Episode Transcript
Paul Rossi (00:00)
Welcome to Weekly Wings, your go -to podcast from DroneLife .com, where we soar through the latest in drone technology, regulation updates, and exciting innovations. Each week, join Sam, military, and I as we navigate the drone industry, offering expert insights, interviews with key figures eventually, and a bird's eye view of how drones are shaping our world. From commercial applications to recreational adventures, Weekly Wings.
delves into how these remarkable vehicles are impacting construction, education, agriculture, filmmaking, delivery services, and much more. Whether you're a professional drone operator, a hobbyist, or just drone curious, tune in to stay informed and inspired as we explore the heights of what's possible in the world of drones. Subscribe now and never miss an episode of Weekly Wings where the future is looking
Samuel S (00:58)
How's it going?
Terry Neff (00:59)
Please don't expire on us. We need every viewer we can get.
Paul Rossi (01:02)
Need to expire. Yeah, I don't want to expire. It's almost fun. It's kind of like, you know, if it was pre -recorded, it would just be perfect every time. This way it's almost fun. It's like, you know, which word is going to be the word today that gives Paul difficulties because we all know English is hard. But welcome to the show. I'm Paul Rossi, president of 910 drones. Really excited to have everybody here. We got Samuel.
Terry Neff (01:04)
the
Paul Rossi (01:30)
We got Terry, how you doing Samuel?
Samuel S (01:33)
I'm doing well, I was talking to you before the episode started. Terry, a quick question, do you know what magnet fishing is based off our last episode?
Terry Neff (01:41)
I do. I did not watch the last episode, but I do know what magnet fishing is.
Samuel S (01:42)
Okay, so I was just kind of curious if he did know, but yeah. I think it's just a younger generation thing.
Paul Rossi (01:46)
Only.
Yeah, nah.
It's just a yeah, magnet fishing and I guess it's a lot of it's like it's one of those FYP pages, know, you're scrolling along. You've never seen magnet fishing and just it stands out. How you doing, Terry?
Samuel S (01:52)
Thank you.
Terry Neff (02:06)
been doing good man my last weekend took a lot out of me mentally but I'm trying to recover currently long weekend long weekend
Paul Rossi (02:13)
man, mentally, mentally.
Samuel S (02:14)
any UFOs on your trip.
Terry Neff (02:16)
No, This resident joined the cult I went to,
Samuel S (02:17)
No, okay. I thought you were going up near the mountains, so... Wasn't sure if you'd see any UFOs or space trash coming out near your way.
Paul Rossi (02:26)
Yeah.
Danny SpaceX debris.
Terry Neff (02:28)
That would be my luck getting hit by something.
Samuel S (02:31)
Oof.
Paul Rossi (02:32)
We got some great, great stuff to discuss this week. We'll be diving into some Beyond Visual on a Site conversation approvals taking place in the state of Michigan. We'll talk about counter UAS. I think Terry found something interesting that we'll kind of look
We'll talk about something that's not necessarily drone related, but it's electric and it has to do with NASCAR. So that'll be neat. We'll be talking about Acelon Robotics again and an accomplishment that they achieved over the last week. I know we talked about them in one of our previous episodes and then we'll end the day or end the episode here, not the day, but
our weekly wings episode in the regulatory corner, just talking about the FAA's new Freya map that they have published for folks to look at and see where their nearest Freya is.
And with that...
We're gonna head to the great state of Michigan. Who's has ever been to Michigan?
Samuel S (03:51)
It's on the to -do list. You gotta check that one off.
Terry Neff (03:56)
I don't think I wanna go. yeah, I'm good.
Samuel S (03:58)
What? Why, Terry?
Paul Rossi (04:02)
Have you not seen 8 Mile?
Terry Neff (04:05)
I'm watching mayor of Kingstown right now and it doesn't, I know that's a fictional show, but I mean, there's got to be some type of truth to that. All right. I don't want to go there ever mayor.
Samuel S (04:12)
Did you say mayor?
Mayor. Okay. There's another show similar called Mayor of East. Yeah.
Terry Neff (04:20)
Yeah, sorry, it's a little...
Samuel S (04:24)
Two different shows, my bad. Go ahead.
Terry Neff (04:24)
Yeah, think this same dude makes it. It's a little hard for me to talk. I got new rubber bands in my mouth. Little weird.
Paul Rossi (04:33)
You got a new what? A new diamond? You got a new grill?
Terry Neff (04:37)
new rubber bands, are shaped like triangles.
Samuel S (04:37)
For context, that's for your braces, right Terry?
Terry Neff (04:42)
my braces
Samuel S (04:44)
Gotcha, okay.
Paul Rossi (04:44)
Got to get it straight. to get it straight. In Michigan, where I think Terry's okay on not visiting, Samuel's all in, automotive capital of America, we have ground -based detect and avoid facilitates FAA BV loss waiver at Michigan test site. So an integration of the UAVONIC's CASIA -G system
enables advanced drone operations. Unmanned vehicle technologies, known as UVT in the industry, Chris Fink, great person, leading a really awesome company, launched out of Fayetteville, Arkansas. But UVT and UAVionics have announced that UVT has been granted a Federal Aviation Administration waiver to operate small.
unmanned aircraft systems beyond visual on a site at their at their test site in Michigan beyond visual on a site at their test site in Michigan. So.
How about that?
That's what's out there in Michigan.
Samuel S (06:05)
looks cold.
Terry Neff (06:06)
little bit of drone technology and then nothing else maybe some bad drinking water
Samuel S (06:11)
Also the auto what was that Paul? The automotive...
Paul Rossi (06:12)
That.
Samuel S (06:20)
You mentioned the automotive industry being in... Yeah, there we
Paul Rossi (06:21)
What cap it with the autumn?
