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Delivery Drones: More Feasible If They Come By Truck

Posted by timothy on from the last-mile-problem dept.

malachiorion writes Amazon's drone delivery service was never going to work. It was too autonomous, and simply too risky to be approved by the FAA in the timeframe that Jeff Bezos specified (as early as this year). And yet, the media is still hung up on Amazon, and much of the coverage of the FAA's newly released drone rules center around Prime Air, a program that was essentially a PR stunt. Meanwhile, a Cincinnati-based company that makes electric delivery trucks has an idea that's been largely ignored, but that's much more feasible. The Horsefly launches from and returns to a delivery truck once it reaches a given neighborhood, with a mix of autonomous flight to destination, driver-specified drop-off locations, and remote-piloted landings. The company will still need to secure exemptions from the FAA, but unlike Amazon, they at least have a chance. There's more detail about Amp's technically impressive (and seemingly damn tough) drone in my story for Popular Science.

75 of 129 comments (clear)

  1. It's because flying is magic by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    People like magic

    1. Re:It's because flying is magic by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      most people don't understand flying anyway.

      Probably no one does, entirely. It's complex.

      and then that phrase...that phrase...."the air over the top has to speed up"....NO. NO IT DOESNT. IT DOESNT SPEED UP.

      Clearly you don't understand it, because it does speed up.

      even the college level physics books and even fluid mechanics books, get this wrong.

      What's more likely, that an AC is lying about getting an advanced degree, or that collegial level books and fluid mechanics books get it wrong?

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  2. More important - by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

    More important, they can continue to function even in snowstorms, albeit at a slower pace because the drones won't be usable.

    --
    "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  3. really? by rossdee · · Score: 1

    How is this better than the driver getting out of the truck, walking up to your front door, and putting the parcel down.
    Sure he wont get so cold (its nearly up to zero today)
    I still don't think drones would cope with bad weather that well (eg the east coast right now)

    1. Re:really? by ScentCone · · Score: 1

      The thinking is that a truck could roll into a defined area with, say, a dozen small packages to deliver, and have drones fan out to several places at once (presumably, destinations that routinely take such deliveries, and are well suited to it). That's a driver/truck magnifier.

      I can see some businesses installing what amounts to a drone delivery doggie-door/coal-chute on their roof tops, possibly with coded locks, that allow stuff to be dropped off with a straight shot down to a mail room or catch bin in a loading dock area. If you have a dozen business tenants in a small building like that, you know that Amazon (for example) is going to be delivering small boxes with things like phones, batteries, disk drives, ink carts, etc., on a daily basis.

      --
      Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
    2. Re:really? by RingDev · · Score: 1

      I would assume that the goal would be to pull into a subdivision, park, and then let the drone(s) deliver a half dozen parcels to residence in that subdivision.

      Or identify packages that cannot be drone delivered (shape/size/weight), drive to those locations, and have drones launching/returning for the smaller packages while the driver is en route with the big stuff.

      -Rick

      --
      "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
    3. Re:really? by Kjella · · Score: 1

      How is this better than the driver getting out of the truck, walking up to your front door, and putting the parcel down.

      Well from the description of autonomous mid-flight and dedicated landing crews it seems their main idea is delivering many packages while the truck is moving slowly through the area launching new deliveries coming into range as finished ones come in. I have my doubts about flying drones as the last mile delivery vehicle though, they'd probably do better with a small fleet of rolling drones travelling at under 10 km/h along pedestrian walkways - that will let you escape a lot of regulation around here, they can hold on to the package until they get a signature/payment and depending on type they can probably cross most terrain you'd come across as long as they don't run into the street. Except for brats tipping them over, but I suspect flying drones will get their share of harassment. And the nearby truck could always be called in to assist if there's some kind of problem.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    4. Re:really? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      The truck drives it to within like a mile or two then launches the drone from there.

      Yes but ...
      1. The person controlling the drone does not have to be the driver. They can be located in India. They only have to control the drop. Everything else is automated.
      2. Many, perhaps dozens, of drones can launch simultaneously, fanning out over the neighborhood.
      3. While the drones deliver the small packages, the driver can drop off the big boxes.

