Why Octocopters are better than Quadcopters
Drone sales are expected to top $1bn by 2018 according to the Consumer Electronics Association
What is the point of having eight motors/propellers when wouldn’t four be more efficient? The simple answer is yes. On paper, a quadcopter (a craft with four motors and propellers) is more efficient than an octocopter (a craft with eight). The added motors mean more energy sucked out of already limited battery lives, and the larger footprint makes it harder to transport. Despite the drawbacks, there are several reasons why the octocopter is the professional and commercial industry standard.
According to Arland Whitfield, founder and president, Skyworks Project the first is the redundancy and security the extra motors and propellers offer. With a quadcopter, any type of motor failure can lead to a crash. There is no recovering from malfunction on a quadcopter. While the initial investment of a quadcopter will be less than that of an octocopter, you will quickly find that the extra cost of extra motors is a lot cheaper than replacing an entire quadcopter when a motor fails. There is nothing worse than seeing your craft, gimbal, and camera shattered into a million pieces on the pavement. All of the Skyworks Pro Professional Drone solutions feature redundant motor systems that are able to recover from a malfunctioning motor.
Safety is another reason professional and commercial drone users choose to fly octocopters. Flying without a redundant motor system is not only a hazard to your equipment, it is dangerous to others. When you have five to ten pounds of camera gear, radios, and gimbals on a five-pound multicopter, you don’t want it falling out of the sky and seriously injuring somebody. It is a liability to fly without a redundant motor system, and a lawsuit is much more expensive than extra motors.
Additionally, octocopters can lift more weight than quadcopters. More motors means more thrust, and more thrust means the craft can carry more weight. This allows you to fly bigger cameras and lenses.
A disadvantage to flying an octocopter is the size of the actual craft. Octocopters are notoriously large, making transporting and deploying the craft difficult. Many professionals settle on disassembling the craft for travel, then reassembling on location. This works, but when it comes to shooting, time is money, and people often make mistakes while reassembling drones - motors are hooked up incorrectly or propellers put on backwards.
The SkyworksPro Professional Drone solutions feature an X8 motor configuration, giving you all the benefits of a full-sized octocopter while keeping the craft’s size close to most professional quadcopters.
What is a Commercial drone?
What, exactly, is the difference between a 'hobbyist' drone and a 'commercial' drone? Skyworks Pro believes there are three main parameters that differentiate the two.
- Lifting capacity. Many drones on the market aren’t capable of lifting the equipment that commercial companies need, and most ready-to-fly commercial drones cannot lift more than a GoPro. Skyworks Pro drones are designed to carry heavier weights (up to 13 pounds), allowing a large amount of flexibility. From professional cameras to advanced sensors, there isn’t much the Skyworks Pro Professional Drone can’t handle.
- Battery Life. When it comes to surveillance and surveying, battery life is crucial. While some manufacturers promise systems that can carry huge amounts of weight, they often only stay in the air for up to ten minutes. Skyworks Pro solutions give you the flexibility to stay in the air longer ( anywhere from eight to ten minutes longer when compared to other RTF solutions.)
- Fail-safes. Because the industry is relatively new, drone technology is not developed to the point where it is bulletproof. Failures do happen when systems are in the air, and to prevent catastrophic results, commercial drones need effective fail-safes.
All of Skyworks Pro systems are designed with a number of fail-safes: redundant motor systems prevent the drone from falling out of the sky even if a motor fails, and return-to-home modes ensure that your drone and equipment make it back safely in the event of a lost radio signal.