Have not seen this light in use before

Tim Jones · Jan 14, 2018

Interesting application for crop inspection

BritishBigfoot · Jan 14, 2018

Not quite crop inspection, it's just a night inspection facilitated by a high powered light (IMO)

Tim Jones · Jan 14, 2018

I have not learned much about the details of crop inspection yet.
Are your main tools different spectral cameras?

What is in the average crop inspectors UAV tool box?
Are you guys using specific software

Sorry for the noob questions, I am curious about this aspect of the industry

ArrUnTuS · Jan 15, 2018

Multispectral cameras are used to determine the health of plants and even thermal cameras to determine water levels or hydric stress.

Making flights with sensors is the easy part. With the information obtained and combined with the field tests carried out on the land, a map of the needs is obtained. Fertilizer or pesticides maps are created for example. They seek above all to increase production, reduce the use of fertilizer or pesticides that are as bad in excess as for lack, to standardize the production achieving that all the parts of the farm produce efficiently the same everywhere, etc. It is a sector with many variables also

Mike Nevins · Jan 19, 2018

Nice video for the product. I wonder how long that farmer took to get his Night Waiver? There are many issues when it come to Precision Farming. The key is not the drone data itself, but the actionable information it can provide, i.e., prescription for the particular crop you are inspecting. Are the plants stressed, are they infected, do they have enough nitrogen, water, or maybe too much water, is the drainage good? All kinds of things. You need an agronomist to tell or interpret the data into information farmers can use. Just some of my thoughts...

ArrUnTuS · Jan 20, 2018

Mike Nevins said:
Nice video for the product. I wonder how long that farmer took to get his Night Waiver? There are many issues when it come to Precision Farming. The key is not the drone data itself, but the actionable information it can provide, i.e., prescription for the particular crop you are inspecting. Are the plants stressed, are they infected, do they have enough nitrogen, water, or maybe too much water, is the drainage good? All kinds of things. You need an agronomist to tell or interpret the data into information farmers can use. Just some of my thoughts...

I totally agree, but I'll simplify it. The ideal is to have an agronomist but seeing how reluctant the farmers are to hire these services I try to redirect it elsewhere.

I just provide the data, give you a map of where the sensors detect that something is not right. Then you, as a farmer, as a professional, determine the actions to take.

I have been farming for 30 years, now you are going to come and tell me how I have to cultivate my land?

Still, the sector, at least in my area, is not in good shape, and they are very reluctant to innovate if they are not very clear that it will provide them with benefits and still, although scientifically it is proving that yes, the feeling they have is one of scepticism. It's very hard to get customers, I haven't got it yet.......

Tim Jones · Jan 21, 2018

I am still trying to figure out what lighting I am going with.
For high intensity search light or light painting light I will most likely just throw another lipo on the UAV to power it
On the issue of navigational and night operations, I have now rigged 12 volts on each of my four arms, and additional 4s battery and 12 volts on the body
Cannot quite decide on that product

FlyaDrone · Feb 25, 2018

Tim Jones said:
I am still trying to figure out what lighting I am going with.
For high intensity search light or light painting light I will most likely just throw another lipo on the UAV to power it
On the issue of navigational and night operations, I have now rigged 12 volts on each of my four arms, and additional 4s battery and 12 volts on the body
Cannot quite decide on that product

You might be getting a false impression of how much night flights and lights are utilized in crop health flying. The vast majority of flights are performed during daytime missions. If you wish to learn more the people at Sentera have an initial focus on agricultural applications of drone technology and it's application to agriculture with a full range of sensors and software to assist with the gathering of data and the analysis of this data. Their website in the support tab has a wealth of information for you to consider and if you better understand what they have to offer you will become a well educated individual in this area of science.

FlyaDrone · Feb 25, 2018

BTW it is just what ArrUn TuS stated - IF you cannot help the farmer understand how his investment in time and money with you or this technology will provide him a return on investment then he will not spend for your service. The longer he has farmed the longer he trusts his instincts to beat the odds he is standing against. It will help you to realize that unlike most of us who casually want to know if it is going to rain today, he is betting his 12-16 hour days that he can properly read the weather and beat what mother nature throws at him over a 4-6 month time frame to produce a commodity that needs to get to market before it spoils.

In summary these individuals are strapped for cash and play a weather forecast game that over time makes them VERY risk adverse.

FlyaDrone · Feb 25, 2018

One more thing - if you become successful with this service it will not be long before you will have to upgrade into a fixed wing solution. The economics of flight time versus battery management with drones will dictate that your service is acreage limited and most farmers who can best afford to pay for your information run large acreage operations. Just a little more for your considerations.