    5. Re:really? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      I can see some businesses installing what amounts to a drone delivery doggie-door/coal-chute on their roof tops, possibly with coded locks, that allow stuff to be dropped off with a straight shot down to a mail room or catch bin in a loading dock area.

      I could see somebody putting a net over the opening and taffing all the stuff.

      Now I'm an honest person, so I'd never do that. But I might drop a bag full of turds down it.

      During a holiday weekend.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    6. Re:really? by ScentCone · · Score: 1

      Most high-end apartments and office buildings (the sort of places where you'd find enough clients to make this sort of delivery interesting) don't have their rooftops (or, their entire rooftops) open to the public. Otherwise you'd have the public messing with their HVAC, dishes, and everything else). And it should be trivial, using bluetooth or another close proximity protocol, to have the drone ring the doorbell with a pre-assigned key. I can see this being useful for document tubes being delivered (instead of having a guy on a bicycle race through the ground traffic doing the usual gotta-have-this-delivered-RIGHT-NOW courier thing), and other specialty tasks.

      --
      Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
    7. Re:really? by dpidcoe · · Score: 1

      No, it makes about as much sense as sailing an aircraft carrier into range of the target and then launching the aircraft to go drop bombs on it.

    8. Re:really? by Livius · · Score: 1

      The truck would actually be an aircraft carrier, of sorts.

  4. What are they doing to that truck!?! by RingDev · · Score: 4, Informative

    From TFA:
    "A delivery truck costs roughly a dollar per mile with diesel."

    I have a 1997 F-250 that pulls a fully loaded 3-horse slant load goose neck trailer and even with amorting out the depreciation over mileage, including tires and maintenance, and obviously Diesel fuel, I'm no where's close to $1/mile.

    We don't put nearly as many miles on the truck as a delivery truck, so they are likely seeing higher maintenance costs, but with so many miles their amorted costs are going to be way lower per mile driven.

    If they're looking to save costs and they're currently spending $1/mile on their trucks, I think there are some low hanging fruit they could tackle before jumping to drones.

    -Rick

    --
    "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
    1. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by SJHillman · · Score: 1

      It's not just the number of miles, but also the stop-go-stop-go-stop-go nature of deliveries that kill fuel consumption and increase wear and tear too.

    2. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by Aqualung812 · · Score: 1

      $1 per mile covers not only the stop-go-stop-go fuel costs, but far increased wear and tear.

      Add to that the cost of the human that is driving (usually their highest paid non-management people), and now $1 a mile seems right.

      --
      Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
    3. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by Solandri · · Score: 1

      If they're looking to save costs and they're currently spending $1/mile on their trucks, I think there are some low hanging fruit they could tackle before jumping to drones.

      The problem with the $1/mile figure, even if it's correct, is that that's the cost of the truck per mile. The UPS trucks I've seen carry hundreds of packages. So on a per package basis, the cost is on the order of 1 cent/mile.

      That's not going to be the case for drones. Because of weight limitations, each package will need its own dedicated drone. So the cost per mile to operate the drone will be the cost per mile to deliver the package.

    4. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by RingDev · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The full block from TFA:

      An electric truck is already a step up in efficiency and environmental responsibility from traditional internal combustion trucks, with a delivery cost to the shipping company of 30 cents per mile (compared to roughly a dollar per mile with diesel).

      they're claiming a 70% cost reduction by going to an electric truck. Same driver, same parcel load, same mileage, ect...

      Which would imply that their Diesel fuel + Diesel specific maintenance costs them 70 cents per mile MORE than their electricity and electric specific maintenance.

      If they can put that same driver in an electric vehicle and do the same deliveries for 30 cents a mile, I'm thinking that they are doing something really wrong with the Diesel vehicles.

      The big wear and tear that they will see over my horse truck is brakes. But even if you figure they drop $1000 on rotors, pads, and labor for brake jobs, every year, they're still putting probably 50k miles a year on those trucks. Which works out to be 2 cents per mile. And that's the hardest hit area.

      You could toss in the tranny (although it should be holding up for much more than a single year of stop and go). But even if they're only getting 1 year out of a tranny, and they drop $5k for a new tranny installed each year, that's still only 10 cents a mile.

