02/15/2010 08:08 PM

Mr. Weber,

Thank you for your question.

I will tell you right away that materials and assembly are NOT my background with UAS. My expertise is in the radio spectrum management arena and UAS needed lots of radio spectrum (megahertz) to do its job.

With that understanding, I will try my best to give you some information that hopefully you can use as background or maybe help you figure out the right questions to ask.

I do teach a one-day short course in UAS (http://www.aticourses.com/unmanned_aircraft_systems.html) and my last section is ?Looking to the Future?.

I characterize the trends I see in the following maner:

1) Bigger, Badder, Faster?

2) Smaller, Smarter, Stealthier?

3) More megabits than megahertz

4) Greater integration with other platforms (land, air and sea), both manned and unmanned

5) Net-centric operations


#1 I would apply to each class of UAVs. For example, AAIs Shadow (about a twelve foot wingspan) has just introduced a new lighter weight airframe. The Raven from Aerovironment has just intro?d new lighter and better batteries. Both of these result in longer flight times and more time on target. There is also a lot going on in better and better sensors of all kinds (Optical/IR/Radar etc)

#2 is toward smaller and smaller air platforms, some smaller than the palm of your hand. Some of the platforms are inherently unstable, better to make adjustments due to wind or crashing into a wall

3# There is more of a constraint in megahertz to send data down to the ground than there is in onboard CPU processing power. Right now, most UAVs are ?bent-pipes? and send down raw sensor data by the bucketful. Some kind of board signal processing will be necessary soon.

#4 Right now UAV more or less operate independently of manned aircraft. The Army is developing the ability for an Apache helicopter weapons expert to fly a UAV remotely from the cockpit of the Apache. Also, situations where one manned aircraft may lead a squadron of UAV and when he fires, EVERYBODY fires.

#5 UAV used as airborne networking hubs for tactical commutations

Does that help you at all?

I am leaving tomorrow (Tuesday) for a one night trip to Huntsville, AL. I will return late Wednesday, so I will be out of touch until Thursday if you need to get back to me.

Best Regards,

Mark N. Lewellen
ATI Short Course UAS Instructor

PS. I just remembered that a guy got in touch with me who was consulting to a company who made some kind of light weight material and they were wondering if there was a place for them in the UAV world. I could not help him very much but maybe he might be able to help you better than I can.