i feel like i should get a drone

[Dan Druff]

Video is 4K quality (though lighting isn't that great because it was almost 8pm), so blow it up to full screen and select 4K to see more detail.

[Mintjewlips]

A hypothetical here, lets say you spent 5grand on a fancy drone that has amazing range and youre at the entrance of a national park where bears frequent and your drone runs out of battery or malfunctions and falls in the wilderness.......what im trying to say is, would you risk your life to retrieve your very expensive drone?, ofcourse its a hypothetical, mainly because we all know you're not dropping 5k on a drone.

[sonatine]

I would in a heart beat for approximately any drone I gave a shit about, but I have a reasonably a high end GPS unit and would certainly buy a proper tracking chip for the drone itself.

Thing is, Id be a lot more willing to go after it in a bear filled national park than I would the LA hills during peak rattlesnake season.

[Dan Druff]

I actually researched the rattlesnake thing. Found that very few rattlesnake bites result in death or long-term consequences. If you get to the hospital for anti-venom treatment within a reasonable amount of time, you usually fully recover.

I also read that most times you can avoid being bitten by just being really aware of where you're stepping, making lots of noise, and backing off as soon as you hear the rattle.

Furthermore, if you wear pants and high boots, your chance of your skin being penetrated goes down.

The shoes I wore were more like high-top snow shoes than full boots, but they were tough and a snake wasn't going to bite through them. So if the snake bit the shoes, I would have been okay. If it bit above the shoes, then it might go through my jeans, but at least at high-shoe level, I was covered.

So all in all, I decided the chance of actually getting bitten was low, though possible. Given that the biggest danger of snake bites involves not getting to a hospital in time, I brought Ben's mom out for the trek, though she stayed up on top of the trail and got updates from me. Part of the reason I didn't go back a second time, aside from it being awful, was that I didn't want to put her through another wait on the top of that trail.

For several reasons, I am very happy with my decision to have hired that college kid and forking over $200 for the recovery.

BTW, if this happens to any of you (provided you have a Phantom), you can push the left stick up during the forced auto-land, which will make it maintain altitude while you can guide it with the other stick to somewhere better for auto-landing. Handy to know if you're over terrain like this, or something even worse (such as water).

[snake_in_the_ass]

Middle aged men playing with drones = LOL

[Dan Druff]

Middle aged men playing with drones = LOL

Why is that LOL?

It's an offshoot of the RC airplane hobby, and the average age of dudes involved with that is older than I am now.

[sonatine]

I actually researched the rattlesnake thing. Found that very few rattlesnake bites result in death or long-term consequences. If you get to the hospital for anti-venom treatment within a reasonable amount of time, you usually fully recover.

I also read that most times you can avoid being bitten by just being really aware of where you're stepping, making lots of noise, and backing off as soon as you hear the rattle.

Furthermore, if you wear pants and high boots, your chance of your skin being penetrated goes down.

The shoes I wore were more like high-top snow shoes than full boots, but they were tough and a snake wasn't going to bite through them. So if the snake bit the shoes, I would have been okay. If it bit above the shoes, then it might go through my jeans, but at least at high-shoe level, I was covered.

So all in all, I decided the chance of actually getting bitten was low, though possible. Given that the biggest danger of snake bites involves not getting to a hospital in time, I brought Ben's mom out for the trek, though she stayed up on top of the trail and got updates from me. Part of the reason I didn't go back a second time, aside from it being awful, was that I didn't want to put her through another wait on the top of that trail.

For several reasons, I am very happy with my decision to have hired that college kid and forking over $200 for the recovery.

BTW, if this happens to any of you (provided you have a Phantom), you can push the left stick up during the forced auto-land, which will make it maintain altitude while you can guide it with the other stick to somewhere better for auto-landing. Handy to know if you're over terrain like this, or something even worse (such as water).

Crofab is hideously expensive, rattlesnake venom dissolves flesh, and one needs bite-proof gators that extend up to the knee with hard leather boots to be even close to worry free.

I have fished snakey areas for two decades, its something to be taken seriously, you were not covered. Its great that you cared enough to research this online but much like your adventures with the Mormon housewifes blog on marijuana legalization, I sincerely hope that wherever you got this opinion, you kept the receipt.