      Suspension, power steering, tires, etc... would all be taking the same abuse whether you're in a Diesel or an electric.

      To be spending $0.70/mile on a vehicle putting down 50k+ miles a year, means spending over $35,000 a year on vehicle maintenance.

      To put that into scope, a Ford e-350 stripped chassis (your basic commercial delivery frame) MSRPs for $25,000. Jump up to an e-350 cutaway (your standard UHaul truck) for $30,000. Even if they blow $15k on a custom cab/body, you're still looking at a $40,000 vehicle. How the heck are they blowing over $35,000 a year maintaining a $40,000 vehicle?

      -Rick

      --
      "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
    5. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by Aqualung812 · · Score: 1

      An electric truck is already a step up in efficiency and environmental responsibility from traditional internal combustion trucks, with a delivery cost to the shipping company of 30 cents per mile (compared to roughly a dollar per mile with diesel).

      they're claiming a 70% cost reduction by going to an electric truck. Same driver, same parcel load, same mileage, ect...

      +1 informative.

      Which would imply that their Diesel fuel + Diesel specific maintenance costs them 70 cents per mile MORE than their electricity and electric specific maintenance.

      If they can put that same driver in an electric vehicle and do the same deliveries for 30 cents a mile, I'm thinking that they are doing something really wrong with the Diesel vehicles.

      Seems like they could just put a genset on the truck & use electric driven wheels and get a big cost reduction while still using diesel, if TFA is correct. I assume they're just burning a ton in the stop-start nature?

      --
      Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
    6. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      It's not just the number of miles, but also the stop-go-stop-go-stop-go nature of deliveries that kill fuel consumption and increase wear and tear too.

      ... and far more than any of that, are the wages paid to the driver. If the truck averages 30 mph, and the driver makes $30/hour wages+taxes+benefits, then that is $1 per mile.

    7. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by RingDev · · Score: 1

      Some fedex driver posted a 'day in the life of' blog and mentioned his 150+ mile daily route. Base salary of a fedex driver is ~$13/hr. Call it $20 as costs (tax/benies/sick/vacation/etc), that puts it at $160/day. Which is right about $1/mile.

      But here's the rub, the article claims that switching from a Diesel truck to an electric truck takes their operating expenses from $1/mile to $0.30/mile.

      If labor is already $1/mile, then they are either doing absolutely no maintenance and using no fuel on the Diesel and they have hired illegal immigrants to drive the electrics that they are charging up on stolen electricity, or....

      labor is not included in the numbers they provided.

      I'll let you choose which you feel is correct ;)

      -Rick

      --
      "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
    8. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by fnj · · Score: 1

      But the cost to the carrier is likely a lot closer to $30 than $13.

    9. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by Trailer+Trash · · Score: 1

      You could toss in the tranny (although it should be holding up for much more than a single year of stop and go). But even if they're only getting 1 year out of a tranny, and they drop $5k for a new tranny installed each year, that's still only 10 cents a mile.

      Have you checked backpage or craigslist recently? I think you could get a better deal on a tranny if you looked around a bit.

      --
      Do you have ESP?
    10. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by N22YF · · Score: 1

      To be spending $0.70/mile on a vehicle putting down 50k+ miles a year, means spending over $35,000 a year on vehicle maintenance.

      Much of this cost will be energy cost. Electric powertrains are about three times as efficient as conventional combustion engine powertrains, and on top of that, electricity is cheaper per kilowatt-hour than gas or diesel. Regenerative braking, and not having to idle the engine, would improve the mileage as well.

    11. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by newcastlejon · · Score: 1

      What about the driver? Drones don't have those. Trucks may be cheap, but they're useless without a person to pick up each package and walk it to the door.

      I picture a hybrid of both: a truck can deliver heavy items and act as a pickup and recharge point for a number of drones dealing with the small ones. This way the number of drops for the driver is reduced and the drones' problem of range is side-stepped.

      --
      If God forks the Universe every time you roll a die, he'd better have a damned good memory.
    12. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      Show me a driver who makes 30/hr.