Yeah, like Detroit being a huge automotive capital. Lots of cars made there. What you're looking at here... What you're seeing here... Yeah, so what you're seeing here, right, is what would normally be considered a communications tower. Someone might put this up for a local...
Samuel S (06:29)
Yeah, so not just bad drinking water.
That's what Terry said, just quoting.
Paul Rossi (06:55)
radio communications, public safety, utilities. You could put something up on here in order to receive some sort of service. Well, now what you can see mounted here, what will be the top of this tower. And we're just, for folks listening on audio, it's, I think it says in here, it's about an 80 foot tower, not entirely sure.
Samuel S (07:23)
thing is huge.
Paul Rossi (07:26)
tall, but it's just one of those little triangular, speaking of triangles, Terry, a triangle tower that you would see in the back or on a piece of property in a more rural area. And on top, this is an electronic visual observer.
Samuel S (07:46)
Hmm what I'm assuming kind of the first of its kind in this field
Paul Rossi (07:54)
Yeah, so you avionics.
Samuel S (07:58)
It makes sense Michigan now because I mean looking at this photo and seeing like there's not a whole lot of people around this would be a pretty good way to be able to pick out the drones as if in my opinion like start small and then slowly get bigger and bigger with more population.
Paul Rossi (08:18)
Yeah, so you can see this.
So an electronic visual observer, so not so much like the population density, but really it's just at this point, it's looking at airspace, being able to detect and avoid. So this is ground.
Samuel S (08:36)
I guess that'd be the key thing.
Paul Rossi (08:40)
So this is ground -based detect and avoid. So what you're doing is taking this, is, you know, pole mounted, constant power, constant internet. And this is just cameras that are designed to do nothing but just scan the field of view and search for and identify moving aircraft. The same way a
Samuel S (09:08)
over a 360 degree.
Paul Rossi (09:12)
360 degrees the same way that a human could stand and even a human would have to, you know, rotate constantly and not have full 360 degree view.
Samuel S (09:25)
It's one hell of a visual observer.
Paul Rossi (09:27)
And this
Terry Neff (09:27)
looks like it uses AI.
Paul Rossi (09:31)
one hell of a visual observer is
Samuel S (09:40)
So they're going to mount this bad boy up on that 80 foot pole is what
Paul Rossi (09:41)
And so
Yes. And so this is integrating into like a drone in the dock solution. You can see it's right here. You got a more wide open flat area. You've got flight base. Flight base is taking this. So flight base is that third party software that allows you to fly your drone.
But with this mounted on top of this pole, it's going to allow that Cassia G to be above the nearby obstacles, like a person standing on the ground is going to be blocked by this building. Whereas now this will be able to get above the nearby obstacles.
Samuel S (10:31)
So is it purely just using the cameras on it? So would it theoretically detect birds?
Paul Rossi (10:41)
So it's going to have once a bird gets so far
this sensor, the bird's only going to take up like a pixel or a half a pixel. So once the bird gets so far away, it, the size will become, you know, irrelevant. Whereas the bigger the aircraft, the earlier it will be able to detect it because of the size that it's showing up on the sensor.
Samuel S (11:06)
That's right.
Paul Rossi (11:18)
So if a bird does fly by this thing very...
Samuel S (11:18)
So it's not purely... It has other sensors to detect the size of an image or object in the image, Software. Hence one of the reasons for the constant internet. It's pinging back and forth with the software and analyzing and kind of being like, hey, the bird, plane, bird, bird, plane. Gotcha. Cloud.
Paul Rossi (11:29)
The The software.
And then it's doing that in 360 degrees.
Terry Neff (11:51)
Yeah, I wonder, I mean, it's gotta be pretty hard to distinguish a bird, particularly one that moves kind of slow and at a steady pace at distance between like a drone. I wonder how accurate it is or if they just call all birds drones and you just worry about them.
Samuel S (12:12)
Can't imagine they do though, I feel like...
Paul Rossi (12:13)
And so
Samuel S (12:16)
I like they would have that distinction. I don't know if you've seen the drone videos of they disguise their drone as a bird, but I still feel like this software seems pretty powerful. I feel like it can have some distinction.
Terry Neff (12:31)
I remember seeing somebody putting a squirrel on a drone and flying it around like a taxidermied squirrel.
Samuel S (12:40)
Was that on your for you page, Ter?
Paul Rossi (12:41)
and so
Terry Neff (12:44)
It was.
Samuel S (12:48)
Sorry, Paul, go ahead.
Paul Rossi (12:48)
And so, yeah, no, and so this is ground -based detected and alert, right, with cameras. So it's alerting the operator that there's a aircraft in your operational volume. And what we've looked at, I don't remember, I think we did look at this in a previous, yeah, because I think we mentioned Claymore.
Samuel S (13:16)
I feel like this came up in passing.
Paul Rossi (13:19)
Matrix Space? Yeah. now, oh, Matrix Space got $1 .25 million in funding. That's what it was. There was an article that we talked about that this company got funding. This is radar. So this is going to do the same thing. It's going to detect objects in the airspace, but instead of using visual, like a camera,
Terry Neff (13:20)
you we definitely we definitely talked about this the claymore
Paul Rossi (13:47)
This is using radar technology.
what they don't, it's hard to find some of the details in here. But this radar is trying to hit the surface of an
to detect its location. the bigger the object is.
Right? The bigger an object is, the easier it is to see when it's far away. Right? Big plane, far away, easy to see. Small plane, far away, hard to see. Small drone, far away, even harder to see. So that's true for your visual eye, but when you're sending a radar out, right, and those beams are going in
the size of the aircraft is getting smaller the further it gets from the radar.
it's less likely to detect it. So birds become undetectable at distances that aircraft are still detectable.
