Robot wars helping British troops

[Arct1k]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7560300.stm

The main one they show is a revo with a couple of camera's slapped on the top!

No doubt the goverment paid $1M for it!

[Dafni]

I-spy? And it's nitro? Someone send them a link to our site!

[brushlessboy16]

oh come on... a revo- and that camera base is 10 bux, we run that same base on our robot for a programmable camera, anyone could ziptie that to a car :D

[bl-is-future]

any land vehicle will not be that practical.... An unmanned air concept is the best way to go.

[Dagger Thrasher]

Cool, interesting stuff...but that "I-Spy" Revo has got one fatal flaw; it's nitro. Anyone that it's meant to be spying on will hear it coming miles off lol. I like the looks of that hex-rotor heli though. Very clever...

[J3110]

That's funny. That is seriously funny, but the presenter girl was cute.
I can't even take that seriously because there are so many problems with both of the demonstrated applications...for urban recon?

I think we would all agree that the revo should have been a brushless e-revo, at least. Full aluminum FLM build-out, UE diffs etc. Perhaps something a bit less break-friendly in a battle zone, like, oh, I dunno, a battlebot?
Lightweight, but more armored and stable/inver...ok, anyways. Point made, I think.

How is that ufo deal any better than current designs that pivot their 4 rotors?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhK0JTq7DKQ
That one works.

I could see that being used to create a good distraction, but spying? Haha, don't make me laugh. This looks like something I could put together with a few zipties, my old camera, and some duct tape, really...
I also think an electric heli of some sort would be better for spying... not only would the camera be smoother, but you could get much better views.
Also, imagine strapping some sort of gun or explosives to a Revo or some other rc vehicle, that could actually have a lot of uses in urban combat.

also: a rock crawler of some sort with two speeds would also be much better than a revo for spying.

[J3110]

Saw a vid of a guy running some kinda MT with jumbo kongs on it(over at slap-ma-fro productions) and he could drive it upside-down because the tires were so huge. Something like that would be essential for the revocam, first of all and something I've already seen done here in the states.

I think you are on to something with the distraction bit as I think that is basically the best use of an easily detected RC ground pounder. In fact, that's what I thought of when I was checking out that thread about the guys in Iraq that have converted their Baja 5b into brushless and slapped dualies on the back.

Say you're in a firefight with some rascals in south-central Falluja...send out the armor plated BL5b and drive it to the opposite side of the enemy to take their attention off of you. Put something on it that looks like it could do some damage(flat black painted paper towel roll or something like that, maybe).
Of course, the FPV camera would still be used, but just so you could drive it around barriers etc and remain under cover.

One of the finest arial surveilance vehicles I saw being developed was actually a co-ax heli design with one rotor above and one below the vehicle and a tripod extended off the lower spindle. It was big, so would be impractical for indoor use, but it seemed exceptionally stable. My thought is that another co-ax design would beat out a standard rotor design any day due to the extensive research the Navy's already done into the benifits of co-ax rotors during their early anti-sub efforts using drones.

I have yet to see a reasonably stable platform for indoor use and would expect it to be largely run by autopilot with the pilot only telling it where to go and not actually doing the keep it from crashing part.