ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 9 เม.ย. 2017
- At the University of Manchester's High Voltage Laboratory, we see what happens when a DJI Phantom 3 drone gets hit with an electrical impulse of 1.4MV - basically, a lightning strike. Actually, two Phantom 3 drones. We had a backup.
Thanks to the team at the High Voltage Lab! Here's their side of the story: www.mub.eps.manchester.ac.uk/s...
And here's a teardown of the drone: www.mub.eps.manchester.ac.uk/s...
The University of Manchester's TH-cam channel: / universitymanchester
You can also follow on Twitter:
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Vidyadhar Peesapati / drviddy
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Main camera: Fraser Cottrell / www.frasercottrell.com
Edited by Michelle Martin / @mrsmmartin
Audio mix by Matt Gray / www.mattg.co.uk
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The team at the University of Manchester tore down the drone after to see what the damage was, and they've just posted their results: www.mub.eps.manchester.ac.uk/science-engineering/2017/05/11/inside-the-drone/
Interesting results! I'm surprised how little damage there was externally. Love the videos!
That's very interesting.
It may be interesting, MrAntieMatter, but is it Sips O'Clock?
Tom Scott o
Should have sent it to mikeselectricstuff ... :P
"Don't try this at home"
Damn it Tom, I was just about to power up one of my 1M volt lightning generators I have next to my bed and blow up a few drones, I guess I have to shut it down now that you called it....
LateNightHacks I think he meant fly your drone into lightning
but where are you gonna get a lightning at home to fly your drone into?
Besides, there is nothing wrong with flying a drone into a lightening as long as you are not holding onto it the whole time
'a lightning' hehehe.
1 lightning.
1 singular lightning.
yeah, you gotta be specific with these stuff, what if someone mistakenly uses two lightnings instead? that won't be pretty
Last week I was reprimanded by the police for electrofelling some trees in my backyard and now this? What's the point of having a lightning generator at this point?
I was going to put a complicated title on this, but no. "Drones vs Lightning", and a lightning bolt. That'll do nicely. It's good to be back.
hi
Good to see another video from yourself, Tom. Welcome back!
Tom Scott WELCOME BACK, we missed you and your videos
Welcome back
Tom Scott welcome back Tom. going for the nice and short and suspiciously clickbaity title, and then delivering the goods. well done. now I wont have to try this at home :-)
To be fair, Tom, if I had a high voltage laboratory at home, you would have a hard time convincing me to NOT try this at home.
The exit point that the lightning took through the landing leg of the drone was caused by the fact that the antenna is actually tucked into the leg.
There was actually a bit of footage where we talk about that - but there was also another leg with a different wire that was untouched, and no scorch markings -- so we weren't 100% convinced that was the reason, particularly as the bolt ignored the big, obvious block of conductive tape. To be safe, I cut that out!
I would Love to see photos of the board, but It might have something to do with with the Receiver (connected to the motors) vs the Video (connected to the camera) antenna? My guess is that the current traveled down the low resistance motor wires to the ESC circuit, and then jumped over into the receiver circuit, and exited through the antenna, a path that was probably still less resistance than the tape.
A possible reason the battery wasn't harmed is the circuitry built into most ESCs to protect the battery from any Induced voltage spikes from a motor being suddenly stopped in the event of a crash, which would short out under the high voltage, leaving an electrical path that does not involve the battery.
It's probably impossible to completely protect a drone from lightening, since the GPS antenna has to be exposed on the top, and the radio antennas exposed on the bottom. As I'm sure you know, a faraday cage will also block any radio signals, so the antennas couldn't be inside.
Contrary to popular belief, lightning does not always take the shortest path.
ElectroBlood It takes the path of least resistance?
Nope. The probability that it does take the shortest path is the highest of all paths, but it is by faaaar not guaranteed.
No Autopsy ?
I think Tom should send it to you for an autopsy. I'd love to see that.
mikeselectricstuff yay Tom should send you the drones for an autopsy!
It wouldn't surprise me if the huge em induced voltages just fried it, no reason for dji to have put EMC measures into that thing :)
We need Autopsy from you or some one else that knows about electronics.
Happy to do that - I'd be surprised if there wasn't some visible evidence. What often happens is that the high voltage causes latchup, and the device's own supply does most of the damage.