Samuel S (14:57)
Makes sense.
Paul Rossi (14:58)
which is positive because the further away you get, the less you want to know about birds and the more you want to know about the airplanes.
Samuel S (15:08)
You're right.
Paul Rossi (15:09)
So that's that whole argument is like, yeah, well, here's the cameras. But at this range, how effective is that sensor, whether it's a visual sensor or a radar?
And then these have effective ranges, which become radius. And then using
using that radius, you can go in and you can say, well, this is what we need in order to have full coverage.
Samuel S (15:36)
Hmm. It's a pretty impressive piece of technology.
Terry Neff (15:38)
Do we know the range for this?
Samuel S (15:42)
Say again, Terry.
Paul Rossi (15:42)
The range for this.
Terry Neff (15:46)
like one unit.
Paul Rossi (15:49)
It's that's a solid question that you might be able to single node max range 3024 meters. Your average range for a single node is going to be 2126 meters. So these are not like airport. You know.
Like an airport radar system is super sophisticated. Its size is significant and it's going to detect aircraft at a very large radius, range and altitude. Whereas these systems that are coming out are pretty tight.
And then you ask yourself, when they say average range, is that the diameter or the radius?
Terry Neff (16:49)
Yeah, I'm kind of confused on the two numbers we got there. Like does it do 3 ,000 meters or does it not do that?
Paul Rossi (16:57)
If it's mounted on and it's perfectly flat, if you got, it's just like, how long will this battery last? Well, 40 minutes in perfect ideal conditions or how, what's the range of your drone's remote controller? Well, if you're in an urban environment with a lot of, you know, frequencies that are, you know, fighting for lack of a better word with one another.
congestion, your range is going to be shorter. But if you're in the middle of Montana, flat land, nothing around, your range is now going to be longer.
Samuel S (17:39)
I just want to point out that max temperature, 122 Fahrenheit, that's crazy. 50 Celsius.
Paul Rossi (17:49)
It has to be. This thing is just sitting like this photo was even called desert photo or something like
Samuel S (17:52)
Yeah, can't melt, can't get...
Terry Neff (17:55)
Just baking
Samuel S (17:58)
Thanks.
built the last.
Paul Rossi (18:06)
It's got to be high up and it can't be shaded. So it has to sit in sun constantly.
Terry Neff (18:14)
Does it have cameras on top of it? Because it's kind of like got the little mushroom thing on top.
Paul Rossi (18:19)
Good question and we can go back to our original article for this wonderful photo of it going
No cameras on
Terry Neff (18:28)
does not so I can't see anything above it it's got spotted before it gets
Paul Rossi (18:30)
By the time it's on top, yeah, think it's like, all right, that is, it's the idea of detecting it right before it's in that area.
And so you set this up and this is what's good and enabled beyond visual line of sight is these electronic visual observers, whether it's radar, optical, visual. People might find ways to use thermal, you know, at night. don't know. I don't know what their camera quality is and what they have built into it, but what the challenge is during the day versus night. And, you know, some radar technology might
be effective in light rain in various weather conditions where visual sensors might fog up or have other issues.
Samuel S (19:31)
Notably no price point on that bad boy
Paul Rossi (19:33)
The price point on that, you're talking like, again, this is a tool like a forklift or some other kind of business technology, a computer that lets you, automates things. So the cost isn't going to be $10 ,000. It's going to be like, hey, this is as effective as five people. This is as effective as three people. And what would three people cost you?
50, 60, 70, hey, $100 ,000. For what it is going to enable, that cost is somewhat justifiable. Not for everybody, but for the people that can afford the drones
Samuel S (20:16)
But you'll need a few of them too. Yeah?
Paul Rossi (20:20)
If you're going to cover a downtown, if you're going to cover a Wake County, if you're going to cover a Cumberland County, a Fayetteville, North Carolina, if you're trying to cover a whole region, yes. If you're trying to do security for a property, for a business, if you're trying to do localized operations, a substation inspection, then one would be just fine.
Samuel S (20:45)
As for one more thing and then we can move off the story, do we know specifically what kind of tests they want to do in Michigan with those radars? Because I mean it's drone tests detecting them.
Paul Rossi (20:55)
Yeah, great question. Great question. Unmanned Vehicle Technologies is a reseller, a drone sales and training organization. So they're helping end users integrate this technology into their business. So working with public safety departments, UVT is helping start Drone as a First Responder programs.
They have locations and employees all across the United States. So they're helping businesses and organizations integrate this technology. at their site, they're going to be able to test out even the sensor itself. When they have new updates, new improvements, a new sensor comes out, they can bring it to that location, put it on that mask, use this waiver data. They can demonstrate to customers.
what the technology is capable
Samuel S (21:50)
Sounds good. I was just kind of, yeah.
Paul Rossi (21:50)
Like a playground, it's not a playground. A research, a learning, a development.
Samuel S (21:53)
I think it's what you're saying is fitting though, you know, yeah, that good old R &D. There it is.
Paul Rossi (21:58)
R &D. Yeah. All right, what are we looking at here? Terry.
Terry Neff (22:10)
so some interesting came across my for you page since we, I'm so young. have to be on tick tock constantly.
Samuel S (22:20)
You did.
Terry Neff (22:21)
very loud.
It's just basically a drone gun. I believe it can kind of like control them. I don't know how well that would work. But they're using it at the Euros, like one of the biggest soccer tournaments. Just thought it was pretty cool to bring up.
Cause they have to deal with streakers, people flying stuff. mean, it's an open air stadium. So you're to have to deal with people like that occasionally.
