Flying FPV (in acro mode) has a steep learning curve (but is, arguably, much more fun). The way to learn is to use a proper simulator. The most versatile and popular one is Liftoff and costs around $20, but there are many others, including free ones. You should also buy a dedicated controller since normal game controllers don't work well (the throttle joystick needs to stay where it is instead of returning to center). Dedicated drone controllers can be found around $40-50 used.
And then off you go! Be prepared to spend at least 20 hours on a sim before you can fly IRL (it took me around 100 hours to really be comfortable). It's surprising how well the learned skills transfer from the simulator to the real thing.
* "Controller" isn't used much as a term, when you start looking around. You'll see things listed under "transmitter" or "radio"
* The majority of FPV transmitters use OpenTX or EdgeTX software (EdgeTX is newer and a fork of OpenTX). Both of these support plugging the transmitter in to a host computer over USB, where it can appear as a HID joystick
* ExpressLRS (ELRS) is an open source radio protocol, with 2.4ghz and 900mhz versions. 2.4ghz is a denser waveforms, so better latency, but less penetration (unless you are going loooooong range, default to 2.4ghz). If you buy a radio today, get one with ELRS built in
* ELRS transmitters include Bluetooth. They can act as a BLE controller to a host computer, for wireless gamepad use: https://oscarliang.com/expresslrs-bluetooth-joystick/
* And there is a 3rd option for more convenience, since both HID over USB and BLE wirelessly require a tiny bit of menu fiddling: A dedicated simulator dongle. This acts as a full ELRS receiver, so you would just turn on your radio within range and play the simulator: https://www.getfpv.com/squid-stick-wireless-usb-simulator-do...
And finally, on radios themselves:
* The big split is between smaller "gamepad" style transmitters and full-size box transmitters. The larger versions usually have more inputs than you would use, for other radio control hobbyists (wings/planes/etc)
* Radiomaster is a solid recommendation. Check out the Pocket as an intro radio ($65 USD), and then the Boxer as a step up ($140 USD base, or $260 with all-metal gimbals and upgrades)
* Unless you have a strong reason to, like someone is gifting you a pile of quadcopter hardware using a different protocol, go with ELRS 2.4ghz built in
But there are controllers from BetaFPV that are much cheaper. A friend of mine just got started with the BetaFPV Radio Lite 3 ($60 new) and is very happy with it.
Edit: RC2 -> Remote 2.
I personally have a Team BlackSheep Tango 2 - though I haven't been flying as much as I would like, and have done little simulator time, it's worked fine for both.
If you want to get into the hobby in general, look up Joshua Bardwell on youtube - a lot of great information, including a variety of controller reviews, simulator reviews, and general "here's how to get started" videos. There are of course others, but Bardwell is the only one I'm actually subscribed to (not that I'm any great metric).
EDIT: for a lot of great information, see my sibling comment from Matthew.
The arguably best all rounder controller at a decent price point is the radiomaster boxer at about $99. Their pocket model is only $55 and super compact, but isn’t really full sized.
If you prefer game pad style controllers, you can use radiomaster pocket/Zorro depending on your budget.. ELRS version.
They have USB ports and can be plugged in and detected as a joystick.
I think 20 hours is excessive. I'd say 30 mins to 2 hours is fine, depending on the user. The most dramatic learning will happen in the first 10 mins or so.
They have open races every week.
I can place in the top 300 sometimes.
You can see the FPV of any of the races. The fastest pilots fly so fast it's insane. It's hard for me to comprehend how they can even comprehend what they are seeing.
They will fly though a 3 gate ladder(aka corkscrew) in 1.5 seconds.
The drone soldiers operate in small teams from underground bunkers close to the front from which they launch hundreds of drones a day, with different types of drones for different targets. The limiting factor is the amount of drones, Ukraine plans to build one million of them this year domestically.
Apart from jamming, there's not much to defend yourself against drones except staying underground, or moving fast enough that there is no time for you to be spotted and tracked. But drones can see kms away and move at hundreds of kmph, then go after you personally, even inside buildings, and even at night with infrared vision.
In an interview they asked a drone-ace how many ennemies he killed, he said he couldn't remember; "Do you remember how many cups of coffee you drank last year?".
I am not sure what to think about all this, but it is certainly fascinating
Autonomous drones are supposedly already used for oil refineries (vision based navigation, to mitigate GPS jamming), once this tech trickles down to smaller drones things will get really scary..
You'd think so. I mean to fly a quad properly, you'd need like 20-30 hours. To just crash a drone into a large enough target, 6-7 hours is more than enough.
As for having to be relatively close to the drone, range extenders these days seem to go a long way.. or even having a receiver outside a safe bunker - that seems to be how the Ukrainians/Russians fly these days.
That is here now. Small drones are appearing in Ukraine that target vehicles and infantry using machine vision and thermal imaging. This is driven by RF jamming that limits FPV. Also, the terminal phase of a small drone attack is often where the attack fails and automating that improves effectiveness even when FPV is possible. Less skill is necessary when a fighter can just designate a target and hit the 'kill' button, so this is a force multiplier.
