drones

[M-Tecs]

https://laws101.com/shoot-down-a-drone/

https://www.securitymagazine.com/art...g-down-a-drone

[Johnch]

Drones can be fun
BUT Please watch where you fly it
As duck and goose hunters tend to dislike them flying around and spooking the birds
The kids and parents next to the marsh I hunt
Found out a Game Warden will write tickets for Hunter Harassment
From their kids buzzing the duck hunters with a drone

I also have heard several have had BAD CASES of High Speed Steel Poisoning
I was told 1 1/4 oz of #3 Steel is fatal to a drone at 40 yards

John

[uscra112]

As useful as they may be to farmers and others, I have a very hard spot in my heart for drones. My OTHER hobby used to be scratch-building and flying fixed-wing model aircraft, something that takes considerable skill and practice, and which thus gave me a lot of satisfaction in accomplishment. Then came these self-stabilizing drones, which any idiot with $$$ and a smartphone can operate, and a lot of idiots did/do. So my painstakingly crafted airplanes are now a threat to national security; I have to get a license to fly them, and all my $$$ radio equipment (which doesn't have this ID broadcasting feature) has to be scrapped. My model shop is closed up. It breaks my heart to even look into it.

Thankfully our founders wrote a Second Amendment, so I can still build and use my guns. For now.

[Good Cheer]

If there's a purpose for curtains on windows it should be curtains for any device spying on you.
That it isn't says who is making the rules.

[rancher1913]

while they can be used for nefarious purposes, my op was about how useful they can be if you have a large property. there are lots that dont like drones and i almost fall into that category, but it serves a very useful purpose and gives me piece of mind that i can keep a watch on intruders from my armchair. given the crime levels that keep going up and stupid people that think your land is theirs, a landowner has to find ways to be viligent. i have a camera system on the house but it cant record license plates of vehicles stopped on the road, the drone can. it saves me climbing on the roof to check creosote build up, it allows me to check my creek areas that are hard to access by vehicle, and can spot a camp site of a squatter. in the wrong hands a drone can be bad but in the right hands it can be a powerful tool for a rancher.

[uscra112]

All true. I don't hold any personal grudge against people who use them wisely. But I do wish that shooting them down when misused would be considered property destruction in the public interest. And I really do wish that fixed-wing RC had been exempted.

[contender1]

"while they can be used for nefarious purposes, my op was about how useful they can be if you have a large property. there are lots that dont like drones and i almost fall into that category, but it serves a very useful purpose and gives me piece of mind that i can keep a watch on intruders from my armchair. given the crime levels that keep going up and stupid people that think your land is theirs, a landowner has to find ways to be viligent. i have a camera system on the house but it cant record license plates of vehicles stopped on the road, the drone can. it saves me climbing on the roof to check creosote build up, it allows me to check my creek areas that are hard to access by vehicle, and can spot a camp site of a squatter. in the wrong hands a drone can be bad but in the right hands it can be a powerful tool for a rancher. "

I agree 100%!!!!!!

Your post is easily related to someone who has a fair amount of property. Sadly, too many people do not have much property & think they can do as they please.

[MaryB]

"Laws against jamming"

But if I fire up on the 13cm ham band with 250 watts to a high gain yagi giving me 100,000 watts effective radiated power I am not jamming, I am testing my ham radio station LOL that WOULD take a drone down! Heck I crashed one inspecting the tower before a contest. Friend who was down to contest with me fired up the 23cm setup to make sure the 550 watt amplifier was working and n relays were sticking. I just happened to be 50 feet in front of the 4 antennas... 218,000 watts effective radiated power... yes it is dangerous level to a human but being 33' in the air it doesn't reach ground level until 2,000 feet out. By then signal strength has dropped well into the safe zone... FCC requires a yearly RF safety calculation be done and filed in my paperwork in case they would ever receive a complaint

[popper]

SIL has one, it downloads to his computer. Quad copter, good resolution in the vids. Ones I have of property are too long to post but he went up too 200ft or so. And you have to avoid running into trees like he did, but it recovered well and kept on flying.

[Scorpion8]

Very informative thread. I'm also in the boat of "would love to get one".

[Rapier]

Owning a tree farm with 150' high trees on rolling hills, exactly how does this humming bird fly back to launch? Thinking about how they would work for my riding fence outings, which I do three times a week.

