Phantom for the farm.

[fizzlefish]

So my dad is in his 60s and owns a farm. Being in Florida he gets some pretty bad weather at times the fences keeping livestock in get damaged/destroyed. He had the idea of using a quadcopter to patrol his property line so he can inspect it without all the hassle of getting the 4wheeler/tractor out warming it up, opening all the fences while keeping the horses in the right pens and so on. I have a Phantom 3 and would be great for doing this using waypoints or flying it himself. Now he is hesitant due to the price but with the 4 coming out prices are getting more tempting for him. The dilemma here is what version to get. The area he would like to cover is only about 10 acres with some small trees and windmill in between the furthest reaches. Would the P3 Standard do or would it be better to go for the Advanced.? I have no experience with the standard so i am unable to give him any input. The standard is currently selling at a reasonable price but i do not want him to be disappointed in the performance or lose signal and crash. Any input would be great. Thanks guys.

 

[Numone]

The Advanced is so cheap in the US compared to UK/EU, I'd go for that, for the peace of mind of Lightbridge if nothing else...

 

[ccbdav]

The cheapest option would probably be to grab a P3S ($400-500) and the Litchi app ($20). After the initial setup of a mission to survey the fence line(s), he could simply reload the mission whenever he needed to and have the quad fly to the same waypoints every time he wanted to check the fences. Range is a moot issue, as the bird will fly the mission even without signal. Sort of fire-and-forget if he's not really interested in actually flying.

For what it's worth, I have a Standard and regularly fly around a ~5 acre farm and rarely have any signal loss issues (unless I fly behind a treed hill [approximately 300' + 100' old-growth oaks] on the property). Even then, I only lose video feed and can either ascend to regain video/LOS or jiggle S2 to trigger RTH. I'm not sure how your father's land is parceled out, but he could probably maintain signal at nearly any point on his property if he keeps LOS.

Just my two cents!

 

[fizzlefish]

The cheapest option would probably be to grab a P3S and the Litchi app. After the initial setup of a mission to survey the fence line(s), he could simply reload the mission whenever and have the quad fly to the same waypoints every time he wanted to check the fences. Range is a moot issue, as the bird will fly the mission even without signal. Sort of fire-and-forget if he's not really interested in actually flying!

Just my two cents!

Thanks this is a great idea.

 

[Mark The Droner]

Yes, cheaper would be P3S, and that would do the job for him.

However I'd still be inclined to get the P3A with lightbridge since it is just so much clearer a picture if he wants to see what's going on LIVE. And the technology is only one generation back instead of two.

 

[drunkpenguin]

I wouldn't worry about signal loss if most of it is LOS. I just bout a P3S and I live on 14 acres in a square formation which is about 800' by 800' if I recall. I can fly mine waaaaaay beyond my fence line without losing it.