Flight Tracking

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Ian
Posts: 214
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2013 1:44 pm

Flight Tracking

Post by Ian »

So the winner of today's speed trials is Jamie's Ninja, with a speed of 180.7mph, followed by Craig's powered glider with 130.4mph! For those who weren't there, this was recorded using my GPS tracker, first described in the December 2017 Newsletter, page 15.

Attached are .kml files for both flights so you can see the flight tracks for yourselves. If you have Google Earth installed, just double-click on the files. For the web version (https://earth.google.com/web) select Projects / Open / Import KML from computer.

From what I remember of the GPS module data sheet, differential, and hence speed, is very accurate, position accuracy moderate (about 3m) and altitude much less so. This is reflected in the fact that some negative altitudes were recorded! Where this happened I clamped the altitude to ground level. The recording is every half-second, hence the rather jerky traces.

So this might inspire me to make a new version with modern electronics, perhaps incorporating attitude and G-force measurements, and with a shorter recording interval, and perhaps interfacing with the telemetry now common in today's radio systems.

Oh, and if you look carefully at the second trace you may see the track of the Walk of Shame :)
Attachments
craig.kml
(33.71 KiB) Downloaded 558 times
jamie.kml
(19.74 KiB) Downloaded 543 times
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Ian.
Mike P
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Joined: Sat Nov 16, 2013 7:26 am

Re: Flight Tracking

Post by Mike P »

Great job Ian. It would be quite interesting to see just how fast the average trainer is. Or guess the speed competition for those who want to join in with the club fun days without involving there own models.
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Ian
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Re: Flight Tracking

Post by Ian »

>> guess the speed competition
That's a good idea. I'll bring it along each time from now on.
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