"Don't try this at home"
There go my plans for this weekend
If I remember correctly, rotors cause a lot of static electricity around themselves when they spin. So they are the most natural connection points since they would already have a high load.
good point i had forgot about that just remembered about helicopters
3:26 I'm no expert on lightning (shocking I know), but from conversations with people who install lightning protection systems, and looking at plans for said systems, it's slightly more complicated that just sticking a bit of metal onto whatever your trying to protect.
A lightning conductor placed on top of an object, say a church tower, provides a cone of protect from it's tip extending downwards. A lightning rod placed on a church with a tall tower may find the entire building is protected, whereas a lightning rod placed on a church with a short tower may need to have a second conductor placed on the other end of the church.
The problem here is your conductor didn't extend far enough up (and presumable similarly down) in order to provide the path of least resistance for the lightning. Now I don't know what calculations and equations are involved in working out the dimensions of an effective lightning conductor, but I would hazard a guess that the conductor would needed to have extend above the drone by at least it's width and probably the same downwards as well. And that's assuming whatever materials you're using was capable of handle the charge...
p.s. sorry about the bad pun...
“Shocking” 😭😭😭
Dr Peesapati has a really good accent, I imagine he's a pleasure to learn from.
CaptainNuge it's like Indian and Irish at the same time
Bendaspy Scottish I think, still great!
Scottish
Where do you people get Indian from
@@zakklebowski7712 from the town centre next door to the Chinese
I would have liked seeing the drone keep on flying, protected by a complete Faraday cage.
So would I! I was really hoping the conductive tape lightning rod was going to work, but no. (We were worried that if it was any bigger, it would have started to interfere with the rotors or aerodynamics.)
Yeah, you wouldn't want to damage the drone
Frying - Okay. But damaging? NO - ABSOLUTELY NOT! xD
The quadrocopter would probably still go down because the magnetic field of the lightning induces enough current in the electronics to cause some problems. Most devices detect that something is not right and reset when this happens. You can actually try this at home with an electric fly swatter and a digital alarm clock. Put the swatter as close as possible to the electronics of the alarm clock (near the display should work fine) and drop a bit of metal in the grid of the swatter while pressing the button. The alarm clock should be able to survive this but behave as if the batteries were taken out and put in again. At lest that's what my alarm clock does :)
Faraday cages protect against magnetism as well.
photonicinduction must be in love with this tower
I was thinking the same thing :D
Yep :D
He probably has one in his living room
he poped it
Would match his carpet
"Can store 100,000 volts"
So near, and yet so far... :'(
I knowwwww...
I was internally screaming 'AND HOW MANY MICROFARAAAAAAADS?!!'
what
@@eminenception
There is nothing special about being able to store 100kV. I can just take any random two bits of metal and insulate them well enough from each other and boom! Million volt capacitor!
However, the capacitor I just built is an absolutely crappy one that will be able to hold next to no charge and really can't be used for anything.
So the i interesting bit about those 100kV capacitors that Tom didn't mention is how much ENERGY they can store at 100kV and how quickly they are able to release it.
I am fascinated by the two propellers that went skyward when the lightning struck. Did the motors spin up uncontrollably to the point where the props just let go? That only two propellers left their mount could be because they are counter-rotating (to balance out the torque to stop the drone from rotating the other way), and the other two would then just seat themselves further on the motor shaft.
Since they're designed to produce lift, as soon as they were disconnected they went skyward on their own. But how they were shaken loose, I've no idea!
If the motors dead-stopped due to the electrical assault, I could see the props spinning themselves off the now-stationary motor shafts (I believe the Phantom 3 props are spin-off - normally tightened by the drive direction of the motors). The props which rotate "the other way" are also threaded on to the motors the other way (so motor acceleration acts to tighten, not loosen). The newer Phantom 4 prop-mounting uses a bayonet-fitting (push-and-twist) lock so they won't get spun-off.
I agree with Matthew, but what can cause the motors to stop that fast? Is it the magnetic field or the motor bearings welding themselves stuck?
My guess is the motors getting suddenly welded. I doubt the magnets within them would react fast enough to the sudden magnetic field change, despite how large it may be. Again, just speculating here.
the rotor and the stator are very close to each other. the closer the better but a high voltage will induce a spark between them and the current will fry and weld them together
When AIs get sentient and humanity is put on trial, this will be Exhibit A.
