Comment by arthurcolle
11 hours ago
Since them I've acquired a 3D printer, so I've increased the surface area of expensive things I can break.
If I can ever figure out how to repurpose some of these electronics maybe for some kind of AI robot (yes, the gimbal + camera optics are so nice, it feels like a sci fi eyeball from 2037!) I will be back in business.
Some people sell exploits to "jailbreaks DJI drone firmware but with current US admin I don't think it is prudent to do too much "off-label" usage of this kind of tech.
But seeing this geofencing post.... I just had too much experience trying to get around these restrictions to actually believe that they'd drop the geofencing, especially after a consumer drone ban.
Thank you for the chain suggestion, that would have been intelligent to do. Matter of fact, my father may have made that suggestion at the time. Alas, that was a very move fast and break things period of my life.
I'm flying very experimental drones (~1 Kg only so not super heavy, but still, you don't want one to land on your head) in an urban environment so I really care a lot about keeping things safe and within my yard. This seems like it was the easiest way to get really hard safety guarantees. That thing is going nowhere further than the length of the tether. Building drones is fun, there is a ton to learn and the constraints are crazy enough that you have to be very creative.
If there is one resource I can point you to that may help to inspire you have a look at this:
https://www.drehmflight.com/
Top engineering skills, very likable character and an amazing source of hard tech knowledge.
Thank you so much for sharing this excellent resource.
I'm watching this youtube video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlD0C5CrWcA) and he apparently built this out to support his Master's research at the University of Maryland, where I went to school for undergrad.
The long arm of the DMV no-fly zone is no joke!
In one of his videos he claims he's 'not a software guy' and then proceeds to put together a piece of control software that is more flexible and far better laid out than whatever is out there in common usage.
He's right in many ways, unfortunately I really need all those other features as well, but I think there is something to be said for ripping the inner control loops (rate, level, stabilization) out of say Arducopter and replacing it with this stuff on a separate micro controller. It's much easier to divorce stability and primary flight characteristics from things like high level mission planning and such and it isn't rare at all for such things to get in each others way in the usual suspects (Betaflight, INAV, Arducopter and various derivatives of these three).
I just had too much experience trying to get around these restrictions to actually believe that they'd drop the geofencing, especially after a consumer drone ban.
DJI has got to be pretty sore about the ban. The geofencing was always voluntary on their part as I understand it, basically an attempt to proactively engage with the US and other aviation authorities in good faith. Then, when Trump blew up the truce by ordering the FCC not to approve future products, they may have felt they had no reason to continue to cooperate.
That's what I was wondering -- whether or not that speculation really does describe the situation accurately. If it does, it sounds like good news for you, since that hardware may now be usable after a firmware update. I only have a 249g first-gen Mini, myself... and being out in the middle of nowhere, I don't know if it ever had those restrictions to begin with.