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Power wire avoidance.

Soutthpaw

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New guy,. I just placed a deposit for the Skydio 2,. Trying to gather as much info as possible before it ships. From watching various videos, it seems that overhead power wires are an Achilles heel for this Done. Anyone know if all these work from home engineers have improved the collision avoidance with power wires? I'm getting this mainly for the autonomous tacking, as I already own the DJI mavic 2 air,. Which I think is a fantastic drone for the $$. Also my first drone and I am hooked
also does avoidance of power wires and branches improve with lower travel speeds?
 
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New guy,. I just placed a deposit for the Skydio 2,. Trying to gather as much info as possible before it ships. From watching various videos, it seems that overhead power wires are an Achilles heel for this Done. Anyone know if all these work from home engineers have improved the collision avoidance with power wires? I'm getting this mainly for the autonomous tacking, as I already own the DJI mavic 2 air,. Which I think is a fantastic drone for the $$. Also my first drone and I am hooked
also does avoidance of power wires and branches improve with lower travel speeds?
For me when you manually fly the drone the drone sees the power lines ... branches are problematic also during wintertime when the leaves are gone.
Quit al lot of improvement on this area last year.
 
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For me when you manually fly the drone the drone sees the power lines ... branches are problematic also during wintertime when the leaves are gone.
Quit al lot of improvement on this area last year.
That’s go to know. Glad to see they are continuing to work on it.
 
I've already crashed my Skydio into powerlines once. Apparently I haven't learned my lesson:



Skydio definitely has gotten better at powerline avoidance since one took mine out in July, this video is all shot with latest firmware in past month. I'm really confident that powerlines are the 'true Skydio killer!' ;)

It scares the crap out of me when it comes close to them. I've been trying to avoid filiming whenever they are around, or at least setting Skydio at height good enough or have path set to clear them but we all know that Skydio can be erratic when avoiding stuff and doesn't stay at a constant elevation. One of my biggest pet peeves of this drone. I wish I could set a ceiling and the drone would never dip below it. The one following my RV I meant to put Skydio on back left and hit the right button instead by accident. Totally nerve racking.
 
It would be nice to be able to decode the logs and see if it missed those lines by luck or actually was aware of them and avoided them
 
I've already crashed my Skydio into powerlines once. Apparently I haven't learned my lesson:



Skydio definitely has gotten better at powerline avoidance since one took mine out in July, this video is all shot with latest firmware in past month. I'm really confident that powerlines are the 'true Skydio killer!' ;)

It scares the crap out of me when it comes close to them. I've been trying to avoid filiming whenever they are around, or at least setting Skydio at height good enough or have path set to clear them but we all know that Skydio can be erratic when avoiding stuff and doesn't stay at a constant elevation. One of my biggest pet peeves of this drone. I wish I could set a ceiling and the drone would never dip below it. The one following my RV I meant to put Skydio on back left and hit the right button instead by accident. Totally nerve racking.
luckly there is a good contrast between the nice blue sky and powerlines.
 
It would be nice to be able to decode the logs and see if it missed those lines by luck or actually was aware of them and avoided them
Not sure if there's anyway for a layman to get logs from Skydio. I'm nerdy enough I'd be interested too though!
 
I look at flying around power lines as a crash waiting to happen. Not long after the SD2 release there were a couple users with YT channels that posted up their powerline encounters, it wasn't pretty. Surprisingly SD fixed at least one of the drones but I think those days are past. With wires you may get lucky but it's a costly gamble if it doesn't go your way.

Mine has been brought down a couple times due to thin branches but aside from a damaged prop it didn't phase it. The drone is pretty durable but doesn't seem to do well when it falls from a powerline onto the pavement.
 
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New guy,. I just placed a deposit for the Skydio 2,. Trying to gather as much info as possible before it ships. From watching various videos, it seems that overhead power wires are an Achilles heel for this Done. Anyone know if all these work from home engineers have improved the collision avoidance with power wires? I'm getting this mainly for the autonomous tacking, as I already own the DJI mavic 2 air,. Which I think is a fantastic drone for the $$. Also my first drone and I am hooked
also does avoidance of power wires and branches improve with lower travel speeds?
I have had my SkyDio 2 for about 6 months, batch 2. IMHO, you cannot trust that SkyDio promo video that shows the S2 flying autonomously through a thick forest. I'm an experienced drone pilot (and airplane pilot) with more than 1500 missions behind me, mainly with DJI drones. I fly VERY cautiously. Yet when manually flying the S2 down a driveway about 10 feet AGL, at 3 mph or less, in excellent lighting, no wind, the S2 prop hit a small twig and the S2 fell straight down. The camera separated from the Gimbal. SkyDio refused to honor "no crash" warranty. I had to pay $300 for replacement.