SkarmoryThePG ban testing on robots!!!
I was hoping that the drone would become self-aware and refuse to be sent on the suicide mission.
Tom pushes the button for the lightning
AI: I'm sorry, Tom. I can't allow you to do that.
Tom gets lightninged instead
I still think the Boston Dynamics robots will riot before there's any chance for a trial.
hahaha no, Boston Dynamics will be
Drone: *gets struck by lightning*
Propellor: “Bro I’m outta here”
"Please, don't try this at home.... if you have a high-voltage laboratory at home."
Photonicinduction :)
It's really cool to see an actual experiment on this show. Good to have you back Tom!
This channel deserves all the funding. Imagine how that footage would have looked if only it were filmed on a Phantom camera.
As a engineer and a physicist I must correct the flawed usage of units in this video. Capacitors do not store "volts", they store electrical charge which has SI unit Coulomb. Volt is not a unit of energy, however Volt times Coulomb which is Joule is a unit of energy. Because of the linear relation between charge Q and voltage V over the capacitor, Q=CV where C is the capacitance, the stored energy in a capacitor is E=CV^2.
The size alone of the capacitors tells me to stay clear.
Bruno Mailly I agree
this is one of my favorite conclusions yet. "if you're going to fly your drone in a lightning storm, don't."
I swear Tom always finds the neatest stuff to do videos on!
Best video yet IMO, short sweet and awesome.
I wouldn't have minded it being longer, with more info about the facility and staff, but it was great to watch.
Tom, I really can't believe it. You were a small channel making odd little videos here and there only yesterday. Now you're moving in on a MILLION! Keep up the amazing work!
This was unbelievably satisfying
Your profile picture doesn't match the comment at all haha
Iain Waller THAT WAS UNBELIEVABLY SATISFYING!
Cool! This reminds me of some of the lightning strike protection testing I had to have done several years back, but this is much cooler. (Not sure how much the technology has progressed, but back when I worked with composites, there was the tried method of using metal mesh on the surface for lightning strike protection. We were tries to replace that with a lighter material. Either buckypaper infused with the composites, or a paint that could be later applied.)
This is my favorite series of videos that you produce.
"Don't try this at home... if you have a high voltage laboratory at home..." Looking at you, PhotonicInduction!! ;)
You don't store volts. You can store coloumbs, or joules, but not volts. Or, you can store x coloumbs at y volts, with x*y/2 joules of energy.
I guess they mean it's the highest voltage they can achieve with this set of equipment.
It stores charge with the purpose of maintaining a voltage. It's a bit lazy with terminology but with static capacitance voltage and charge are functionally interchangeable so the phrasing is not that egregious IMO.
Perhaps it was a simplification, whereby the uninformed viewer may understand the scale of the beast in a format that is understandable by all.
The pedant in me would argue, but you're right. I would like to know the rated capacity of those beasts though.
I was also disappointed Tom only gave voltage. Caps are rated for voltage and capacity, give me both numbers dang it!
0:58 those guys love blowing things up
Another great video Tom, keep doing what you do!
Welcome back Tom! Hope you're feeling rested and had a nice "holiday" :)
Wondering -- if the camera was recording to the SD card onboard, would the lightning strike wipe the card, or would you have a video recording up until the point of strike?
Don’t get me wrong-I support science and encourage curiosity. Moreover, I have the same question. But still, I don’t want to waste my quadrocopter like that to find out, whether we’d be able to get the video.
SD cards aren't vulnerable to magnetic fields, generally. But any device will be absolutely ruined if that much current goes through it. An HDD would probably be less vulnerable, due to having a metal enclosure.
most likely in my opinion if the electricity hit the card then it would just fry it, nothing left to carry electricity yet alone hold data. +joshua HDDs would be destroyed due to the electromagnetic field that the electricity would produce, that would destroy the platter that it's writing to and delete all data.
That's why I said "less vulnerable", not "invulnerable".
+joshua well no not really, when electricity flows it produces a magnetic field which being so close would reverse the magnetic fields on the platters which will not only destroy data but destroy the platters.
SloMo Guys should have been there for this.
would have loved to see the several hundred thousand frames per second on this.
