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With these specs, I wonder if some countries military wouldn't be willing to offer them more money than they could ever make with deliveries... (At least on a p

With these specs, I wonder if some countries military wouldn't be willing to offer them more money than they could ever make with deliveries... (At least on a per-drone basis)

fragmede 3y ago
1.8kg isn't much of a payload, nor is a 5m diameter very accurate for military use.
- BurningFrog 3y ago
  It's 2-5 hand grenades.
  - true_religion 3y ago
    Most of the time if you've decided to go the 'air superiority' route, then you're in a traditional war. So I feel that the cost-value factors will still favor dropping larger ordinance from much larger drones.
    - op00to 3y ago
      Have you watched any of the drone footage from Ukraine? They are dropping hand grenades and modified mortar shells into tanks from drones. Mortar shells have about 500g of HE. Highly effective.
      - hef19898 3y ago
        And yet Ukraine is stopped by old school mine fields... Well, slowed down considerably. It is almost as if everything is a trafe off with benefits and downsides. Drones work until drone-specific AA is developed, and then it will be the same race we see between tanks and anti-tank weapons.
        jncfhnb 3y ago
        The drones don’t interact with the the mine fields, and in fact, are extra useful in this in this situation as they can fly over them. I’m not sure I see the trade off here. Drone specific AA will be very difficult.
        hef19898 3y ago
        Well, a drone doesn't help ypu a tiny bit it getting across the mine field. Without that, well, your counter-offensive stalls, drones or not. And for now, anti-drone AA is difficult. But not unsolvable. Jamming, small caliber radar controlled AA guns. Point defense weapons can shoot down cruise missiles and even artillery shells. Applying the same principle at slower drones isn't that hard.
        some_random 3y ago
        Your demands are completely unreasonable, a weapon platform can be extremely effective in its role and not win a war outright. Yeah drones aren't magically solving the problem of minefields, so what?
        hef19898 3y ago
        My point was exactly that: no weapon system is a silver bullet, including drones. And just because something is old doesn't make it less useful. And I didn't make any demands, not sure how you woupd read that into my answers to a thread started with "dropping stuff from drones is an attack that cannot be countered". People didn't learn anything it seems, first tanks were obsolete, until Ukraine wanted every single one of them. Then modern AA made fighters and helicopters obsolete, only to be replaced by drones as the latest shit. Those arguments are just cheerleading whatever is en vogue and hyped.
        jncfhnb 3y ago
        I’m not seeing your quote. Tanks being obsolete is… not clear. Tanks vs. western anti tank missiles and drones dropping grenades does feel like a terrible ROI but they are still useful. Russia doesn’t have these things at the same level of efficacy so tanks are perhaps more valuable for Ukraine to have. Helicopters and fighters are in the same boat. They’re useful, but vulnerable and expensive. The thing about drones is they cost $200 to take out weapons that cost up to millions of dollars.
      - true_religion 3y ago
        I guess I was thinking about it from the point of view of a large industrial power fighting its equal. Ukraine vs Russia seems more asymmetric. For instance, Russia can be an existential threat to Ukraine, but the positions can not be easily reversed since Russia has nuclear weapons. While they wouldn't want to deploy them, they'd rather do that than lose Moscow. Asymmetric warfare makes use of a great number of things, which wouldn't be very cost-effective in a battle of equals. For instance all the insurgents that use IEDs to harass checkpoints, would probably rather use factory made air-craft delivered ordinance.
        sangnoir 3y ago
        > I guess I was thinking about it from the point of view of a large industrial power fighting its equal Human-in-the-loop ethical concerns aside: a highly industrial power can fully automate the entire process and massively scale up from individual-pilot controlled prosumer drones. Imagine a high-altitude loitering spotter-drone that autonomously identifies any tanks with open hatches and tasks smaller multirotor drones to precisely drop small munitions. You may take out an entire tank battalion for less than the cost of a couple of traditional air-to-surface missile without putting your personnel in harm's way. Future wars will be horrifying for infantry and ground vehicles.
- ranting-moth 3y ago
  1.8kg of high explosives and shrapnel. That's a total havoc in a 5m diameter. And the safe zone does not start at 6m.
- e12e 3y ago
  The traditional M18A1 Claymore mine weighs about 1.6 kg total and has optimal effect to 50m in a 60 degree arc (potentially lethal to 250m I think - Ed: "moderately effective up to a range of 100m ... fragments can travel up to 250m").
- some_random 3y ago
  Spend 5-10 minutes on twitter watching drone footage out of the Ukrainian war, both sides are getting a lot of work done with less accurate, smaller payloads.
mambru 3y ago
https://www.engineering.com/story/can-swarms-of-cheap-drones-overcome-military-defenses https://www.engineering.com/story/can-swarms-of-cheap-drones...