Samuel S (22:53)
Does he have that AI voice?
Terry Neff (22:57)
Yes, it's uni -led.
Paul Rossi (23:01)
UniLab, is that what we're hearing? AI voice?
Terry Neff (23:05)
not just unilaterally people in the second is coming
Paul Rossi (23:11)
So this counter UAS is big, not just detecting. Like we're talking about detecting and being able to see what's in the airspace. once you know that, once you identify that that drone is not authorized, what can you do to counter its activities? And these types of devices that
kind of like mimic the remote. So it creates like a disconnect, but I think it's almost like hijacking per se.
the drone itself and it's mimicking the remote controller and it's telling it, land here. This guy's got some sweet tights on, by the
Samuel S (23:59)
Kind of just overriding.
Yeah, I did not even notice that, but yeah, he does. He's ready to play some soccer.
Terry Neff (24:10)
And if you'll notice on the, I'm going to call it the gun. If you notice they're using like a $4 ,000 or not, maybe not $4 ,000. It's a very expensive site made for like a firearm.
Paul Rossi (24:24)
Are you sure? think that's like PVC pipe painted black with like a trash can lid on
Terry Neff (24:27)
No, there's a I can see an EOTech right there in front of us. I see an EOTech.
Samuel S (24:35)
It's
Terry Neff (24:36)
Right there, right on your mouse.
Samuel S (24:40)
There's just a lot going on in this video apparently.
Terry Neff (24:41)
I mean, it's expensive, man. I want one. I can't afford it.
Samuel S (24:45)
Terri, just what, to have it?
Terry Neff (24:51)
I could put on stuff.
Samuel S (24:52)
See you.
Paul Rossi (24:54)
It's intense,
Samuel S (24:55)
I you meant the whole drone gun thing. What would you call it? A drone... disabler?
Paul Rossi (25:05)
Jam device,
Samuel S (25:06)
Jammer.
Terry Neff (25:09)
Yeah, and I'm not exactly sure who makes it. I was trying to do some research on it. think San Friend, I don't know, San Friend Group. I think they're the ones who make it, but I can't find any links or anything where you could buy it.
But yeah, they make a lot of stuff. So was trying to scroll through their products. They make crew seats for like spacecrafts, air conditioners, like whatever you want basically.
think it's called the Skyjacker. think you might want to go look it
Paul Rossi (25:51)
Yeah, drone shield, that's the one that I was thinking
Drone shield is won.
Samuel S (25:59)
That looks like a weird 80s sci -fi movie prop. Is anyone else getting that? Yeah.
Terry Neff (26:00)
It looks very hard to hold.
Paul Rossi (26:05)
Right, like this.
Terry Neff (26:05)
RoboCop.
I can only imagine how much that weighs. You probably gotta have like a crazy battery.
Samuel S (26:17)
Oof.
Paul Rossi (26:24)
mean they make it look
Terry Neff (26:27)
It looks cool.
Paul Rossi (26:29)
like violent or just seriously like a like an actual projectile is gonna come
Samuel S (26:34)
It's got the scare factor
Paul Rossi (26:39)
Long range, immediate video cease.
So it immediately this one right here immediately cuts video back to the pilot.
GNS disruption. So it's disrupting the
Satellite navigation.
Terry Neff (27:04)
easy to use. I hope so. You point at something. You just hit the trigger if it has one.
Samuel S (27:09)
suit.
Paul Rossi (27:12)
The drone gun.
Samuel S (27:13)
It's funny how different this looks from the other thing though.
Terry Neff (27:14)
It doesn't look like it has a trigger.
Paul Rossi (27:18)
Right, that's why when I saw that one pop up on the...
I was like, jeez.
Like I guess they want theirs to look less violent? I don't know.
Samuel S (27:34)
I can't imagine trucking that thing along though. He hauls?
Paul Rossi (27:38)
But the other one looked like, for people that are just listening, it looked like a potato gun with like...
Samuel S (27:42)
Eh.
The scope. Yeah.
Paul Rossi (27:45)
something wrapped around it. It's like, all right, make sure you're leaning forward in case it recoils.
Terry Neff (27:52)
It... Well, it looked like a rail gun. Like, if I imagined what a rail gun would look like, that would be... it.
Paul Rossi (28:00)
And so people will say things like, if my drone loses connection, it'll just fly home. it's like, yeah, how's your drone going to fly home when it doesn't have
GPS. Like this is the whole thing. They're disrupting it, disconnecting your video feed, messing with your GPS. Drone doesn't know where it is. It's not going to be able to come back and they're telling it to land. So they're like sending a weird set of signals and it's not going to be like a perfect landing.
Terry Neff (28:40)
Yeah, it's like a lasso. It's like an invisible lasso.
Samuel S (28:43)
Yeah. New day and age, isn't it?
Paul Rossi (28:46)
And so those are the types of things where you have the detection at these stadiums. But again, once you detect it and you know, in the military, it's called IFF, like identify friend from foe. So you these military bases, right? You've got aircraft coming in constantly. And so you're not like, hey, let's make sure that that's a friendly helicopter.
Like how long do you wait before you can tell? And it's all electronic. So when friendly aircraft are flying into a base in Afghanistan, there's an electronic system in place where the helicopter or the plane is sending a code constantly, constantly. Because it's like, I don't
Those people, I don't want the detection system to think that I'm a threat. So I'm sending the special code and the detection system around the base receives that code and validates it. And it allows that aircraft to penetrate cross enter. Even though you have that security system in place. Now, if there's an aircraft coming towards that base.
and it's not sending a valid code, that anti -aircraft security protection system is going to shoot that aircraft down. No questions asked. It's just an invisible fence that exists. If you say, well, we weren't sure, and then that thing causes death, you're failing. At a stadium,
at a park, not a park, but like a baseball park at these high risk areas, prisons, jails, how do you set up systems to detect and then
remove or eliminate the thread itself.