      Here are a few citations, that contradict each other, but all list pay over $30/hour.
      Salary for a unionized UPS driver: $82,997
      Wage for a UPS driver: $12-$33
      This is just base pay. The cost to the employer is the burdened cost of base pay, plus taxes, medical, unemployment insurance, pension, etc.

    13. Re:What are they doing to that truck!?! by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Which would imply that their Diesel fuel + Diesel specific maintenance costs them 70 cents per mile MORE than their electricity and electric specific maintenance.

      I would believe it. I have heard that depreciation costs + maintenance costs + fuel will chew up around 50c / km on an average family sedan. Electric vehicles have a far more simple maintenance regime.

      The only thing I find hard to believe in all of this would be the cost of battery replacement. For a vehicle that is always on the road I expect you wear out the battery through constant charge / discharge cycles quickly so you would have quite a frequent battery replacement program. That however speaks against the savings, and does not necessarily speak against the figure of $1/mile which I find fully believable for a large commercial vehicle.

  5. Here is the #1 problem with delivery drones by brunes69 · · Score: 1

    Company spends $10,000 on delivery drone. Company dispatches done on it's first delivery run. Rogue actor uses $100 worth of equipment to jam all transmissions to/from the drone, removes power source, and steals it. Company is now out $10,000.

    Because they are unmanned, drones are simply far too easy to lose and far too easy to steal. They are impractical.

    1. Re:Here is the #1 problem with delivery drones by SJHillman · · Score: 1

      Delivery by truck was impractical at one point too. There's a solution to every problem. And because the truck won't be too far from the drone, you could probably find a way to detect jamming, which the FCC doesn't look to kindly upon.

    2. Re:Here is the #1 problem with delivery drones by brunes69 · · Score: 1

      Detecting the position of jamming sources is not as easy as it is in the movies.

      And if you are trying to commit grand theft, I don't think you are worried about the FCC.

    3. Re:Here is the #1 problem with delivery drones by zlives · · Score: 1

      "FCC doesn't look to kindly upon"
      wasn't planning to show it a nipple.

      also "truck won't be too far from the drone" unless you arm it with HARM what good is that going to do?

    4. Re:Here is the #1 problem with delivery drones by ustolemyname · · Score: 1

      Company spends $50,000 on delivery truck. Company dispatches truck on it's first delivery run. Rogue actor uses $5 worth of wrench to jam the driver's noggin, takes key, and steals it. Company is now out $50,000.

      Because they are manned, trucks are simply far too easy to lose and far too easy to steal. They are impractical.

      FTFY.

      1. This does happen (Google had plenty of examples)
      2. Rogue actor ends up with a huge volume of parcels that are easier to fence than a specialized machine

  6. Waste of time by BitZtream · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I fly fully autonomous quads.

    This is another stupid idea.

    It will take longer to get into the neighborhood, setup for launch, launch, deliver, return, and manually recover than it will take your standard fedex/UPS guy to do his job.

    Oh, and its going to carry small objects and drop them in the front yard. Not under the car park or the stoop. Most objects will still need carried by a person large enough to carry them for more than 30 seconds and NO ONE is going to want their shit left out in the front yard or otherwise somewhere not leaning up against their home where its safe and dry.

    Again, this is another stupid idea. Perhaps people should actually try to implement their projects and compare them to the existing conventional method before starting a 'business' around the idea.

    Flying and fighting gravity constantly is expensive, thats why we currently all drive cars and not fly everywhere. Its not because we can't have a flying car, its because it'll cost more fuel just to get that flying car off the ground in the morning than it does for most people to drive to work and back. Flying ANYWHERE takes more time than driving when its less than about 100 miles due to the extra time consumed by taking off and landing SAFELY. Drones don't change that in any way, they just take the human flying out of it. The human flying a problem or a cost when you look at the other expenses. Well, and the human flying doesn't have a death wish, but thats not any different than a broken down drone that flys itself into a mountain.

    --
    Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    1. Re:Waste of time by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 1

      I fly fully autonomous quads.

      Don't they fly themselves by definition? (jk)

      You have a good point about setup. Seems that they would need a programmed drop spot for each house. I suppose over time they would have the route & drop data for all repeat customers, but the time to setup time for each house would likely required more time to complete than the first few manual deliveries.