They did use a high speed camera at some n-ty thousand frames per second. Says 3000x slower, and assuming it was slower than "regular" 25fps video, that would put the cam at 75 000 fps.
You could catch a glimpse of the Phantom Camera Control software on the laptop :)
a 200,000 frames per second camera would still be better.
@@jamesmccann531 No high-speed camera in this instance works very well without sufficient lighting and I have to say I was a bit bummed that you could hardly see anything happening besides the discharge striking the drone.
The second shot at 2:20 is so pretty it's now my desktop wallpaper. Great video, Tom!
Welcome back Tom, hope you feel energized and charged up after your brake.
Fascinating and AHAHAHA LIGHTNING!
Also, as a Scot, that's a particularly sweet accent to hear. Fifer or Northeast, at least, I'm guessing.
I'd really like to see a teardown of the drones and failure analysis of the electronics.
Just how bad was the damage internally?
(What components still functioned ex. microcontrollers and digital logic, discrete transitors, motors, etc.)
Welcome back. We missed you. Nice, funny ending.
Probably the best techrax video so far.
there's an antenna in the foot - the one that's used to communicate with the remote
The motors got shorted out which puts an electronic brake on them and stops them really fast. The propellors have a screw that is pitched opposite of the direction of the motor spinning forward. So the motors stopped and the propellors kept going and the propellors unscrewed themselves and took off
Love this tom! So cool! Love your videos!
Another awesome video, Tom :)
Quite a few years ago (long before drones) I seem to recall a guy launching rockets with a copper wire attached to them into storm clouds to try and get lightning strikes. I would love to see that emulated.
You should send one to BigClive for an autopsy.
Double post police - You're under arrest ;)
I hadn't seen this one yet. Looks good :) You seem very comfortable/relaxed in this video.
I'm so glad I subscribed to you. Your content is absolutely amazing :D
I always love "it's not conductive" when people talk about lighting. Is air conductive? Because it's no problem for lighting...
Anyway, thanks for great content! :)
The lightning here sounds like a gunshot. Out of curiosity, any idea how loud it would be if you were standing right next to the drone?
Can dead people hear?
this has made my monday and will make many more mondays to come
I haven't seen tom this much excited before
no shots of the components? that would have been the interesting thing to see :/
Guess I'll stick to a kite in that kind of weather, heh saved me some trouble eh!
I saw this yesterday, but I'm here again because it was in the news feed in google. One of the top 3 stories of the morning. That's pretty cool.
lovely video as always
4:55
_"But soon, the flames will fade and only Dark will remain. Even now, there are only embers[...]"_
Can you please disassemble the drone and show the internals, I would like to see the viable damage to the electronics.
You're back!
I just love everybody's energy there
Tom's Back! We missed you!
The way the propellers flew off really is shocking
Sevda Yskovich happened all the time on my x5c-1 but I fixed it with lot of superglue
***** Glad to hear that the old methods still work.
Pun intended?
Hi Tom. I always enjoy your experiments :)
That was awesome! Nice to know as a drone owner, thank you! :)
So, if you're gonna try fly a drone in a lightning storm...
Don't.
You just HAD to use a DJI Phantom instead of a dirt cheap race quad?
*RIP PHANTOM* I WOULD LOVE TO HAVE ONE! *WHAT A WASTE*
@@jontesgamlakanal2992 science is never a waste
@@kas-lw7xz not in this case, but sometimes it is
best HV lab ever!!
That lightning rod UI is so oldschool, I love it
why is it that everyone uses the exact same type of drone when doing crazy drone experiments?
Tom, how many Farads were those capacitors?
We effectively have 10 capacitors all of 750nF, these are charged in parallel and discharged in series.
thanks Ian, That's pretty cool! from the size i was guessing 1F each but at that high voltage it's a bit hard to gauge by size. I used to put 12v 1F caps in cars for the sound systems but they were only about 1Kg.
Yes, the spark gaps are in the large blue column. This contains the noise and also allows us to push fresh clean air through the gaps once they have fired. Solid state switches would be a very tall order at this voltage level but you can make lower voltage generators work that way.
This video was awesome!
Tom continues to lead the life we would all like to live :-).
1:42
"WARNING!