What moving on here to our next really neat thing, Samuel. What are we bringing up here from the verge?
Samuel S (31:03)
No, that's not a drone show. It is a NASCAR EV prototype. So yeah, it looks like NASCAR is sticking their toes into the EV division of things and just trying it out, seeing how it looks. But it's just kind of weird because for those that have been near EVs, they don't have that signature noise. Although there have been a lot of cars that will actually EV cars specifically that will emulate.
engine noises now, which is whole other side topic. yeah, NASCAR showed off a new EV prototype at the Chicago Street Race, which we mentioned, think. What was that? I mentioned it last. Was it last episode? I think.
Paul Rossi (31:49)
Yeah, it was.
Samuel S (31:50)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Three electric motors, one in the front, two in the back, powered by a 78 kilowatt liquid cooler battery that can generate 1 ,000 kilowatt at peak power. Some of these factoids are going a little above me with those electric, electric, I can't think of the word, but all that electric stuff going on. It's pretty impressive. Yeah, there we go.
Paul Rossi (32:16)
stats specs.
Terry Neff (32:20)
What's the point of this? I don't understand. Isn't the whole point of NASCAR to go drink beer, watch something loud, go around and laugh? Because they're not doing anything crazy, right? They're just taking a left turn. Now we got to take away the noise.
Samuel S (32:33)
I think it's specifically where this is introduced, isn't it? It's not introduced at those typical races. This is at something a little different. It's at a street race in Chicago, isn't it?
Paul Rossi (32:45)
Terry's got to watch, you got to go back and so see it's that left turn mentality. So that's why NASCAR is going to the streets. And when you look back to NASCAR and bootlegging and the racing and the speed, right, it's these combination like Daytona. Daytona, the Daytona race used to be a race that was partly on the beach and on the
Like there wasn't a Daytona Speedway when racing started. So it was an actual beach race. And then it was actually on the roads. And as it developed, it was like, all right, we need these cars. They've gotten loud and faster and noisier. And they're on tracks now. But the Chicago Street race.
was exactly the opposite. It's a race in the street. They shut the roads down. It's very similar. Things are getting very similar to the way formula racing is internationally. it's a... I don't know. Let me go back. I can't get the volume. It's a
Samuel S (33:56)
Wow. Now that did have a signature sound to it though.
Paul Rossi (34:04)
It's a completely different noise.
Terry Neff (34:08)
Sounds like you're in the Jetsons.
Paul Rossi (34:10)
If you have a pack of 40 of these electric vehicles, it's not the exhaust.
Samuel S (34:11)
Wow.
Paul Rossi (34:21)
your traditional, you know, gas engine vehicle, it's going to be a sound of just a lot of electricity, a lot of power, a lot of energy moving, and it's going to sound, I don't know, like a like a movie from the future. And these stats, when you have three motors, I mean, having three motors is
Samuel S (34:45)
Kind of did.
Paul Rossi (34:52)
is like your highest end electric vehicle you could buy on the commercial side, but that's a motor moving your two front tires and then one motor moving each of your back tires. That is an insane amount of energy. The battery size is 78 kilowatt hours is very similar to a Tesla, 80 kilowatt hours.
The battery size and volume, whether it's charged or not full charged, the weight stays the same. So you see in NASCAR with the fuel and the size of the tank and having to manage that, there is some limitations. How they charge these things and what that would look like, it'd be interesting. But they have Formula E or E1. So they're actually doing electric car.
Terry Neff (35:49)
I think it's formula E.
Paul Rossi (35:50)
Yeah, electric car racing, electric boat racing too. Kachow.
Terry Neff (35:55)
I just don't like EBs.
Samuel S (35:59)
I literally have a good shout out in the article.
Terry Neff (36:01)
I'm all for hybrids.
Paul Rossi (36:03)
Yeah, it's is now the right time to say ca -chow because this exactly reminds me of like Cars 3 when you have Jackson Storm, right? The new race car. When that new race car shows up, if go back and watch the movie, Jackson Storm goes by. He's not going by going, Jackson Storm goes by. It's like, it's like that was an awful impression of Jackson Storm.
Terry Neff (36:29)
I like how you know his name.
Samuel S (36:30)
I don't, I haven't seen cars through. can't believe Paul has that on me. He's,
Paul Rossi (36:31)
It literally sounds little.
Terry Neff (36:34)
First and last.
Paul Rossi (36:37)
It sounds just like I'm turning volume up right now. So if you're in a library, you may want to turn the volume down. Let's see what happens here.
Is that loud though?
Terry Neff (36:55)
Those bricks, those breaks man sound hideous.
Paul Rossi (36:58)
I didn't know what that was too.
Terry Neff (37:00)
That was the breaks.
Samuel S (37:06)
It sounds so - it sounds synthesized.
Paul Rossi (37:07)
It's the motor though, because the motor stops.
Terry Neff (37:16)
on a man art style like you do these will be a number one the hater until then
Paul Rossi (37:22)
But the... See this? Listen.
That's the car stopping, Terry, because the electric motors also make that really weird noise.
Terry Neff (37:36)
the brakes most likely race car brakes have to have a lot of more power behind them because they have to stop faster
Paul Rossi (37:44)
Yeah, yeah, that's true. It's probably going
Samuel S (37:44)
I'm gonna throw another EV article in next week as well just to keep that theme going now.