    2. Re:Waste of time by jellomizer · · Score: 1

      It will depend on the community and the volume.
      Say you have an area that is mostly densely packed. And you have 95 Small packages, and 5 large packages, with 10 drones. While you are hand delivering the big packages, the drones can be getting the small ones outs.
      If you have just a few packages, and the area isn't so dense, then you are better off hand delivering them.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  7. This is more efficient, reduces cost how exactly? by Jahoda · · Score: 2

    So it's more efficient to park a truck at the entrance to a neighborhood, load a package onto a drone, fly that drone to the home, drop the package, fly back, load another package, then fly to the next house, etc etc repeat ad nauseum than it is to just drive the truck to each home and have a human carry a package up the front steps? I don't think so. If anything, the improvement would be self-driving trucks so that the driver could focus on package delivery, loading/unloading, etc.

  8. Re:Whoa by SJHillman · · Score: 2

    Your FedxEx and UPS guys are already using drones with truck-based mobile launchpads?

    Shit, my FedEx guy is still trying to figure out the "This Side Up" arrow on package.

  9. I live in an Apartment. by Nyder · · Score: 3, Informative

    I live in an Apartment.

    --
    Be seeing you...
    1. Re:I live in an Apartment. by zlives · · Score: 1

      landshark drones?

  10. Bah ... thinking too small ... by gstoddart · · Score: 1

    A truck? Really?

    Bloody amateurs.

    So, I propose one big giant drone. It will fly to the locale, and then unleash dozens of smaller drones.

    These drones, under the pretense of delivering packages (wink wink), will then scan all residences with FLIR, infrared, and every other technology, including tapping all communications.

    The marketing people will take all of that information and do what they need to, and the government will also be provided the information.

    Your signature for the package will have a rider on the EULA which says you also authorize the government to tap your phone and your internet connections.

    Government will immediately begin any parallel reconstruction tasks needed depending on your political leanings, and the tap on your computers will alerts the copyright assholes if they also need to get involved.

    *sigh* Ten years ago, that would sound paranoid ... these days, I'm not sure it's paranoid enough.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  11. Here are the FACTS by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Amazon's drone delivery service was never going to work...

    Amazon's "drone delivery" was never a serious project, other than for PR to keep Amazon in the headlines.

    --
    If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
    1. Re:Here are the FACTS by microTodd · · Score: 1

      I'm of two minds on this.

      One the one hand, being a pragmatic engineer and business strategist, I agree with you. Amazon's drone project would never really work.

      On the other hand, I really WANT it to work. And, historically speaking, whenever radical disruptive change happened there were people who always said "that will never work", backed up by plenty of sound reasoning and scientific fact.

      Yeah, sure, say what you will about how smart you are. I'm just saying.....disruptive technologies tend to either a) catch everyone by surprise or b) had lots of naysayers or c) both.

      --
      "You cannot find out which view is the right one by science in the ordinary sense." - C.S. Lewis on Intelligent Design
    2. Re:Here are the FACTS by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      lots of naysayers

      Always remember that Slashdot has lots and lots of cynical naysayers, they are disproportionately modded up, and they are nearly always wrong about anything that has a "social" aspect. Here are some consensus predictions from Slashdot:

      1. Smart phones are stupid, and will never catch on. They are a solution looking for a problem.
      2. Tablets are even stupider, and will definitely fail, because you can't write code on a tablet.
      3. Facebook will be out of business by 2008.
      4. Nobody will use "the cloud" because any home user can build their own triple-redundant RAID storage system, and battery backed whole-house conditioned power.

    3. Re:Here are the FACTS by rogoshen1 · · Score: 2

      Also Slashdot has some crazy smart people posting, but that intellect is very domain specific and tinted by an insanely high level of naive, unrealistic libertarianism.

      Correct for that, and you're golden.

    4. Re:Here are the FACTS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      5. And when something we thought would never catch on does, it's because that thing was "forced down our throats", not because we were wrong about it.

    5. Re:Here are the FACTS by Quirkz · · Score: 1

      On the other hand, I really WANT it to work. And, historically speaking, whenever radical disruptive change happened there were people who always said "that will never work", backed up by plenty of sound reasoning and scientific fact.