Mike Nevins · Feb 25, 2018

I would have a big problem with trying to conduct crop inspections at night for a number of reasons. First, you want to avoid shadows at all costs, when conducting crop inspections. If your using a NIR sensor I don't know what spectrum of light is being produced by a manmade light, but the idea and science behind NDVI (using NIR), is to determine the amount of infrared light that is being reflected by the plant. I think that would be hard to do at night using lighting on a drone. I don't know of anyone that does crop inspections during the night.

FlyaDrone advocates only the use of fixed wing drones for doing profitable agriculture service. I happen to completely disagree with this. IMHO.

ArrUnTuS · Feb 25, 2018

I just can't find any reason to do it at night. What need is there? Can someone tell me?

Redrat100 · Feb 23, 2019

Cool idea, a spot light on an sUAS. But utterly useless without a part 333 exemption for night flight. Nothing in AG is so emergent that waiting for daybreak would justify this product.

As a SAR product it may have its uses though.

BigAl07 · Feb 23, 2019

Redrat100 said:
Cool idea, a spot light on an sUAS. But utterly useless without a part 333 exemption for night flight. Nothing in AG is so emergent that waiting for daybreak would justify this product.

As a SAR product it may have its uses though.

Part 333 Exemption for night flying? Most operations are no longer utilizing Part 333 Exemptions because Part 107 covers the vast majority of possible flights. While Part 107 is Daylight Only we do have the option of getting Waiver ~107.29, Daylight Operations Waiver. Many of us here have our ~107.29 for various operations well outside of SAR and Emergency Services. So Night Time Inspection can be carried out (assuming you are clear in terms of Airspace, Meteorological Conditions etc) at night using a ~107.29

For the record, some people think/assume that Exemption 333's no longer exist but they DO and were around long before Drones/sUAS came on the market. A 333 Exemption Process is used for operations in Manned Aircraft and for Operations that just can no be done under Part 107 with sUAS. Some examples are:

1) Removing the door(s) of your aircraft to facilitate sky divers exiting the aircraft easily
2) Ferrying a plane from a repair facility without N#'s (from repair shop to paint shop)
3) Flying sUAS over people in a Closed Set Motion Picture Set. That's how they are able to make movies etc over people and not bust Part 107. They are operating under a 333 Exemption instead of Part 107 regulations. The caveat is you can NOT mix and match them in a single flight. You are either flying under your 333 or Part 107 and must continue the whole flight as such.

Back on topic - We use the exact lights from the OP's post in our SAR operations. They give amazing illumination from our Yuneec H520 and allow us to operate in areas and at times we would not be able to without them. They are insanely bright even from a long distance.

Redrat100 · Mar 2, 2019

BigAl07 said:
Part 333 Exemption for night flying? Most operations are no longer utilizing Part 333 Exemptions because Part 107 covers the vast majority of possible flights. While Part 107 is Daylight Only we do have the option of getting Waiver ~107.29, Daylight Operations Waiver. Many of us here have our ~107.29 for various operations well outside of SAR and Emergency Services. So Night Time Inspection can be carried out (assuming you are clear in terms of Airspace, Meteorological Conditions etc) at night using a ~107.29

For the record, some people think/assume that Exemption 333's no longer exist but they DO and were around long before Drones/sUAS came on the market. A 333 Exemption Process is used for operations in Manned Aircraft and for Operations that just can no be done under Part 107 with sUAS. Some examples are:

1) Removing the door(s) of your aircraft to facilitate sky divers exiting the aircraft easily

2) Ferrying a plane from a repair facility without N#'s (from repair shop to paint shop)

3) Flying sUAS over people in a Closed Set Motion Picture Set. That's how they are able to make movies etc over people and not bust Part 107. They are operating under a 333 Exemption instead of Part 107 regulations. The caveat is you can NOT mix and match them in a single flight. You are either flying under your 333 or Part 107 and must continue the whole flight as such.

Back on topic - We use the exact lights from the OP's post in our SAR operations. They give amazing illumination from our Yuneec H520 and allow us to operate in areas and at times we would not be able to without them. They are insanely bright even from a long distance.

Thank you for clarifying BigA107. Looks like I have a bit more studying to do for my 107. And thanks for validating the use of these spot lights for SAR missions.

BigAl07 · Mar 2, 2019

Redrat100 said:
Thank you for clarifying BigA107. Looks like I have a bit more studying to do for my 107. And thanks for validating the use of these spot lights for SAR missions.

You're welcome and thank you for having a positive attitude. We all started at ground ZERO and learned along the way. I happened to have been very fortunate to have some amazing mentors guide me over the years and now it's my turn to Pay It Forward when/where I can.

Good luck with your studies and pending test.