That all said, BE CAUTIOUS. Consider the OA to be a small "back up system", keep away from drone magnets (trees). Don't invite a crash by thinking the S2 is not vulnerable.

At least , that is my humble opinion.
 
I have had my SkyDio 2 for about 6 months, batch 2. IMHO, you cannot trust that SkyDio promo video that shows the S2 flying autonomously through a thick forest. I'm an experienced drone pilot (and airplane pilot) with more than 1500 missions behind me, mainly with DJI drones. I fly VERY cautiously. Yet when manually flying the S2 down a driveway about 10 feet AGL, at 3 mph or less, in excellent lighting, no wind, the S2 prop hit a small twig and the S2 fell straight down. The camera separated from the Gimbal. SkyDio refused to honor "no crash" warranty. I had to pay $300 for replacement.

That all said, BE CAUTIOUS. Consider the OA to be a small "back up system", keep away from drone magnets (trees). Don't invite a crash by thinking the S2 is not vulnerable.

At least , that is my humble opinion.
Refusing to honor your "no crash warranty" very much goes against what I've noticed in other claims for reimbursement.

Care to share a copy of the message explaining the refusal?
 
Problem is sometimes Skydio works soo good you start to overly trust it. I had three-four months trouble free and gradually I upped the risk, starting taking all sorts of risks flying through dense woods, stopped looking for drone while actively being followed, just trusted it to do it's thing. That's when I got sloppy and it hit a powerline. Kinda hard to reel it back in sometimes because throw it in the air and forget it is pretty much Skydios super power. Now I gotta be a little more strategic and plot out the path I'll be taking and what potential obstacles are. I'm super nervous to crash mine again cause I can't imagine being without it for long..
 
Problem is sometimes Skydio works soo good you start to overly trust it. I had three-four months trouble free and gradually I upped the risk, starting taking all sorts of risks flying through dense woods, stopped looking for drone while actively being followed, just trusted it to do it's thing. That's when I got sloppy and it hit a powerline. Kinda hard to reel it back in sometimes because throw it in the air and forget it is pretty much Skydios super power. Now I gotta be a little more strategic and plot out the path I'll be taking and what potential obstacles are. I'm super nervous to crash mine again cause I can't imagine being without it for long..
Finding a good middle ground between trusting the S2 too much and just being overly cautious isn't going to easier over time. Probably the best anyone can do is not to take unreasonable chances and to just really enjoy flying for the sake of flying.
 
I do my best to stay away from wires, I get real nervous if I come up on some unexpectedly and slow way way down. They are by far what I consider the biggest crash risk.
 
I'd love to see some stats on how many Skydios have crashed into powerlines.. might really strike the fear into you.
 
It would be impressive if the SD2 in OPs video actually saw and avoided those lines. My bet would be more along the lines of pure luck, scary for sure
 
New guy,. I just placed a deposit for the Skydio 2,. Trying to gather as much info as possible before it ships. From watching various videos, it seems that overhead power wires are an Achilles heel for this Done. Anyone know if all these work from home engineers have improved the collision avoidance with power wires? I'm getting this mainly for the autonomous tacking, as I already own the DJI mavic 2 air,. Which I think is a fantastic drone for the $$. Also my first drone and I am hooked
also does avoidance of power wires and branches improve with lower travel speeds?

Power lines are hard to see, and Skydio's OA is optical. Manned aircraft fly into power lines all too frequently. My flight instructors always told me, "If you see towers, think wires." For those operating in the drone space, substitute "poles" for "towers." Skydio advise avoiding bare branches and objects less than 1/2" in diameter.
 
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(y) ....Well worth the warning.

In every video I've seen where an S2 collided with a wire, either "telephone poles" or "transmission power line towers" were clearly visible near the flight path.

See the bigger one and the smaller hard to see little one is always near by....
 
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