      What I'd really like is a house built with pre-installed vacuum tubes, so that you can get immediate distributions from a central depot. That would be awesome.

      --
      The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
    6. Re:Here are the FACTS by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      You can add my prediction to that list: The iWatch is going to be a dud.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    7. Re:Here are the FACTS by Rob+Riggs · · Score: 1

      Add my cynical prediction to the list:

      • Driverless cars will put suicide bombers out of work.
      --
      the growth in cynicism and rebellion has not been without cause
    8. Re:Here are the FACTS by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 1

      Here are some consensus predictions from Slashdot:

      1. Smart phones are stupid, and will never catch on. They are a solution looking for a problem. 2. Tablets are even stupider, and will definitely fail, because you can't write code on a tablet. 3. Facebook will be out of business by 2008. 4. Nobody will use "the cloud" because any home user can build their own triple-redundant RAID storage system, and battery backed whole-house conditioned power.

      5. Socialized medicine will lower costs and result in better care.

      (Oops; did I say something true and genuinely subversive again? Quick, mod me down!)

    9. Re:Here are the FACTS by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 1

      So you think you're getting lower costs and better care?

    10. Re:Here are the FACTS by Neil+Boekend · · Score: 1

      I'd mod you down because that is not a "naysayer" thing. It is a "yes we can" thing.
      The parent was about naysayers

      --
      Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
    11. Re:Here are the FACTS by lsatenstein · · Score: 1

      lots of naysayers

      Always remember that Slashdot has lots and lots of cynical naysayers, they are disproportionately modded up, and they are nearly always wrong about anything that has a "social" aspect. Here are some consensus predictions from Slashdot:

      1. Smart phones are stupid, and will never catch on. They are a solution looking for a problem.
      2. Tablets are even stupider, and will definitely fail, because you can't write code on a tablet.
      3. Facebook will be out of business by 2008.
      4. Nobody will use "the cloud" because any home user can build their own triple-redundant RAID storage system, and battery backed whole-house conditioned power.

      So, I like your implied conclusion. Do the opposite to what Slashdot recommends. Actually, for the above, slashdot caused the price of shares to drop to where the smart one purchased them at a bargain. I was the one of the smart-ones, but I did not have enough money to make a difference in my life.

      --
      Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
  12. Fido will take care of that. by BoRegardless · · Score: 1

    How many drones will be lost to dogs?

    1. Re:Fido will take care of that. by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 1

      Just drop a drone bone, and the dogs will leave the drone alone.

    2. Re:Fido will take care of that. by 4pins · · Score: 1

      How many drones will be lost to dogs?

      That is a great idea! Where can I get an anti-drone dog?

      It won't be delivered by a drone, right?

      --
      I will not mourn that which I never had to lose. - Unknown
  13. Re:Whoa by gstoddart · · Score: 1

    Your FedxEx and UPS guys are already using drones with truck-based mobile launchpads?

    Nah, it's more like the "domestic parcel delivery catapult" judging by what most packages look like.

    No drones, just pure ballistic flight.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  14. Or just make people cheaper by monkeyxpress · · Score: 1

    Relative to the few who will own everything and actually be able to buy stuff. Isn't that the plan?

  15. This was never going to work anyway. by Bonzoli · · Score: 1

    Its purely a ploy to up stock price, look innovative, and have competitors spend money with RnD on crap that use not useful.
    Price per pound is still, ship, rail, then truck.
    Unless your delivering something like a paper clip at $10 a piece, there is no profit in this, at this time.
    I'm more curious if their "robot lifter distribution centers" are turning a profit yet.

  16. Re:Drones by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

    If this works out, Amazon will buy the company.

    They will have to prove the technology outside America. The FAA is a victim of regulatory capture. They will not allow serious commercial use of drones, because they function as a job protection racket for pilots.

  17. Why don't they use a single rotor? by monkeyxpress · · Score: 1

    While I agree with people saying the whole drone thing was just a Bezos PR stunt, out of interest, wouldn't it be better to use a single rotor helicopter rather than an octocopter for these sorts of tasks? I remember reading how a lot of the energy in a multi-rotor is wasted accelerating and braking the motors to control pitch and attitude, and this leads to substantial conversion losses and the need to oversize everything. Surely at eight rotors, the cost of adding a swash plate control would be worth it for the efficiency gains, especially in a commercial setting.

