 Oh yes, so hard to play. Jeez! I'm the drip. I'm Alex Manover. I'm Bobby F.P.V. And I'm Les Flair C. And Shawn, you're usually the one bringing some weird drones for us, but I've got something for you guys. I know, you made your own, you made this? I didn't actually make this. This is actually something that's being worked on at Red Cat. This is kind of an experiment. So we really enjoy just how fast and acrobatic our drones are, and we're not too concerned with like flight time. We don't want to be too far away from ourselves when we crash, but you know, there's other drone use cases where you do want to fly, you know, great distances, have longer range, and you know, flight time is always a challenge with drones, right, compared to like wings. Oh yeah, definitely. Airplanes have a long, long flight time because they're using lift to their advantage where drones just have a big rock that they're putting propellers on basically. The airplane can stop the prop and actually glide, right? So one of the few ideas that's being kicked around is like, how could you get the lift on a drone? So many questions about this thing that I want to ask. Oh my gosh. Like why is the flight controller vertical and looking at the design of this, you actually have an airfoil, like this is faster in the front and thinner in the back. It's not just a simple ring. This is actually a complete airfoil. I was thinking that maybe as you're flying at an angle, like we normally fly, that it would provide a little bit of upward force. Yeah. That's my prediction as to what I think would happen. And you can see the camera angle here that, I mean, this is meant to be flown at a pretty aggressive angle of attack, and with all the air, you know, the air being generated by the props and the air that you're going to be moving through, the idea is that this should create some actual lift. I kind of want to race this thing because in theory, this should be a kind of really fast quad. Exactly. The idea behind this is to make something that's really fast, but can fly for a very long time. So I mean, how long do you fly one of your race quads for? It's about a minute on a success battle. So maybe a minute and a half, depending on how fast or slow. But I'm really curious to see, because you know, the problem is if you have like a two minute race, which a lot of like these multi-GP races do two minute, finish your lap, you have to like really pace yourself. You can't go full out because you're not going to be able to finish the race. So maybe if this was like that much more efficient, you can actually fly it longer and keep the same speed. I don't know. I mean, I'm skeptical, but I'm really excited to try it. I would say this is definitely just in kind of like the experimental research and development phase. This is obviously, this is very prototype phase. This is just bent pieces of metal, a 3D printed foil structure, very hot glue. Just to experiment to see like, is this even really worth continuing to develop on? Is this a horrible idea? That's what we're going to find out today. Awesome. So we've got some top pilots here. Let's put it to the test. I'm ready to fly. So we're actually just going to load up a 550. This will definitely test the longevity of the flight and see how long we can get out of a 6S better, because they're typically a lot bigger than that for a race drone. Yeah, imagine if I could fly the same amount of time on a 550 6S as I could on a 1300 on my normal. So can the drone take a bigger battery or let's just... Or you could make the compartment bigger. This is just what they would test. I mean, before we could fly. Oh my God. So fast. Wow, he just went right for it. Oh, well, it's got some weird tendencies. Like when you... Fossilates a little bit. When you turn. Do you feel... Can it glide? Like, do you feel it gliding at all? Like when you just do that? Yeah, I mean, it's interesting. It's different. I'm just... Okay, that's... It's got some like weird Senna-Woop style, like... Like, you see when I turn it can't... It doesn't like lock. Like, if I just turn it just like... That looks really fast to me though. Whoa! Oh my God! Oh my God, do that again. Oh, I can't even... It's hard to control. It's actually really hard to control. Do it again, do it again, do it again. Oh, yeah. It's so hard to control. Geez! It's actually going up and down. Is that you or is that me? I mean, I'm trying to minorly correct. That is so fast. It looks like one of those paper airplane designs. You know those O-ring ones? It's fast. It's very fast. Oh man, it does change direction fast. It does change direction really fast. The battery's dead. That's it. Really? Wow, that's fast. There's your battery life. Oh, it's just dead. Oh no! I'm just sorry, I'm just sorry. It's super hard to control on pitch when you're going fast. It just is like... Once you start going one direction, just like once to go there. How long was that flight? Let's be sure. That flight, I think it was only like a minute and a half. I can't even get the battery out of here. Oh, really? Oh my gosh. It is so hot. Oh my God, it was, whoa. Is that a fresh battery? That was a brand new battery. Wow. Oh my God. You just turned a 500 into a 1300. Wow, wow. Woo! Yeah, that battery's done. Okay. That's a... I did not expect that at all. You killed it. Ho-ho! Whoa, yeah. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Could you feel it like pitching when you higher? Yeah, it was really hard to control on pitch. It felt like I had changed direction just like normally on any quad, but when I did, it just really wanted to go in that direction. It wasn't really, it was really hard to just make minor corrections. It felt like... Like as you were flying forward just straight, did you notice any kind of additional lift like that you would get? Oh yeah, I think I was lifting it. I think so. Oh yeah, I think it definitely was. I think they're just definitely doing something for sure. I'm really curious to see what it feels like. Woo! That's pitch though. I see what you mean. Fast, right? Yes. Wow. That's on 4S too. This is 4S. You didn't even get the full 6S experience we got. I don't really know what to say except that this flies like a crappy 5-inch quad. Yeah, like, I don't... There's nothing spectacular about it, I guess. I can't tell if it's like gliding when I'm just dropping throttle or if it's... I mean, I feel like it is. I feel like it is too. Like, I feel like it's dropping really slow. But like, at what advantage? Oh! Like, like, yeah. That's weird. It like, drops. It drops like, it's weird. I don't know. That's stupid. That's stupid. Why? Why? It looks so funny, man. It definitely has some glide to it. That is the one thing that was like... It does have glide, but it doesn't... That glide doesn't seem to be adding any value. Yeah, it doesn't help me at all. Like, you feel the glide. All right, here we go. It definitely doesn't feel like it's struggling to stay in the air. I don't feel like it's moving up, though, when I'm going forward. I was expecting it to move up when I gave it throttle. No, I mean, the foil is, you know, it's equal all around, so it wouldn't really... It's in the same direction as the propellers, but for some reason, like, I was thinking that the wind blowing against it as I move forward would add... Kind of go over the trees to see what happens. Yeah, if I, like, give it any kind of quick movements, it freaks out a little bit. I would expect that because of the extra stuff attached to it. Full speed. Full speed. Oh, that wasn't hard. If you ramp it up slowly, it wasn't hard to keep stable. I didn't. Let me see if what happens if I punch it. That was okay. It wasn't so bad. I guess it was because I was coming out of a turn. It didn't feel that bad. It was just like it had really bad yaw tendencies. And as soon as I tried to give it any kind of yaw, it just didn't do what I told it to do. It did whatever it wanted to do. Let's put the tiny battery on his race quad and, like, compare. Let's see how long it lasts. Just, like, doing the same thing? Just flying around? I mean, unless... You know what the first thing I want to do is I just want to drag race. I want to see what's just faster. Yeah, let's just drag race. Let's have one of you guys fly this and I'll drag race my 6S on. Yeah, I mean, it's... Oh, God, this camera angle's definitely not something I'm used to. I mean, flying slow, this definitely seems to cruise. You're going fast in what you mean. Woo! You're cruising fast. Am I? Yeah. This is 20% throttle. I'm a little higher. That's pretty fast. Let me know when you're ready, Drew. I'm going to just do one practice run. Oh, my! Oh, it's so fast. Holy warp mode. It's so fast. Holy warp. We're going to have to... Yeah, I think you might meet me. Holy warp. They're close in speed. OK. We just... OK. You're changing direction so quickly, though. All right, I'm down here. I'm following you. Just get as much of a hover as you can. OK. And then count it off, like... OK, I'm hovering. I'll count it off. Yeah. Let me know when you guys are both ready. I'm ready. We should start further back, shouldn't we? Hold on. All right, let me get further back. Let's go further back. Go on. Over this crap. Go on, go. Let me know when you're both ready. Almost. I'm ready. Are you good, Alex? Ready. Three, two, one, go. OK, so it looks like... Drew's having pitch problems. Yeah, Drew's having pitch problems going up and down. So I think that really changes. Can we erase from a roll? Here, just start behind me and just kind of chase me. Yep, go for it. And we'll just see. All right, so I'm just going. Count me down, buddy. Three, two, one, go. Wow, that thing was, yeah, up and down, up and down. It's so