[rancher1913]

mine can go up to 400 foot high before you get in trouble with air traffic. it can return home at what ever altitude you set, but i fly mine home. i generally make a loop around the property so end up back where i started anyway. i ride my fence with it but for the most part my fences are treeless so there are no obstructions for it to hit. it does have radar so it stops before it hits something. with the prop guards it could probably bounce off of some things.

[uscra112]

Jeeeez, radar too?
One of my old gliders had a control receiver with GPS. Handy if I got it so high that I lost visual contact. Send it the "home" command and it would fly a straight line to a preset lat/lon, close enough that I could regain visual on it. That was 13 years ago. I assume these drones have the same thing. but much smaller and lighter.

[contender1]

"Owning a tree farm with 150' high trees on rolling hills, exactly how does this humming bird fly back to launch? "

Most people fly the drones back to themselves by visual sight. Many people use an IPhone or such to operate their drones, to be able to see what the drone sees as well. That can help. HOWEVER,, good drones have a very neat feature called; "Return to home" that you can activate & it will return to the launch spot.

[rbuck351]

Put up a bunch of barrage balloons with monofilament fishing line around areas you don't want a drone to be. It shouldn't be illegal to fly a couple of kids balloons up to 300'or so.

[MrWolf]

Do you need wifi or line of sight for them. I have 81 acres but mountain and trees. No wifi out here until Elon gets his butt in gear with Starlink. Been waiting since 2021.

[uscra112]

The system I had in that glider could be programmed to fly to a sequence of GPS waypoints independently. Can these drones do that? Would the FAA allow it? Ought not to, given that it makes the drone a poor man's guided missile, but ?????

[uscra112]

Put up a bunch of barrage balloons with monofilament fishing line around areas you don't want a drone to be. It shouldn't be illegal to fly a couple of kids balloons up to 300'or so.

Not just monofilament - hang curtains of mist netting. The kind homeowners use to deter deer, and fruit growers deploy to keep birds out of their trees. You'd probably catch a few birds, which would send the Audubon Karens into a frenzy, but. . . . .

[Markopolo]

I am a drone person.. I own more of them then my wife knows about.. I also research the laws. I can tell you that if somebody shoots my drone, I would absolutely press charges and call the state troopers. It is NOT allowed.

To speak to the OP’s original post..

Drones are an essential tool in my tool chest of subsistence lifestyle. I discover much new deer habitat, and can count salmon numbers without paddling miles away. It also allows me to inspect creeks for beaver and all sorts of other Ariel surveys. In my neck of the woods, lots of areas are virtually impassable otherwise. But finding safe and realistic travel corridors has opened up my hunting areas that are never traveled. I do not use drones to hunt, but do use them for discovery. I also respect others privacy. I do not fly into somebody’s “airspace”, and have respect.

I have 2 primary drone “screwdrivers” in my tool chest. An aging DJI Mavic Pro and a brand new DJI Mavic Mini 3 pro. I have done modifications to the controller and added aftermarket antenna’s and hacked the firmware of both of my primary drones to customize the limitations. My Mavic mini 3 pro can reach distances of over 5 miles or more and it is a joy to fly with the new controller and extended flight times of the new breed of batteries. I can be in the air about 40 min with the little guy and I just love it. It travels with me in the woods and fits right into my backpack. At a weight of under 250grams it requires no fcc registration. It is small enough to fit in a coat pocket.

my old dji Mavic pro is a completely different beast. It is big and heavier and requires cables and such, controllers and what not to attach to my iPad so it is no where near as mobile as my Mini 3 pro. But, when it’s terrible weather outside it just goes and goes. It is very powerful and I have flown it in rainstorms and wind with no issues. And in my part of alaska, wind and rain are almost daily occurrence. Both of my primary drones have been modified with neoprene rain gear and engine covers to keep it water tight as possible.

I hope that if you are interested in done stuff, that you will follow your interests, and don’t let folks with anger or fear deter you from proper use of drones. Some people sound similar to those that are paranoid about the number of guns a person own, or the stockpiling of ammo and components.. don’t be part of the problem.

Here are a couple vids showing some areas that I do hunt and trap. They are about 4 min in length, and show MUCH detail that a hunter or fisherman can use.








MarkoPolo

[contender1]

"Do you need wifi or line of sight for them."

It depends upon the control unit. Most of mine use a dedicated control unit. No wifi or internet etc necessary. I do have one that I operate with a tablet,, or IPhone,, but I'm not sure if it needs the wifi or not. (I've never questioned that.) It's never failed to operate either.