> Traditional stereo won't help you localize them [...] and LIDAR sacrifices resolution for weight and power consumption

I wonder if a more mechanical solution wouldn't help:

Whiskers, like on a cat. A long enough set of thin lightweight whiskers could touch the wire before the propellers do, giving time for the drone to stop and change course. Essentially, giving the drone a sense of touch.

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jrussino 39 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

As an undergrad I worked with a professor who was doing precisely that! https://sense-lab.github.io/pubs/pdf/solomon_nature_2006.pdf

I hadn't thought about this in a long time. Looks like her lab is still going strong doing research at the intersection of biology and robotics on whisker-based sensing:

https://sense-lab.github.io/robotics.html

https://sense-lab.github.io/publications.html

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ianferrel an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Thin lightweight whiskers are going to be challenging to manage on a propeller-driven vehicle. They'll get blown all over the place. Having them extend out past the propellers will likely get them tangled in the propellers.

	▲	ssl-3 28 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Sure, they'll move around in the prop wash. But that's fine, isn't it? If they're intended to detect fixed objects, then noticing that one or more of them have ceased to be blown around in that way may be a good way to detect unanticipated contact with a fixed object: When the signal becomes less noisy, then maybe something is in the way. And the whiskers don't have to be all floppy like a wet noodle. I myself am thinking that something rigid or semi-rigid might be good. Perhaps something akin to armature wire, or thin spring steel. Maybe even literal bamboo chopsticks. They can also be constrained so that they don't get sent into the props. My little brain thinks that the drone-end of the whiskers can be attached to potentiometers, with light return springs to bring them back towards center, like the mechanism used by an analog stick on a PS3 controller.

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cromka an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Would help avoid damage with other misrecognized or ignired objects, too.