Paul Rossi (37:50)
Yeah, that's I wonder what the specs are on it and all that, but that's really cool. The thing is you just how you would you charge that? I do think there could come a time where you know how drones are going to have contactless charging and phones can have contactless charging like the tires will have something and then the road is going to have basically basically you charge while you drive, right, Terry?
Terry Neff (38:11)
Yeah,
I think that's already been proposed. don't know. think it was, if I'm not mistaken, I think it was Nevada, but, I think Elon Musk was one of the first people I seen a few different articles about it, but Elon Musk wants to put charging in his little like tunnels. Yeah. His like, yeah, he wants to put chargers in the bottom of the tunnel. while you're driving on it, you're charging.
Paul Rossi (38:36)
in his loop, the Vegas loop.
Yeah, that would be awesome.
Terry Neff (38:45)
I don't think that was the first one I did see something else about it.
Paul Rossi (38:48)
Eventually it'll be here.
Terry Neff (38:51)
I don't like
Paul Rossi (38:53)
With all this future stuff happening.
Terry Neff (38:55)
Let's use hybrids. Those are really cool hybrids.
Paul Rossi (39:00)
Hybrids. Yeah, I got this thing from Duke Energy. was like, all right, you want to know how to, you know, save money with energy. If you have a hybrid, keep it plugged in so you're using more battery and gas. And it's like, you're the electric company. You sell electricity. You're encouraging people to use a lot of electricity in order to save money. That sounds.
Samuel S (39:23)
Hmm.
Terry Neff (39:28)
Let's create a lot of e -waste.
Paul Rossi (39:31)
Yeah, yeah. That's all right. I've got the nuclear plant. I just I just tell everybody I use nuclear energy. It's clean.
Samuel S (39:41)
The warning just went off for you guys recently,
Sorry, that's a whole nother. Yeah, don't listen to me. Don't listen to me.
Paul Rossi (39:47)
I don't, I don't know. what the warning goes off. When you're having children, the warning goes off like every 45 minutes. There could be a new.
Terry Neff (39:58)
I don't understand why we don't use nuclear energy. just, I don't understand. Yeah, not very much of it.
Paul Rossi (40:03)
We are. So, well, moving on to our next topic here, to kind of keep on the semi -focused here, DroneLife article, Acelon Robotics celebrates 100 ,000th drone dog mission, showcasing innovative security solutions. And I just want to say, what an episode, because now we're talking drone dogs and
We had a nice flow from drones in the sky to electric NASCAR. And now we're here with circling back to our robot security perimeter dogs in their dog houses. So congratulations to Aslan Robotics for their accomplishment of over 100 ,000 missions with the drone dog system. It's pretty awesome.
Samuel S (41:02)
I realize we need a soundboard. That's what we need.
Paul Rossi (41:03)
Looks like they're using.
We need to set up. We do. We do.
The pup pack, do you see this?
Samuel S (41:16)
Define a hundred thousand missions. What is a mission?
Paul Rossi (41:17)
So Boston
The dog leaves the dock. Like if you went and delivered something, if you flew the drone on a flight, it's a mission. If the doghouse opens and then the drone dog deploys,
Samuel S (41:24)
okay.
Terry Neff (41:34)
it went and played fetch, alright Samuel? that was their missions
Samuel S (41:36)
That's his mission. He had a mission. Go play fetch. I see.
Paul Rossi (41:40)
Their pup pack, you see that? the Boston, they're taking Boston Dynamics, Massachusetts based company, the Spot, Groundbot, and they're enhancing it with their pup pack, which comes in a variety of Paw Patrol flavors. You can get your chase or just to stay on theme, right, with the Kachow. No.
but they're sensor and cameras which kind of take spot and turn it into more of a security -based, ground -based robot system.
Samuel S (42:26)
And that was a hundred thousand?
Paul Rossi (42:28)
And so a deployment would be the box 100 ,000. So like customer deployments. So right, they're putting these at their customers' locations. And if a sensor goes off, if an alert or a patrol or even a scheduled patrol, all these would be considered a mission, either a routine scheduled mission or an unscheduled non -routine type mission.
Terry Neff (42:57)
Can you zoom in on that picture real quick? I'm sorry.
Samuel S (42:58)
Terry, we don't like the EVs, but do we like the E -Dogs?
Terry Neff (43:07)
we do that's a weird place i'm pretty sure that's a power supply right there in the middle it's a weird place but that
Samuel S (43:07)
Okay,
what words about to lay down.
Paul Rossi (43:14)
This?
Terry Neff (43:15)
No, right underneath it. It's like angled.
Samuel S (43:19)
yeah.
Paul Rossi (43:19)
That looks like a fan.
Terry Neff (43:23)
PSU's have fans on them.
Paul Rossi (43:25)
Well, I think this is a fan. think this and this, because what this drone or drone, it'll crouch down. I think when the thing closes, you're right. Like it'll crouch down and it, this is for wireless charge or this is for recharging.
Samuel S (43:42)
Could you th do they have like - I was gonna say, do they have like a solar panel for the dog house? I think that'd be really cool if it was just self -sustaining.
Paul Rossi (43:43)
And so while it charges, it can cool it and heat
You could probably connect it and use solar, but from a security standpoint, if it's cloudy that day, you don't want your security solution to go offline. So I think from a security standpoint, you would just want it. Yeah, I'm tired. I didn't get enough sun today.
Terry Neff (44:00)
Okay.
Samuel S (44:09)
Or say I'm tired. Yeah, I don't have any energy, I can't. Yeah.
Paul Rossi (44:20)
What were you gonna say, Terry?
Terry Neff (44:20)
You're gonna hate me, Paul, but I just looked up the schematics to the doc and it is in fact a PSU.
Yeah, sorry, I didn't mean to. see. By the way, the charging dock is made by Boston Dynamics. mean, you could have probably assumed that, but there's the link to it.