An interesting story on this is found here[1]. Quantity serial production is underway and it will be in wide use very soon, as in the next couple weeks. One thing they've done is secure the software to prevent reverse engineering.
[1] https://mil.in.ua/en/news/drones-with-machine-vision-are-bei...
Another thing that stands out to me in that article is the claim that production is limited by component availability. An obvious thing to do is further enhancing these drones by converting them from suicide drones to bomb delivery vehicles so they can be reused.
> Bombs and artillery is the main weapon
That's a generalization that overlooks a great deal in Ukraine. It's like selecting some organ in the body and calling it the "main organ." These drones frequently provide precision forward observation that enables artillery and precision missiles. It's a system, and without FPV observation, FPV interdiction and other contributions Ukraine wouldn't be performing as well as it has.
As for optional, full autonomy on small drones - I suspect it's further along than many might expect.
We're almost there: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/369380266_Channel-A...
I can't find the link, but I believe I read Russian doctors claiming that drones were now the #1 cause of battlefield infantry injuries.
Someone is gonna end up using something like a global hawk (spy drone) to deploy smaller kamikaze drones.
Headed to production
With the proliferation of fire-finder-radar, modern artillery started to switch from dug in stationary guns to highly mobile "shoot-and-scoot"-tactics, in which a gun quickly fires half a dozen rounds in a time-on-target salvo and relocates to dodge the counterbattery fire. For this, modern Artillery systems like PZH2000, Archer, RCH155, Dana and Caesar are optimized.
Since the advent of quick and cheap FPV drones, moving artillery on the road is much more in danger, and dug-in guns with jammers, SHORAD and overhead protection again regained the survivability edge - albeit mainly because russia lost most of its modern radar.
The only western SPA with any chance of survival seems to be the PZH2000, as its on a tracked carriage allowing it offroad movement and concealment and being better armored than most wheeled contemporaries on Lorry-Chassis
FPVs are significantly range limited (~10km), and have relatively small surveillance footprint. It's true that persistent ISR is significantly increasing the danger posed to all vehicles within the 10-30km (perhaps further) of the 'front line', but these are predominantly coming from different classes of drones.
And yes, while FPVs can be queued onto SPGs (or whatever) by these other drones, so can other means of fires (like traditional artillery). As a reminder, tube artillery can usually reach out to at least 20km.
I am not downplaying the impact that drones in general have, and I'm also not claiming that FPVs cannot significantly shape artillery operations within 5-10km of the front line.
Here's the rub - Russia is clearly cable to assembly company sized AFV elements (though not consistently) to attack. And yes, we see these attacks generally get repulsed (with significant FPV drone involvement). So we know that Ukrainian ISR + FPV combination (Ukraine has been limiting its artillery usage) can be overwhelmed in the deeper space - it is possible to mass company sized elements, and transit them through into the line of contact, reasonably intact.
There's no denying that PzH2000 is more survivable than Archer or Caesar (that is infact the entire point of Archer and Caesar - trade suitability and tactical mobility for strategic/operational mobility). But you're also missing like... M109? Like by numbers, there were more M109s donated than any other western platform.
FPV drones carrying anything more than antipersonnel grenades are heavy, with limited range and can have EW sensors track the control link signal sources that can then be responded with artillery.
Since a lot of the adaptions have happened, FPV pilots on both sides have become more about harassing the enemy than a strategic flipping of artillery doctrine (which was shifting to more mobile batteries before FPV drones came into the picture).
On the other hand, that's also what someone bragging insincerely would say...
Anyone knows if in China such men loses are acceptable for the population.
When I learned to fly racing drones, I used Velocidrone; I have no experience of FPVSim.
Even if you don't plan to eventually fly an acrobatic or racing drone, the sim experience can be a bit relaxing & focused. I used to practice on a 2nd monitor while I was in large mandatory group meetings for work.
If you do plan to build and fly drones, then a simulator is absolutely worth every penny. You pay for real drone crashes with time and money, and you probably need 100 hours of practice before you can handle the real thing (and not that well).
If I were going to get back into the hobby, I'd probably try to do long range fixed wing aircraft with FPV and flight automation. The view will be much more enjoyable and the batteries will last much longer. I think there's also less community pressure around RC planes vs. drones, especially the loud racing ones.
For me personally that’s too boring.. Long range is illegal in lots of places; in the US you technically need a spotter and the craft needs to be in direct line of sight, and pretty close because it should be visible with unaided eye - so, no binoculars.
3.5" is the sweet spot where you can build a sub 250g (or almost sub 250 - do cops really carry kitchen scales on them?) drone with decent performance that doesn't scare people when you fly around and still has the performance close to a 5" one and you can still do all of the tricks. The only drawback with 3.5" is that they're more susceptible to wind, so if it's always very windy where you fly, maybe consider a 5". Oh, and you also don't need to install a remote ID module on a sub 250g quad.