Also, fun fact, because people kill rattlesnakes who make sound, the ones remaining in the gene pool are the ones who no longer use rattles to warn before they strike. Good times.

[Dan Druff]

Got the info from some .ca.gov site, so I think it has to be fairly accurate (don't laugh at that statement).

I didn't feel I was fully covered. That's why I was afraid to go searching without someone else present to help me out of there in case a bite did happen.

Would have preferred the long leather boots (I read about them), but the snow shoes I had were the next best thing, and I'm pretty sure they were tough enough, just not high enough.

Hopefully my drone doesn't auto-land or fly away in the future, so I won't have to deal with a similar "adventure". But if it does, at least I know how to take control of it now.

[MumblesBadly]

Got the info from some .ca.gov site, so I think it has to be fairly accurate (don't laugh at that statement).

I didn't feel I was fully covered. That's why I was afraid to go searching without someone else present to help me out of there in case a bite did happen.

Would have preferred the long leather boots (I read about them), but the snow shoes I had were the next best thing, and I'm pretty sure they were tough enough, just not high enough.

Hopefully my drone doesn't auto-land or fly away in the future, so I won't have to deal with a similar "adventure". But if it does, at least I know how to take control of it now.

I'm wondering why noone from northern snowy climes has asked this yet. Perhaps one of these?



Or perhaps you meant snow boots. Like this pair.

[Dan Druff]

I meant more like the second one, though for some reason I don't really consider those to be boots.

[sonatine]

honestly I had no idea those were what you were referring to. id consider those snakeproof at face value.

[Dan Druff]

The "boots" in question were literally bought for Mt. Charleston some years ago.

I was on the way up there in the snow, and I thought, "Fuck, I don't have any regular snow shoes/boots to walk around in the snow."

I go skiing all the time but I would always wear either my ski boots or just regular tennis shoes, and just be careful if I'm in the tennis shoes and there's ice on the ground.

But I was going to have to walk around at Mt. Charleston, so that wasn't gonna cut it. So I stopped at some sporting goods store in NW Vegas on the way there and bought them, and here we are.

[MumblesBadly]

The "boots" in question were literally bought for Mt. Charleston some years ago.

I was on the way up there in the snow, and I thought, "Fuck, I don't have any regular snow shoes/boots to walk around in the snow."

I go skiing all the time but I would always wear either my ski boots or just regular tennis shoes, and just be careful if I'm in the tennis shoes and there's ice on the ground.

But I was going to have to walk around at Mt. Charleston, so that wasn't gonna cut it. So I stopped at some sporting goods store in NW Vegas on the way there and bought them, and here we are.

In all seriousness: Does anyone have experience with cheap drones like this? Seems like it might be worth droppong $200 to fuck around with it. (Especially because I'm middle aged. You know. For the LOLs.)

[LarryLaffer]

The "boots" in question were literally bought for Mt. Charleston some years ago.

I was on the way up there in the snow, and I thought, "Fuck, I don't have any regular snow shoes/boots to walk around in the snow."

I go skiing all the time but I would always wear either my ski boots or just regular tennis shoes, and just be careful if I'm in the tennis shoes and there's ice on the ground.

But I was going to have to walk around at Mt. Charleston, so that wasn't gonna cut it. So I stopped at some sporting goods store in NW Vegas on the way there and bought them, and here we are.

In all seriousness: Does anyone have experience with cheap drones like this? Seems like it might be worth droppong $200 to fuck around with it. (Especially because I'm middle aged. You know. For the LOLs.)

i've always wondered who buys those truck stop drones

[simpdog]

In all seriousness: Does anyone have experience with cheap drones like this? Seems like it might be worth droppong $200 to fuck around with it. (Especially because I'm middle aged. You know. For the LOLs.)

i've always wondered who buys those truck stop drones

Ya so expensive, 169.99. Who pays more than a days' pay for a drone!?!??!?

Here's one more your size Larry.

[Dan Druff]

Micon bought some of these cheap drones and made a YouTube video of it. Maybe you can find it somewhere.

Basically the drones were fail and were very difficult to control.