Remove the Impulse Generator EARTH STICK before energising the IMPULSE GENERATOR
WARNING"
Not a damn clue what it means, but I've got a sudden desire to do both of those things >:D
I don't think anything special would happen. It sounds like the whole generator is earthed when unused so when you'd try to charge it up without removing the "earth stick" you would simply short circuit into the ground which supposedly is completely unspectacular since I guess nothing noticeable would happen.
Ah, that makes sense. Thanks for the explanation. ^^
Phourc You're welcome :)
Just a thought though. I've also got the urge to try that out and see if I'm mistaken and something explodes out of the sudden! xD
Nearly - if we leave the earth stick on it also causes the main circuit breaker in the lab to trip off which is a little embarrassing for the user! It's happened to me on a number of occasions!
This is the UK, so cut them some slack on descriptive lab terms. The "earth stick" is likely a flexible conductor on a pole that can put a low conductivity (short) between the generator output and nominal earth ground. It is a last chance safety feature to ensure that somebody in the control room doesn't zap somebody working in the test chamber. It also precludes any residual charge on the generator from shocking a worker. The generator likely cannot operate correctly if the earth stick is left in place, so operating the generator in that condition is equivalent to testing the safety circuits on the generator; you may get an expensive surprise (to say that this facility is expensive is an understatement).
I love hearing an Indian having a sort of Scottish accent! Can you do a back story on him?
Normally i'm super nervous when someone destroy a drone , but in this video, i'm super excited because is an awesome experience !
Thanks ;)
Drone: Gets Hit by lightning
Everybody: Clap
Why is the drone transparent in the picture where the lightning strikes?
It's a long-exposure shot: the drone was moving about a lot (you can see the blurred red lights), and that's the one moment where it's illuminated by the lightning!
Okay, that explains a lot! Thank you for your answer, and as always - a great video! Keep up your great work!
Yay Mad Captain Tom is back!
Politic Revolutionnaire *cap'n
I thought my battery of several Leyden jars was impressive. Dang.
Welcome back, Tom!
That was super awesome!
So why don't lightnings affect planes? Because of the metal hull?
@Karl Kastor Yes. Modern airplanes have a conductive skin or layer - usually metal. Airliners are struck by lightning regularly without mishap.
planes are very smooth so the lightning curves around the outside and drips off the bottom.
The simple answer is that it does affect the planes, but various sensitive components are well shielded. If you had a personal electronic device on in an aircraft that got struck and were sitting in a window seat, the might be some issues. However, most commercial flights will avoid situations that would lead to getting struck by lightning due to the other weather issues associated with storms (mostly various wind patterns).
Maybe because planes don't have a string attached to them leading to ground?
I'm 99% sure it exits through the landing gear because of the antennas inside.
Welcome back
Love the, ‘let’s see what happens, (safely)’ attitude of this video.
Here before this goes on trending
Urabouy me 2 m9
Urabouy me 3
me 4
Tom Scott is TechRax confirmed
This was great!
I had a stupid smile on my face this entire video.
children in africa could have eaten that drone
Now that it has been cooked, it will taste even better :) .
Children in africa could have eaten those capacitors
Sadly, they will 'charge' too much for these capacitors.
they will have to made do with eating lightning instead
drones in africa could've eaten those children
Idk I still think flying one into a pool of coke is a better way to destroy one...
Jk great vid
Fantastic!
You've just gotten yourselves a new subscriber!!! :-)
1:47 That old-school DOS interface
waste of a phantom
LawnTractorBoy Now is it really? If you look at it from a broader perspective, Tom already did research for DJI on electrical protection for their drones.
science is never a waste
Nope.
That's like saying that the rovers that were sent to mars went to waste. Its science, it doesn't go to waste.
Skip6235 it can be, when it is done to much.
I really like this one.. tbh love all your vids tom. Wonder if anyone has made a drone work after ligning with this test? Made the whole drone a cage
This is such a great Chanel I highly recommended for kids to watch this
I've been to one of these here in Prague. It's not used anymore for anything but lectures and student experiments, but it's still magnificent.
I love how much celebration there was
That poor drone is tied like a lamb offered to the thunder gods
Does the High Voltage Lab have an art website? Those still images with the lighting going in and out of the drone are stunning!
Well, as far as I know, the electronic compass is housed in one of the Phantom legs...and obviously there are wires from the compass to the main board....so that would account for the electricity always taking that path. Once is in the board, the motor rods is probably the best route out