    1. Re:Why don't they use a single rotor? by Shoten · · Score: 3, Interesting

      While I agree with people saying the whole drone thing was just a Bezos PR stunt, out of interest, wouldn't it be better to use a single rotor helicopter rather than an octocopter for these sorts of tasks? I remember reading how a lot of the energy in a multi-rotor is wasted accelerating and braking the motors to control pitch and attitude, and this leads to substantial conversion losses and the need to oversize everything. Surely at eight rotors, the cost of adding a swash plate control would be worth it for the efficiency gains, especially in a commercial setting.

      Here's an experiment that will illustrate the answer for you.

      Buy a Parrot drone, and fly it. See how easy it is? It's very stable, and quite straightforward.

      Now, buy a small but decent (i.e., big enough that it could carry something like a GoPro) R/C helicopter. Try and take off; don't forget to wear eye protection. Tally up how many times you have to go back to the shop for new rotors and other parts, as you crash again and again. Or, in the alternative, just watch the Mythbusters episode where they take on the myth of a helicopter crashing because its rotor blades were destabilized with a little bit of tape, so you can watch them go through this exact process.

      And yes, it's technically possible to add technology to single-rotor design systems to automate the corrective actions to keep them stable. But by using an octocopter, you can do it a lot more cheaply and more easily.

      --

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    2. Re:Why don't they use a single rotor? by N22YF · · Score: 1

      And yes, it's technically possible to add technology to single-rotor design systems to automate the corrective actions to keep them stable. But by using an octocopter, you can do it a lot more cheaply and more easily.

      That's not true; multicopters are computer-stabilized by necessity - they are much harder to manually control than a conventional helicopter configuration. I don't believe it would be significantly more expensive or difficult to add computer stabilization to a conventional R/C helicopter. The main difference is that multicopters are much simpler mechanically, and multicopters with many rotors are more failure-tolerant (e.g., if you have 8 motors and one fails, you can still fly with control and stability on the remaining 7).

    3. Re:Why don't they use a single rotor? by Neil+Boekend · · Score: 1

      With 8 a decent controller can keep it up in the air (at degraded wind resistance and maneuverability) when 3 are lost.

      --
      Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
  18. Re:Whoa by smooth+wombat · · Score: 1

    Both companies seem to have a penchant for holding packages. Previous package for UPS was delivered at 3 AM to my local facility. We don't get our UPS deliveries until after 12 noon.

    Apparently it's not possible to load a package at a hub on to a truck within five hours but instead takes over 24.

    Then there's my current FedEx delivery. Shipped on Monday, to be delivered on Wednesday.

    Nope, some excuse about them having problems at their sorting facility because of weather. Delivery now for Friday.

    I guess government workers being told to take their time getting to work when the weather is bad is absolutely outrageous, but when a private company uses weather as the excuse for not doing their job, something they're paid to do, well that's okay.

    --
    We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
  19. RE this is more efficient... by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 2

    How about automating the package delivery from truck to driver? I see the driver go back a get a package after he stops, that often takes as long longer than bringing it to my doorstep. If the truck pulled up the parcel for the driver as he approached the house, he could save quite a bit of time.

  20. Feasible = Pointless by frovingslosh · · Score: 1

    The imagined benefit of the drones was that some people who didn't care at all about costs but wanted intimidate gratification (and who lived near an Amazon warehouse) would supposedly pay an outrageous fee to get their little order delivered quickly by drone. Quickly meaning in the next few hours, and definitely today. You can already pay an exorbitant fee for next day delivery if your a rich prick who thinks that they need their Amazon toy tomorrow rather than today. It would be pointless to pay more for drone delivery and then wait for the truck to be loaded tomorrow and drive to your neighborhood (perhaps late in the afternoon by the time it gets to your neighborhood) and then risk the complications of drone delivery just to claim that it was delivered by drone rather than by the smuck in the truck. Similarly, we're a long way from having it be economically practical to drive to a neighborhood and then deploy the drone rather than just have the driver punt the fragile package to the door himself. And we've seen plenty of evidence lately that the UPS and FedEX drivers are quite capable of abusing fragile shipments all by them selves without the help of a drone.