hard to control the pitch. It's hard to see if it's possible. It's hard to go from a blast. Because if I actually get into it slowly, then no problem. Yeah, that's great. But if I... Oh, I can tell this battery's done. Done's out, done's out, done's out. Oh, wait. Is that you on the ground? Oh, I see it. Did I break it? Definitely get nowhere. No, it looks OK. It might have been the battery. OK, you don't see anything missing. Maybe she's OK. Holy crap, though. So far, it's taken two tumbles. Oh, my god. And two batteries. Yeah, and two batteries. It just kills the batteries. Yeah. I only have two of these small batteries. Oh, no. I mean, maybe I can cram in some bigger ones. Do we have a conclusion? I mean, you were observing what? They were both pretty much the same. Like, it's still every time, basically, you were going like this, but he was in a straight line. But you guys always finished relatively similar places. So like, maybe if you were going in a straight line, then it would be faster? That's the two things. I think if he was able to, it's so hard to control that it's hard to tell. If you could go in a perfectly straight line, you would probably be a little faster. However, you're also on higher KV motors. So you should be faster. These are 2,400 KV on success. I don't think that this drone was optimized. Like, we've had many, many, many years to optimize your racing drone to the absolute maximum potential. I mean, the flight controller alone is, I mean, the software is not made for this madness, right? So there's definitely stuff that could be improved on to where this might even be even better than what it currently is. It's hard. This definitely just doesn't have the maneuverability. Like, to go from a hover to, like, then try to get in it, that's when I had problem. But you saw, when I came around the turn and slowly bled on the throttle, I was able to do it, no problem. But it was when we were trying to, like, from a roll just go boom, right? So I really want to see if this gets a flight time advantage when you're not going full bore, you know? I think it could. I think it could. It's just so hard to control. Like, I tried to go through the course a little bit, and it was so difficult to control. Well, how about we just both go up in the air and just, like, just cruise and see which one. So no time limit. Just who can do more laps before the battery set? We just go around the two trees just, like, just an oval. So we killed our two small six cell batteries. I couldn't fit a full-sized six cell battery. So we're both just going to run four cell batteries. I was able to cram that in there. This also helped with the endurance, too. This is going to actually make you fly a lot longer. Yeah. Look weird from behind. What angle am I at? Like, you're at, like, a 30 degree weird. It's, like, 50. It definitely does feel different. Like, I just feel like, for the camera angle I'm at, at a much lower level of throttle than I usually would be. Six. Do not go any faster. You aren't going to go faster? I mean, just so we're not here all day. This is an endurance. Yeah, I mean, you can do it. How's this? You can keep up. 10. I'm going faster. We're just going to go until I fall out of the sky. Feels fine, man. You're starting to feel a sag at all? No. What's your voltage at? I have no idea. I don't have voltage. Neither do I, Steve. What's the time on this? Only three minutes. Wow, it feels a lot longer when you're just doing it. 23. It feels like I've been doing this for seven minutes. All right, just got low battery on the OSD. 25. Yeah, just flash low battery. 28. Oh, it's flashing low battery. I think I'm going to have to, oh, OK. Get to 30. Keep going, keep going. You have two more. It's getting real mad at me. All right, we're almost at 30, Drew. Keep going, though. Don't stop at 30, then. Stop when she falls out. But yours is fine. 30. I don't know. It feels fine. It's saying land now. OK, let's bring it in and check voltage on both of them. That's probably a good way to do it. Yeah, I can't. I got to come down. Yep, lost video. You just lost video? Yep. Well, you got to 31. Well, I got that one, Phil. But yours is still going. All right, you just keep going. Just keep going. Wow. So this circle drone has no advantages. I mean, it seems like it's really fast. But like 10 miles an hour faster, 36. I mean, I just did like six more laps so far. Yeah, you got 36. Wow. 37. OK, it's sagging now. It's sagging now. Geez. Just bring it back. There it is. 38. So you guys both flew your batteries all the way down. You got 38 laps. He got 30. I think it's worth knowing, too, like I was tracking him. So I actually had to make more corrections and everything, which is draining the battery faster by doing that, versus he was kind of able just to fly his own pace. Yeah. So I think it just goes to show that it's not more efficient.