- Joined
- Dec 6, 2019
- Messages
- 295
- Reaction score
- 246
- Age
- 107
As I read Phantom Pilots with interest daily, I never have to wait very long to hear of an unfortunate drone crash. Phantom gimbals and landing gear seem to take the worst of the spanking. In 8 years of flying drones, I've only crashed twice and never with my P4P v2. My first drone was a clever device called the Xiro Xplorer V. It had some pesky limitations...wouldn't fly above 400' or farther away than 600m and camera wasn't 4K. But, aside from that, it pretty much did everything the DJI's did. What I really liked was the fact that it was modular. The camera and gimbal assembly snapped in place securely and could also accept a gimbal designed for GoPro's up to the Hero 3 or 4, I believe. How cool is that!
I often read posts where pilots mention they wish an American company produced a drone product equal or better than DJI's. Me too. And why couldn't they? And make it modular with easily replaceable landing gear and gimbal. Perhaps even have the camera itself easily removeable from the gimbal since, in many crashes, the camera is OK. So much money could be saved in repair costs and anyone skilled enough to plug in a toaster could do it themselves. Of course, keeping the cost of replacement parts reasonable would be important, too.
A modular drone would be a huge selling point, I believe. And that's just one idea to consider. I can think of several more. Batteries fail and accidents happen. It'd be great to know I could repair my drone in short order if I accidently zig instead of zag. And my old Xiro proved it can be done.
I often read posts where pilots mention they wish an American company produced a drone product equal or better than DJI's. Me too. And why couldn't they? And make it modular with easily replaceable landing gear and gimbal. Perhaps even have the camera itself easily removeable from the gimbal since, in many crashes, the camera is OK. So much money could be saved in repair costs and anyone skilled enough to plug in a toaster could do it themselves. Of course, keeping the cost of replacement parts reasonable would be important, too.
A modular drone would be a huge selling point, I believe. And that's just one idea to consider. I can think of several more. Batteries fail and accidents happen. It'd be great to know I could repair my drone in short order if I accidently zig instead of zag. And my old Xiro proved it can be done.
