As Phlier wrote, Mavic has all the necessary equipment to show us wind direction and true airspeed. DJI should be able to incorporate those in the Go4.
By estimating the ground speed and the motor power perhaps? I am not an engineer so I can't say much. In Sports Mode (with no parameter change), it will try to keep the Mavic at about 63kph. The motors will even only do 30% power if it has strong enough tailwind. I was thinking that by estimating the motor power output and the ground speed, the Mavic can estimate the wind speed?
And of course, having a pitot/static system is a fantastic way of getting true airspeed, it isn't the only way. A simple look up table of drone tilt angle and motor speed will give you no wind ground speed, i.e., true airspeed. This would be dependent on the drone always flying as stock, as any configuration changes to weight, motors, props, add ons, etc. would nullify the lookup table values. But simple math of aircraft weight, thrust output at given rpms, and rotor plane angle will produce a performance chart look up table that would give accurate TAS values. Having TAS along with GPS gives all the goodies necessary to calculate accurate wind direction and velocity. Since the Mavic has a built in gyro that is capable of giving tilt angle, the only thing it needs is a lookup table. This would be pretty easy for some of the guys that are really into testing RC motors to create, as we'd need accurate thrust values for the motors across their power output range. Once that's obtained, all the other needed values for the math are cake. And the Mavic has a barometer in it to take care of the air density vs. prop rpm variable.
The reason is, with OA on the Mavic's tilt angle is 16 deg. With OA off the tilt angle is 25 deg (provided that you don't do parameter change).
We're really "old school", you know that, BigDuke6ixx? And I'm not saying that like it's a *bad* thing.
So yeah, the Mavic really does have all the necessary hardware in it to get us a pretty darn accurate TAS, it's just a matter of filling in a few holes in DJI's programming.
Every time I put up a post that disagrees with someone, I really feel bad about it... I don't want anyone to ever get the idea that I'm trying to start an argument with them, belittle them in anyway, or any other negative connotations. Nothing could be further from the truth. BigDuke, please don't feel like I'm trying to take you to task on this, my friend.
All of us old school pilots were brought up being taught that the only way you could get TAS was with a pitot/static system. Today's electronics and PFM have changed that a bit.
Happy flying, BigDuke6ixx!
Haha English is not my first language, can't you tell?
Flying from the balcony, I can't get GPS to lock (edit: because of the roof). So, I have to fly it to an open space below my balcony to get GPS lock and to create a safe Home Point for RTH. So, the small plot of land is in front and below my balcony.
Usually if I still have enough battery remaining, I will simply hand catch the Mavic right at my balcony instead of let it actually land in the small plot of land below.
All that's needed for an estimation is the the tilt angle which is obviously known and a calibration.
That could be factored in as well given altitude is known.
UAV Forecast is an app available for ios and android devices. It will provide you not only with current weather/satellite lock/cloud cover/etc.,but more importantly (for me) estimate of wind speed and gusts at various heights.