With these specs, I wonder if some countries military wouldn't be willing to offer them more money than they could ever make with deliveries... (At least on a per-drone basis)

fragmede 3y ago

1.8kg isn't much of a payload, nor is a 5m diameter very accurate for military use.

BurningFrog 3y ago
It's 2-5 hand grenades.
- true_religion 3y ago
  Most of the time if you've decided to go the 'air superiority' route, then you're in a traditional war. So I feel that the cost-value factors will still favor dropping larger ordinance from much larger drones.
  - op00to 3y ago
    Have you watched any of the drone footage from Ukraine? They are dropping hand grenades and modified mortar shells into tanks from drones. Mortar shells have about 500g of HE. Highly effective.
    - hef19898 3y ago
      And yet Ukraine is stopped by old school mine fields... Well, slowed down considerably. It is almost as if everything is a trafe off with benefits and downsides. Drones work until drone-specific AA is developed, and then it will be the same race we see between tanks and anti-tank weapons.
      - jncfhnb 3y ago
        The drones don’t interact with the the mine fields, and in fact, are extra useful in this in this situation as they can fly over them. I’m not sure I see the trade off here. Drone specific AA will be very difficult.
        hef19898 3y ago
        Well, a drone doesn't help ypu a tiny bit it getting across the mine field. Without that, well, your counter-offensive stalls, drones or not. And for now, anti-drone AA is difficult. But not unsolvable. Jamming, small caliber radar controlled AA guns. Point defense weapons can shoot down cruise missiles and even artillery shells. Applying the same principle at slower drones isn't that hard.
        some_random 3y ago
        Your demands are completely unreasonable, a weapon platform can be extremely effective in its role and not win a war outright. Yeah drones aren't magically solving the problem of minefields, so what?
        hef19898 3y ago
        My point was exactly that: no weapon system is a silver bullet, including drones. And just because something is old doesn't make it less useful. And I didn't make any demands, not sure how you woupd read that into my answers to a thread started with "dropping stuff from drones is an attack that cannot be countered". People didn't learn anything it seems, first tanks were obsolete, until Ukraine wanted every single one of them. Then modern AA made fighters and helicopters obsolete, only to be replaced by drones as the latest shit. Those arguments are just cheerleading whatever is en vogue and hyped.
        jncfhnb 3y ago
        I’m not seeing your quote. Tanks being obsolete is… not clear. Tanks vs. western anti tank missiles and drones dropping grenades does feel like a terrible ROI but they are still useful. Russia doesn’t have these things at the same level of efficacy so tanks are perhaps more valuable for Ukraine to have. Helicopters and fighters are in the same boat. They’re useful, but vulnerable and expensive. The thing about drones is they cost $200 to take out weapons that cost up to millions of dollars.
    - true_religion 3y ago
      I guess I was thinking about it from the point of view of a large industrial power fighting its equal. Ukraine vs Russia seems more asymmetric. For instance, Russia can be an existential threat to Ukraine, but the positions can not be easily reversed since Russia has nuclear weapons. While they wouldn't want to deploy them, they'd rather do that than lose Moscow. Asymmetric warfare makes use of a great number of things, which wouldn't be very cost-effective in a battle of equals. For instance all the insurgents that use IEDs to harass checkpoints, would probably rather use factory made air-craft delivered ordinance.
      - sangnoir 3y ago
        > I guess I was thinking about it from the point of view of a large industrial power fighting its equal Human-in-the-loop ethical concerns aside: a highly industrial power can fully automate the entire process and massively scale up from individual-pilot controlled prosumer drones. Imagine a high-altitude loitering spotter-drone that autonomously identifies any tanks with open hatches and tasks smaller multirotor drones to precisely drop small munitions. You may take out an entire tank battalion for less than the cost of a couple of traditional air-to-surface missile without putting your personnel in harm's way. Future wars will be horrifying for infantry and ground vehicles.
ranting-moth 3y ago
1.8kg of high explosives and shrapnel. That's a total havoc in a 5m diameter. And the safe zone does not start at 6m.
e12e 3y ago
The traditional M18A1 Claymore mine weighs about 1.6 kg total and has optimal effect to 50m in a 60 degree arc (potentially lethal to 250m I think - Ed: "moderately effective up to a range of 100m ... fragments can travel up to 250m").
some_random 3y ago
Spend 5-10 minutes on twitter watching drone footage out of the Ukrainian war, both sides are getting a lot of work done with less accurate, smaller payloads.

mambru 3y ago

https://www.engineering.com/story/can-swarms-of-cheap-drones-overcome-military-defenses https://www.engineering.com/story/can-swarms-of-cheap-drones...