My feeling on this is that you don't need training drones if you can afford a regular one. You can fly the regular ones as conservatively as you want until you're comfortable.

With that said, I would love to see a list of simple, IMPORTANT drone tips for beginners. Maybe I'll put together a list from my own experience.

I watched some videos about this, but none of them mentioned the "drone lands automatically when at critical battery" thing, which is a pretty fucking huge thing to leave out.

[Dan Druff]

Here are my observations regarding the most important things when flying a Phantom drone:

- Don't ever fuck around with low battery. Get it home with 20% or more. It will auto-land at 10% battery. (You might be able to adjust this setting, I haven't checked yet, but I've also heard about drones falling out of the sky when at lower than 10%.)

- If at critical battery, push UP on the left stick to stop the auto landing, and then use the right stick to control where it auto-lands.

- Keep it high in order to maintain better line-of-sight and not lose communication with it.

- MAKE SURE HOME POINT ON MAP IS UPDATED CORRECTLY. When flying in Mammoth once, I accidentally took off with the home point still set to somewhere in the LA area. It should have updated itself properly, but it didn't. Fortunately I noticed this and flew it back home manually, then made sure it updated before taking off again.

- Keep away from high-tension power lines. These can sometimes make the drone act crazy and get confused regarding the GPS coordinates, thus causing flyaways.

- Put on "multiple flight modes" in the DJI app, and then be ready to switch to "A" mode on the controller if the drone freaks out and flies away. You get manual control at that point, and GPS flight is disabled. I've never had to do this, but it's a good tip.

- Stay under 400 feet above the ground, or otherwise if you hit any aircraft, you will be liable (and maybe kill someone!)

[sonatine]

mixed feelings. incredibly cool concept but also reallllly seems to be targetting a segment of the population that wishes they were in a military bunker someplace performing drone strikes. pop an IR camera on this and you can get up to some seriously sketchy shenans.

[sonatine]

So I got a DJI Mavic Pro.

The price was great and I needed something to help plot out some landscaping so fuck it.

Unboxing: First thing I notice is that its missing 2 sets of propellers. I start tearing through the packaging and documentation trying to find some sort of box inventory and find nothing that I can read because the documentation included is clearly not designed to actually be used, so I google dji mavic missing propellers and discover I'm not the only idiot who didnt notice the black pouches tucked into the packing material. So I get those bitches attached.

Basically at this point I 100% gave up on documentation and went straight to youtube. Immediately fire it up in my living room because YOLO and watch in absolute horror as it drifts around with whirling death blades at eye level. Try to steer it. Works great. Try to steer it again. Send it careening into a wall. Expecting shrapnel and expensive horror I find nothing of the sort, its just chilling on the floor.

Take it outside, because I aint no bitch.

So I fire it up and I'm looking at the camera view on my cell phone which btw is fucking flawless and figure I'll send it up a ways because I have it on 'beginner mode' (because Im a bitch) so I know its not going to get too crazy. Seconds later I cant hear or see it. It can sure as shit see me tho, which is the only thing keeping me from straight shitting my pants because really, its hard to describe the existential trust issues that come up when $1000 can neither be seen nor heard.

I send it looking around, obviously in total terror. At no point does it complain about how far away it is or anything so obviously I try landing it.

And get it caught in a tree branch and it careens wildly into the side of the house and I'm like 'ok NOW its broken' with almost a sense of relief that I finally got that part of the trip over with but after I straighten out the propeller arms and sit it on some rocks it shrugs all that shit off and takes off again with zero issues.

Listen, Im saying, these things can take a beating.

Anyway thats whats up for now. I took a few more spins but I could hear the neighbors dog flipping out and its dinner time around here and I'd rather not burn those bridges so whatever.

Tomorrow I have some slick shit planned regarding taking it into the woods. Apparently this thing has balls out object avoidance, which I really hope is true because its basically a poison ivy factory out there and I'm going to be bummed if I have to go on a fucking walkabout to get it but at least its all my land so fuck it.

[SrslySirius]

Ordered a Mavic Pro last week and sent it right back, box unopened, upon discovering how much red tape and regulation there is in Las Vegas.