impressed with how much easier and faster it becomes for the necessary rules to be understood.

Here in South Jersey we had someone shoot down a drone just because it was looking over a construction project.

With all the waterfowlers around here, I am amazed that more haven't been shot down yet

So then, it seems the best solution is right in front of us as stated earlier in this thread. We need R/C aircraft with onboard 12-gauge armament to act as drone hunter/killers.

We can get on that right away. I suggest 1/4-scale FW190's as an air superiority platform of choice.

- JG300-Stoopy

So then, it seems the best solution is right in front of us as stated earlier in this thread. We need R/C aircraft with onboard 12-gauge armament to act as drone hunter/killers.

We can get on that right away. I suggest 1/4-scale FW190's as an air superiority platform of choice.

...with forward-looking onboard video cameras linked to joystick equipped laptops for control/guidance. Standard RC controls just aren't going to cut it for aerial gunnery.

We may have to upgrade to FLIR if the drones elect for a night campaign.

- JG300-Ascout

We may have to upgrade to FLIR if the drones elect for a night campaign.

In which case they'd be playing right into the Wild Saunen's hands. Err....feet.