I need to check the rules closely because there's exceptions for rocket powered gliders but I don't think i'll be able to launch at a sanctioned event and will probably have to go out to FAR (friends of amatuer rocketry) which is a multi-day drive for me. Tripoli, the main governing body for experimental high powered rocketry, has rules about guided recovery with some exceptions for gliders. I have a feeling a rocket powered glider would have to remain in sight at all times which wouldn't be the case with an 'M' motor sending it up. Someone building a rocket that can fly to 100k feet and then land at a waypoint would attract a lot of unwanted attention from authorities and be bad for the hobby which is why those rules exist.
I just bought my first fixed wing, but it made me realize why i like my sub 100 gram " 3" toothpick" kind of quads even more. i can fly those around the home, i get 10+ minutes of flight time (trust me, it gets annoying after 8-9 minutes and you need a break before you fly the next battery!), and even if i crash that 1S toothpick into something or someone, you barely cause a scratch..
what controller would you recommend?
FC are essential for long range missions typically, but I have pushed several miles on just GPS overlay in my video feed.
There's also freerider fpv, DRL, and Liftoff. They're all pretty good, honestly.
Sub 250g drones such as the DJI Mini series and the Autel Nano will give you the most flexibility in places you can fly legally.
Portugal requires approval from the coast guard if your planned flight is within certain distance from a beach/the sea, which is quite easy in a coastal and islands country.
I remember the Dutch laws said, before European alignment in 2020: 150 meters from any uninvolved person, any road, or any building. Since fields generally have less than 300 meters between two roads, that means you can try to fly between trees in some forest (somehow making sure there's not a person in a 300 meter diameter from the quadcopter) or inside your own four walls. It was essentially banned outright. Not to mention that a large percentage (majority?) of the population lives inside of airport no fly zones because there's smallish airports sprinkled everywhere, but that's understandable even if the omission of a height restriction is a bit silly (if you would be allowed to stay below the height of a large flat and are several km from the airport, any plane would be striking buildings sooner than your device... but people are stupid and we probably need this hard rule with safety margin)
I think the location rules are more relaxed now but I don't know them by heart anymore. Stopped taking them seriously during the total prohibition period. If it is now only about people and buildings (and perhaps highways or such), the location rules are making more sense at least.
For FPV flying it's a little bit different. In theory, it requires to have a "spotter" who will watch the drone when you fly, and the same other rules apply. But if you're flying in your backyard, close to the ground, or indoors, nobody will notice or care.
And this covers most parts of EU.
For 99% of flights you also don't need any per-flight "bureucracy".
There are some limitations, like X height in city, not above crowds, no "no-go" zones, but totally not "illegal to fly in most parts of EU".
For FPV drones there are many more options. I think one of the best brands is GepRC but there are so many others, it's impossible to mention them all. Still, for the video transmitting system, DJI is still dominant there as well, but at least you can use alternatives if you really don't like them (Walksnail for digital, or lots of others for analog).
iFlight is probably among the top BnF brands together with GepRC, but nowadays it's cheaper to build your own (used to be BnF/PnP ones were cheaper than parts, no longer the case).
If you want a commercial off-the-shelf drone, nothing is remotely close to DJI, really.
If you’re learning to fly FPV, get a betafpv all inclusive kit like the cetus series - that’s what I started on.
Eventually though, if you’re flying hard you’ll crash hard so you want to know how to build and therefore fix your quads. I highly highly recommend Joshua Bardwells DIY build kit and YT video series.
But you can also buy bind-n-fly quads like the Nazgul.
If it's dji like flying, there's skydio .
If it's fpv racing, freestyle etc ... There are many ready to fly options. Starting at 50 grams all up weight for indoor flying to 5" 200+kmph racers to bigger 7" long range quads..
If this is an indication of what it is like to fly real FPV drones, I'll have to put a lock on my wallet.
You wouldn't want that because throttle is essential for flight control unlike with fixed wing where it's somewhat set and forget in many situations. It's partially alleviated by 'real' radios not having a spring on the throttle axis, so it stays in the position you've put it and part of it is just more practice..
Not springing back the throttle to neutral makes a lot of sense and would probably help!
I don't really care about freestyling - I'm more interested in cruising over forest canopy, and having a reliable return to home function if radio signal gets lost. (I have probably 15 built out airframes; over time I probably need to replace defunct hardware, but a lot of it still seems reasonably acceptable. Quite a few f7 controllers for example.)
I've been thinking of pulling the plug on getting a dji mavic (maybe mini pro which is 249g and doesn't need a licence, but also thinking of another dji mavic pro also). A1/A3 is around £200 elsewhere.
Is this
(1) because my turns are uncoordinated,
(2) because I have an incorrectly configured viewport,
(3) because I'm not cut out for FPV flying, or
(4) a matter of persevering and getting used to the perspective?