Samuel S (44:30)
What where it sits?
You were on that with the schematics, Terry. You were ready.
Paul Rossi (44:42)
Show your screen. Let me see what you're talking about. The dock you're saying is made by Boston Dynamics.
Samuel S (44:47)
The dog house.
Terry Neff (44:48)
So like the the charging part not not like the box itself, but like the
Paul Rossi (44:54)
They probably took the charger and literally just put it in a box.
Terry Neff (44:58)
Yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying. I sent a link in Discord if you want to pull it up, but...
Paul Rossi (45:03)
And so you could either have this, if you're a different business, you might have the dog walk inside at night, or you might carry Drive Spot back to your office. And then
Samuel S (45:20)
What is Spot gonna do if he sees you?
Paul Rossi (45:21)
this thing is gonna sit. Yeah,
Terry Neff (45:26)
look at you with frustration
Samuel S (45:29)
I think he'll call the cops on
Paul Rossi (45:29)
So
This I would guess is a fan right here, Terry.
Terry Neff (45:37)
for the PSU, it's a PSU.
Paul Rossi (45:39)
Yeah, as it's recharging rapidly, this is just blowing. And then these are the contacts.
Terry Neff (45:45)
It has them labeled below this.
Paul Rossi (45:56)
I mean, it can't just go in the dock and then magic just brings it back to life.
Terry Neff (45:58)
Wait, no.
No, no, you're actually right. I'm, I'm on one today. No, that is that sole purpose of that little box right there. It's just to spit air onto the battery of the dog thing. Let's cut, cut it out.
Paul Rossi (46:12)
Yeah, yeah, it just cools it. Wow, because there's so much energy. And I know this because.
Samuel S (46:14)
It gets hot.
Paul Rossi (46:26)
when you look at the dock to.
for D.
Terry Neff (46:32)
Can we like install knives like on the legs? So like when it runs past somebody like slashes their Achilles heel? Is that possible?
Samuel S (46:43)
I mean you could theoretically.
Paul Rossi (46:44)
Huh now?
Terry Neff (46:45)
You
Samuel S (46:49)
I don't think that was the design intentions.
Terry Neff (46:50)
like the rims that can slash people's tires. But what is it gonna do? gonna bark at them? It's gonna get a real dog to do that. It's cheaper.
Paul Rossi (46:59)
Shit.
There's no.
Samuel S (47:10)
Your famous poll.
Paul Rossi (47:11)
There's no thing of it, but yeah.
But that's the biggest thing with these, now when you look at technology, whether it's the ground bot, the aerial bot, is you can put it in a dock, you can put it off site, but you want these things to charge rapidly. You want it to land and then recharge and then get right back to work and land. So battery, drone comes back, dog comes back, it's just been running and working a bunch. It's going to be very warm. So in order to recharge it immediately,
You just got to start blasting the battery in the unit with cold air. And that's what helps alleviate damage. If you take a battery right out of a drone and just put it on a charger in warm conditions, you're going to hurt it in the long run. But if you can cool it down, to cool that thing down super, super fast. It's like the formula cars. You know how as soon as they stop, they
have to take the blowers and shove it into the intake. So when a Formula Race car stops, it's still so warm that they actually will put these coolers into the intake and continue to push cold air into the engines so that they won't damage themselves. That's what you're seeing with these robotic systems.
cooling them super fast. And then also I'd imagine it might even provide heating. it might, well, no, because it wasn't designed for the dog house type thing. Where the heck, if I can get a dang photo.
The
Samuel S (48:57)
Have you gotten to see one in real life yet, Terry?
Terry Neff (48:59)
the Boston Dynamics dog thing? The robo dog? I have not,
Samuel S (49:05)
I will say like I've.
Terry Neff (49:07)
There are some pretty cheap ones you can buy, not made by Boston Dynamic. Those are very expensive. But there are cheaper ones that are like, I think they get down to like 500 bucks and I kind of want to grab one. So if you guys see one just roaming around on my bed in a few weeks, that's why.
Samuel S (49:23)
be pretty
Paul Rossi (49:23)
I'll show this right here. This is the best picture I can find just right now. This is the Dock 2 for DJI. So when the drone lands, it's actually turned 90 degrees from what you see right now on this photo. The drone camera is going to face the H, and the drone is going to land right here. So you see this? That right there.
is where the battery is going to sit and it's going to wirelessly charge the drone through the surface. And as it's charging, it is blowing cool air directly onto the back of the battery and it is cooling it while it's recharging in order to reduce the damage or the stress.
Then also what this dock can do is it can heat. If it's cold outside, drone lands and drone's hanging out inside, the dock will actually produce heat as well in order to keep it warm and cozy.
But shout out to Acelon for their 100 ,000 missions. Looking forward to eventually maybe seeing one of those somewhere. Not just the spot, but to go, oh, hey, there's... And honestly, if it's not walking around, you almost wouldn't even know. This looks like just any other electric utility box, doesn't
Samuel S (51:03)
Hmm. Yeah.
Terry Neff (51:04)
Yeah.
Samuel S (51:05)
blends in pretty well.
Paul Rossi (51:05)
You could walk by one and might not even know it. It's pretty neat. It'll be crazy when they're buried. It's buried in the ground and all of sudden just like pops out.
Samuel S (51:16)
Like a mole man.
Terry Neff (51:17)
Should we band together and buy a robot dog? It's 2400 bucks.
Samuel S (51:20)
Where do you want it to live, Terry?
Terry Neff (51:22)
We can, it's every weekend, it swaps. just keeps on.
Samuel S (51:23)
Take turns. Yeah. Rotate it out. How do you think your kids would respond, Yeah. See you in a real bundle.
