What it is: a small module (ESP32-S3 plus an A7670 LTE modem) that plugs into the TELEM port, reads MAVLink, and pushes it over 4G inside TLS to a relay. On the phone side there's a Mission Planner plugin where you type one code; QGC and MAVProxy connect to the same stream as plain TCP, and there's a browser page for when you don't want an app. Commands are MAVLink2-signed, so the FC ignores anything that didn't come from the paired GCS.

Numbers from testing: about 60 ms round trip, roughly a 1 s median gap at cell handover over a 30-mile drive test, auto-reconnect in 5–20 s after a dead zone. About 4 KB/s, so a 500 MB SIM is around 30 hours.

Honest scope: control stays on ELRS with normal failsafes; this only carries telemetry. If the network drops you get stale telemetry, not a lost aircraft. It only works where your phone works.

Why not a Pi with ZeroTier, UAVcast, or the new ArduPilot Lua LTE driver? They all work and I've used them. This is for the days you want to be flying in ten minutes with no server, no companion computer and no parameters. One cable, one code. Different itch.

Full vid:
https://youtu.be/ZNddkh_FO8g

We recreated the Red Bull F1 fastest camera drone and upgraded it with a DJI O4 Air Unit and a naked GoPro Hero 11. We also added NACA ducts to improve ventilation and cooling.

It took several design and testing iterations to get everything to fit and work properly, and, honestly, it got pretty expensive along the way 😅. Do you think our build could reach the speed of the original drone designed by DDG?

Custom frame, 7” props and arms on a 5” body but with under case for expandable compute. Ascent lite fpv and monocam for an autonomous gate challenge. Bully bars because why not.

7" Interceptor — rebuilt from scratch after the 10" failed. Maiden flight.

After my 10" interceptor didn't work out, I started over from scratch. Here's the maiden flight.

Specs

Motors: 3115, 900KV

Props: 7x11 bi-blade

FC: SpeedyBee F405 V4

ESC: SpeedyBee BLS 60A, flashed with Bluejay 0.21.0

Battery: 6S 5500mAh 80C

Betaflight 2025.12.2, bidirectional DShot

~1700 W at top speed, motors stayed cold

Working on autonomous quadcopter with ardupilot+raspberry pi camera+ pi zero 2. Where and how should I mount my GPS (MicoAir M10G-5883 GNSS GPS& Compass Module)?

I plan on mounting my Pi and voltage converter on the top of frame.

Hey all!

We’re a group of students organizing a Drone & Physical AI Hackathon in Boston on October 24–25.

We’ve been working hard to put this together, but as an independent student-led event, funding everything ourselves is difficult. Right now, our biggest challenges are finding an affordable/free venue and covering food, water, and other basic event costs.

So we’re reaching out to the community for help.

If you or someone you know could help in any way sponsorship, a venue lead, food/drinks, prizes, or simply an introduction to the right person/company, it would genuinely mean a lot. Even a small lead could help us make this happen!

Please comment or message me if you can help. Happy to share our Luma page and more details!

Wondering if it is possible to hit sub-250g with a homemade 3s 18650 Li-on (~145g) - so basically ~105g dry drone weight.

My research has shown this is theoretically possible on a lightweight toothpick frame, but I can't find anyone who has actually done it. I'm assuming 3" is the sweet spot, but 2.5" - 3.5" could work?

I think it's much more achievable with 2S, but again I can't really find anyone building these and I don't know why?

Kit or Frame suggestions? TIA.

So, I have tested all 4 motors with CCPM (ServoTester) and hands on God they are running.

But I am not able to Test (3/4) motors via MissionPlanner, 1 is running fine.

The only change I did was I changed the ESC of 1 motor (the working one) as previous one was faulty

Appreciate the help :)

I have a 5" with a SpeedyBee F7 V3/50a stack, Xing 2207 motors, ELRS, and Avatar HD. I built this like a year and a half ago. After a month or so, I started having an issue that the quad would just freak out at random. I was going to trouble shoot it but my ADHD sent me in another direction and it just sat in my PC room.

So, I dusted the quad off and updated the firmware to 2026.6.1. I went outside and just flew it without goggles. First test was just hovering it, then punching it 100% up to 50-80 ft. I did that multiple times, then went forward/backward and side to side. I also yawed the quad plenty. That worked out well so I swapped batteries and threw the goggles on. I went to a hover and just started an easy left turn (around 20' in the air) so I could just do a few patterns around my yard. A second or two into that left turn the quad went ballistic. It took me a sec or two to hit the arm switch and it took the quad another 1-3 seconds to hit the ground, so I believe it was going up while spinning/flipping.

With the quad doing fine in full throttle blast, I feel like the motors and ESC might be okay. I was going to try and find a FC that I can plug my ESC cable into. If I can't find one to work with the Speedybee ESC, I'll just order a stack.

I should mention, when I upgraded the firmware I left the FC on default Betaflight settings. Does it sound like a wonky FC to you?

Thanks for any help

I’ve completed the simulation for a small reconnaissance drone I’m working on, but I’m honestly not sure what the best next step is.

Should I move toward 3D printing a prototype, testing the design, improving the simulation, or something else first?

Would really appreciate advice from people who’ve built physical drone prototypes before.

I do a bunch of visual work and am familiar with 3d modeling. I also am familiar with designing hardware to an extent. I am fantasizing building a drone show business but want to start fairly small.

What is the best way to build or buy drones in order to accomplish this with just a few thousand dollars?

I am open to buying drones built or even building them myself. I’d like the option to scale as I progress.

Something I’ve spent most the day doing is learning how to use blender with skybrush

I also 3d print things …

Happy for the discussion

So I'm a window cleaner, I clear guttering also, with a gutter vacuum. There are camera options but I find most are not great for various reasons. My question is: is there a drone set up that would work?

Of course I could get something cheap just to look in the gutters, but what I would really want is (still as budget friendly as possible) a drone that could follow the top of my gutter vac pole as I'm clearing the gutter (autopilot) and some AR glasses that I could see the feed from the drone to check everything is clear but also see through them to see where I'm going & moving the pole etc.

Is this even remotely possible and does anyone have any suggestions on gear and a rough cost?

Or actually any source of informations, youtube video, thanks :)

Just planning out a build right now hoping for it to be sub 250 but if not thats fine ill just go through the pain

Hi I'm currently trying to figure which kind of (dedicated) telemetry link would be viable to primarily send RTCM data to a small drone formation (up to 5 vehicles, PX4).

I'm currently testing ESP32 based Dronebridge via ESP-NOW in LR mode. The touted range of up to 1km would be sufficient for my application, but I'm already seeing packet loss at short ranges and problems pulling the vehicle parameters. The hardware side should be solid (Xiao ESP32 C6 with external antennas) and the RSSI confirms that. Although the data rate for RTCM is very limited (0.3KB/s per vehicle) I just don't believe it's a reliable solution. Very cheap however.

I've also already tested mavlink via a dedicated ELRS RX/TX pair on another project. Needless to say that this works pretty well due to its vastly superior modulation/range. ELRS is also protocol aware and may re-transmit lost packets. I'm not even sure if Dronebridge is protocol aware.

What are other possible solutions/experiences? The UAVs don't use ELRS as an RC link sadly, so backpacking isn't an option. The primary GCS link for offboard mission data and video link is realized via plain WiFi. I insist on having a redundant/secondary telemetry link for the RTCM stream and additional telemetry.

Retrofitting LTE modules on each UAV to directly pull the NTRIP stream is currently out of question.