I'm not like a drone-i-ologist or nothin, but from what I gather, both sides have gotten really good at detecting and jamming drone communication in the Ukraine/Russia conflict, which would probably make that a tough use case. I've read that the newer attack drones are controlled by a reaaallly long, reaaalllyy thin fiber optic line!

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650REDHAIR 19 hours ago | parent | next [-]

New attack models are using shielded electronics that don't need GPS and are immune to traditional jamming. Relying on computer vision and old school navigation math.

Go ~X speed for Y distance(+/-) on Z heading until you reach A landmark and then start a new set of instructions.

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cyanydeez 15 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Yeah, but not in ukraine. They brute forced fiber, fly by wire.

Dead reckoning via inertial sensors, cameras, etc are way to complex for the flight controllers without heavier hardware since theyre hugely inefficient.

AI at the sophistication to do this stuff is essentially bloatware. Like running electron instead of a bare metal gui.

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DrewADesign 16 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I’m interested in reading up on that. Where did you see it?

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_boffin_ 14 hours ago | parent [-]

You can take a look into inertial navigation systems and then also terrain mapping

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DrewADesign 14 hours ago | parent [-]

Everything I’ve found about the drones in that conflict indicates they use automated navigation for pursuit once a target is locked, but human pilots before then.

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_boffin_ 14 hours ago | parent [-]

you described two different steps: human pilots get to desired area and target locked. For the human part, if the drone isn't using fiber optic and is getting jammed (many types of jamming), the human pilot might not be able to communicate with the drone. If that's the case, how will the drone get to the desired area? that's where the two things i posted come into play.

	▲	DrewADesign 6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I understand the technology and the purpose, in context. I’m curious about how they’re actually using this stuff because I haven’t seen anywhere say that they actually are.

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rurban 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

At the end of WW2 the very same happened. As if they didn't learn from history. Well, that are Chinese drones, which weren't part of the signals war then.

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vhcr 20 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The idea would be to use autonomous drones, so they wouldn't need to communicate, the problem would be that the GPS signal is jammed.

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BobaFloutist 17 hours ago | parent [-]

If they're not communicating, how are they sending back lots of data?

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PieTime 17 hours ago | parent [-]

I presume these are surveillance drones and are programmed to loop back to origin

	▲	DrewADesign 17 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Surveillance gathered by an completely autonomous drone with no outside data, stationed far enough away to require refueling, close enough to enemy operations to be useful, that then needs to make its way back to origin, intact, through hostile territory, quickly enough for the gathered information to be useful, seems like a preeeetty big lift. Something a startup would promise to tackle with a star team of technologists over the course of like 10 years? Sure. Something they’d have designed within the past, like, year while getting shot at? I’d have to see that believe it.

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mycall 19 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Those fiber optic lines only work 50-60% of the time. Often the drones are carried 20km on foot into position which sucks as you know half the equipment on your back won't work.

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DrewADesign 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Where did you see that?

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snowmobile 19 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

How do they not work? Just fail in transmitting data completely? Do you have a link to learn more about this?

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650REDHAIR 19 hours ago | parent [-]

Cable breaks

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snowmobile 10 hours ago | parent [-]

Well, there's a difference between breaking and being broken. I wouldn't say 33% of all B-17s "didn't work" because they were shot down.

	▲	DrewADesign 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Also, those drones are essentially guided projectiles, and not even particularly expensive ones at that. What percentage of projectiles do you imagine successfully connect with their targets in combat?

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bmitch3020 20 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

A jammed drone that's perched on a power line wouldn't fall out of the sky, and doesn't need to transmit 24x7, only when it detects some activity. The lack of a signal from it would itself be a signal of where the next attack is coming from. Anti-jamming weapons (missiles and autonomous drones) would also be useful, that lock on to any signal jamming sources and deliver the munitions directly to the target that's advertising itself.