Paul Rossi (51:25)
Yeah.
Hey, that's actually like when you go on vacation, they'd probably like it. And I've seen those things take some damage. I saw someone throw one of those little ones around, just toss it and toss it and like, just kick it. like, you watch your three year old whack your dog in the face and you're just like, what'd you do that for? You
And so the neat thing is you can just put it in sleep mode. If you go on vacation, you're like, all right, I don't have to take you and I don't have to put you in a kennel. Go to sleep dog. If you want it to be a dog, you could also have your electronic thing, be a cat, go to sleep cat.
Terry Neff (52:10)
Do you think if like the person that you're sending it to lives close enough, like maybe me and Samuel, it's kind of far, but not really. Just like tell it to go to Samuel, just like shoe and it goes to you.
Samuel S (52:18)
Couple miles.
Paul Rossi (52:22)
Just walk itself. You know what? You go to Samuel's house.
Samuel S (52:23)
Don't get hit by a car.
Paul Rossi (52:30)
is hit by
Samuel S (52:31)
Yeah, send me a link Terry. Show me what you're looking at this. Kind of interested now. Joint custody.
Paul Rossi (52:33)
You're like,
Terry Neff (52:39)
There's a lot of different ones.
Paul Rossi (52:39)
You guys could create a spin -off podcast YouTube channel with this. You could hit everyone's for you page. You could be doing TikToks with it. could be, that would be cool. That'd be cool. Well.
Samuel S (52:59)
Today we sent Spot to Terry's house, you know, just filming
Paul Rossi (53:04)
It didn't make it. didn't make it. We'll try again tomorrow. Spot got scared. He got scared and malfunctioned. We found him curled up in a ball with its light flashing red fast.
Samuel S (53:06)
Does he, does he get hit by a car?
Terry Neff (53:08)
F250 killed it.
Samuel S (53:21)
I am.
Paul Rossi (53:24)
We forgot to upload the latest maps to its database. Well, episode coming to an end here. The last thing I wanted to touch on, another DroneLife article, FAA releases the new FRIA map for drone pilots. So finding FAA -recognized identification areas is made easier with new online maps. So what is a FRIA, right? The FAA -recognized identification area,
are locations where, now that remote ID is in effect, if your drone does not have remote ID capabilities, right? If your drone does not have remote ID, standard remote ID, or a broadcast module, then you have to fly in one of these freas. Drones with standard remote ID, what that means is that the drone, it's built into the drone,
It's built into the remote controller. The remote controller and the drone are working together. And you have the ability to connect that to a network, per se. Broadcast remote ID module, that's when it's not built into the drone from the factory. You take a module, like this yellow thing, you're attaching it to the drone. The drone's broadcasting where it is. Excellent. That's drones with remote ID broadcast module. Fly wherever you want.
If you don't have A or B, standard remote ID or a broadcast module, now you got to fly in the FRIA. This is where people are getting pissed, you're getting upset. There's a list on this site or in this article, certain drones that do or don't have remote ID. FRIA, it's one of those locations where you can fly, visual on a site, a drone.
It doesn't have to be the latest and greatest. It doesn't have to have built -in remote ID. It doesn't even have to have a broadcast module. But these areas are going to be, it's not, you can't even fly in your backyard now. Like you, if your drone does not have remote ID, you have to go to a free up, which ends up being like maybe a park locally, people get together.
hobby fixed wing pilots have been flying in these areas for quite a
Samuel S (55:55)
Those broad - excuse me, those broadcast modules cost around $200...ish? Right?
Paul Rossi (55:59)
There are some options about $89, $79. Some go up to $300. We've worked with a couple in the past.
Golly, DroneTag. DroneTag is a company. DroneTag actually makes a couple different options, and I will just share this real quick. We're not endorsing or we're not a partner or affiliate of DroneTags. It's just the one that I've used. DroneTag makes a DroneTag Mini, which can go on like a small lightweight drone like a DJI Mini.
They make the drone tag beacon, which is what I've used before. It's 199 euros, which I think is like 230 American dollars or something like that. Charges with a USB, has some lights on it, compliant. You can see it's about the size of a little bigger than a quarter. Pop this onto your drone, not really going to affect the flight time or performance in a noticeable. They also have the drone tag BS. What does BS stand for? Well,
It stands for Black Sheep. the drone tag Black Sheep came out for the FPV pilots, the folks who are really pissed and not happy with remote ID. So you can see the cost is much lower. You're buying a tiny module that you can put right onto your FPV first person racing drone about the size of a bottle cap. So low power consumption, low weight.
So there's companies that are just providing options for all different levels in order to be compliant. So then you can fly wherever you want. But if your drone's not compliant, you got to stick to these authorized areas.
Samuel S (57:46)
Pretty cool.
Paul Rossi (57:47)
Fantastic episode today. We covered a lot of different range of things from remote ID and regulatory, our regulatory corner to new tech. And then also looking at some proven tech, celebrating milestones of 100 ,000 missions. That's really significant. So really cool to see what's been done in a short amount of time. as always, I'm grateful to be a part of this industry and help introduce and educate.
and pass on some information to our audience. Thank you, everybody, for listening. Great episode. touched on Beyond Visual on a Sight Waiver for UVT at the Michigan Test Site, counter drones for 20, 24 euros in sporting events, NASCAR going electric, showcasing an EV at the Chicago Road Race.
Again, big congrats to Aslan Robotics and their 100 ,000 milestone. And we just finished things up talking about the new Freya map. If you ever have any questions, comments, email editor at dronelife .com. We appreciate everybody tuning in and look forward to having you next week. Thank you, everybody.
Samuel S (59:04)
good one.