    Quite frankly, a "Delivered today by an Uber driver" plan makes a lot more sense and is much more economically feasible than delivering by drone (via truck) tomorrow. And in the long run, delivered by a self driving vehicle makes more sense than delivery by drone. A self driving vehicle could drive up to my house as well or better than the UPS man can do today, and I don't have to worry about providing a drone landing pad or other drone related issues.

    This discussion in no way should be taken as an indication that I ever believed Amazon was serious about drone delivery.

    --
    I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
  21. Re:Whoa by Guy+From+V · · Score: 1

    Jerry, the whole building is brick....

  22. stupid! by slashmydots · · Score: 1

    There are subsonic, 6mm BB guns that fire 3x normal mass rounds with CO2 that are a solid lead projectile with neon tracer marks on the back where the barrel has a functional silencer as well. They're about $90-150. You could silently take out a drone and grab its package very, very quickly and easily. That or fishing line net traps that no optics or radar can easily detect. It's like shooting fish in a barrel but easier. This is never going to work.

  23. Short Lived by Arcady13 · · Score: 1

    If this were to be approved, the first time a drone hits a kid in the head and rips out his eye, the company will be sued out of existence.

  24. Great for thieves by wiredlogic · · Score: 1

    This is a boon for thieves. They just have to follow the trucks and canvas the immediate neighborhood rather than try to follow them from a distribution center.

    --
    I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
  25. I'll believe it when I see it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    It's just a coincidence that Amazon's Prime Air story (more accurately infomercial) was shown on "60 Minutes" literally the evening before Cyber Monday in 2014, right? In my opinion that shows just how corrupt both Amazon and CBS's "60 Minutes" really are. News == advertisements. Advertisements == news.

  26. Re:Whoa by fnj · · Score: 1

    We don't get our UPS deliveries until after 12 noon.

    My UPS _never_ comes before 7pm. These guys drive a long, long route carrying a zillion packages to a zillion destinations. Did you suppose they call a driver, hand him one package, and tell him to hurry up and take it straight to your place?

  27. Re:Drones by rock_climbing_guy · · Score: 1
    But but but... They're from the government and they're here to help!

    http://aviationhumor.net/the-33-greatest-lies-in-aviation/#

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    Wh47 d1d j00 541, 31337 15n't t3h r0xor5 ne m0r3???
  28. Re:Drones by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Perhaps because commercial pilots are aware of aviation safety to a degree that's not seen by private pilots. I see a much busier airspace than I did when I was flying a little airplane to go get a hamburger. I recognize the risk of killing a hundred passengers by drone because twice a day, 100 passengers bet their lives on my training and competency. I look out and think "where will I land this" because I've been train to prepare for the possibility. I might not have a Hudson river to land in, and worse case is no control as the airplane slams into a school. I'm aware that my airplane has 4 computers each checking the others so that if one has a problem, or two have a problem, I've still got redundant flight controls. I also realize that a "small" 55 lb drone falling from 500' is going to kill whomever it hits. So yeah, professional pilots are much more concerned about drones than unprofessional pilots.

    I'm sure the FAA's proposed multiple guess test will prepare you to fly commercially. What a crock of shit.

  29. Re:This is more efficient, reduces cost how exactl by giorgist · · Score: 1

    Have you seen garbage trucks ? The latest just have a driver that does not leave the truck. Same thing

  30. Modified traveling salesman problem by Astrophysician · · Score: 1

    A visiting professor working on the scheduling algorithms for the Horsefly and other semi-autonomous systems gave a talk on the challenges with things of this nature. The bottom line about Horsefly specifically is that, even though it seems like a good solution and the scheduling algorithm might find an optimal solution for delivering small parcels, the Horsefly a) has not yet landed on a moving truck, b) sometimes requires the truck sit and wait for it to return, wasting time and fuel, and c) has a very limited capacity for carrying multiple parcels.

    I'll follow his lead and believe it when I see it.