tl;dr: drones can be tethered by fiber optic cables. The cable provides jam-proof communication between the drone and the operator; and it also supplies power to the drone so it doesn’t need a massive battery pack and can stay airborne longer.
In the case of drones, the fiber optic cable provides a direct, stable, and high-capacity link for both power and data transmission. […] The fiber optic cable also supplies power to the drone, meaning the UAV doesn’t need a huge battery onboard.
Power Over Fiber “is a technology in which a fiber-optic cable carries optical power, which is used as an energy source rather than, or as well as, carrying data”.
Now I’d recommend looking up how much power can be transported by the very few implementations out there, and how much they cost.
Anything coming close to being able to power a drone would need way thicker fibers, increasing the drone weight. Any too big bend would set the fiber on fire. And it costs so much that building a slightly bigger drone with more batteries is cheaper.
Commercial systems generally deliver about a watt at 10-20 meters, which of course drops with distance and depends on fiber quality. It also requires a separate fiber(pair) from the data fiber.
Ukraine has had a lot of success using remotely operated suicide drones. They are cheap, built mostly from off the shelf hobbyist grade components, but with a few inexpensive upgrades the signal goes for miles. Strap a grenade on the bottom or any kind of bomb with an impact fuse and you have an excellent remote control weapon.
So of course the Russians start deploying radio jammers to block the drone signals.
The solution to this is fiber optics. The drone carries a giant spool of hair thin fiber optic cable which sends control commands from the operator and video back from the drone. Because it’s a cable, it’s immune to jamming.
The cable is insanely thin, usually in the tens of microns thickness. So they don’t bother recovering the cable, drone flies out spooling out cable behind it, hits its target and blows up, operator just detaches that fiber and pulls out another drone with another spool of cable to start again. This leaves tons of little fibers laying around on the countryside because every drone leaves one in its path.
That’s the point of this video. Most of those fibers have a dead Russian soldier at the end of them.
Wondering the same thing myself
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tl;dr: drones can be tethered by fiber optic cables. The cable provides jam-proof communication between the drone and the operator; and it also supplies power to the drone so it doesn’t need a massive battery pack and can stay airborne longer.
Fiber optic cable can’t supply power.
They could if it was a copper wire, but then it’s even heavier.
According to the article:
There’s no way that’s correct though, with current technology
Maybe this is why we shouldn’t have AI write articles. Does the drone have a solar panel on the other end of the cable?
I have to imagine the article is just wrong about this part, but maybe there’s something I’m missing.
Power Over Fiber “is a technology in which a fiber-optic cable carries optical power, which is used as an energy source rather than, or as well as, carrying data”.
Now I’d recommend looking up how much power can be transported by the very few implementations out there, and how much they cost.
Anything coming close to being able to power a drone would need way thicker fibers, increasing the drone weight. Any too big bend would set the fiber on fire. And it costs so much that building a slightly bigger drone with more batteries is cheaper.
To save people the click:
Commercial systems generally deliver about a watt at 10-20 meters, which of course drops with distance and depends on fiber quality. It also requires a separate fiber(pair) from the data fiber.
A small DJI burns about 100 watts
Has it actually been deployed for aerial drones, or just theoretically?
See reference [1] if the article: https://optics.org/news/4/5/1
It seems to work at least for small surveillance drones.
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Thank you, that was helpful.
Ukraine has had a lot of success using remotely operated suicide drones. They are cheap, built mostly from off the shelf hobbyist grade components, but with a few inexpensive upgrades the signal goes for miles. Strap a grenade on the bottom or any kind of bomb with an impact fuse and you have an excellent remote control weapon.
So of course the Russians start deploying radio jammers to block the drone signals.
The solution to this is fiber optics. The drone carries a giant spool of hair thin fiber optic cable which sends control commands from the operator and video back from the drone. Because it’s a cable, it’s immune to jamming.
The cable is insanely thin, usually in the tens of microns thickness. So they don’t bother recovering the cable, drone flies out spooling out cable behind it, hits its target and blows up, operator just detaches that fiber and pulls out another drone with another spool of cable to start again. This leaves tons of little fibers laying around on the countryside because every drone leaves one in its path.
That’s the point of this video. Most of those fibers have a dead Russian soldier at the end of them.
Its very “the fates”. Literally clipping threads.