Thnx Mutley, you have it 100% correct in your description.
Most everyone who has one has told me they absolutely love it.
Launch to me is easy as pie if you commit and get bit done.
As far as mapping goes the big Drak is perfect for mapping, the issue with most other mapping planes is their instability in adverse wind conditions.
We have mapped along side the EBee and have much better data collection with the Drak than with the Ebee.
It has been proven by multiple people that the Drak is super stable when compared.
The Spade 50 The spade 70 and the Drak 62 were all made as durable versatile mappers.
Now here is the history lowdown
Spade 50 was sized down for FPV use for hobbyist and is the Z3 47, then molded out of Epor.
Spade 50 is sitting in CAD and is being reworked for mapping to accept some new cams and gear in the future.
Spade 50 was built and flown in many hotwire versions, it just never made it to the molding gate yet. I had a third party buy the rites to the Spades for some time to use for mapping and the 70 got done but the 50 never was molded.
Spade 70 is only a mapper and is molded from EPP, not sold to people for fpv use, its a heavy lifter for large mapping and sensor gear.
Drak 62" was designed for mapping, super durability major amount of room. Ultimate in performance with a huge speed window. It happens to haul just about anything you can throw at it. Whats amazing is I have seen them fly at 15 lbs for over an hr..
The thing about mapping is there is usually too much wind when the daylite is good for mapping. For good results you need a super stable platform that can fly in blustery conditions .
With the newer faster high res cameras we now map at much faster air speed.
This makes for much faster mapping . The Drak is perfect for this.
Now we map stuff in a lot less time with much better results.
The higher speed also makes for super stable flight, this means your data is much better.
The rite design and the rite wing loading can get you great results for mapping and FPV.
As of last month I know of a Drak mapping a volcano because the Ebee just could not get the work done.
Its the same in our agriculture center here in the middle of the USA.
Best time to map, sunny day mid day when the wind blows, usually too much for the Ebee.
As far as sales there has been over 600 sold since Dec 2015, not too bad in my book!!
The Drak just happens to be a mapping plane you can actually buy that crosses over to be an awesome FPV plane.
It is the only plane to be molded out of such premium foam.
I think I have only seen one out of the 600 sold that was damaged beyond repair.
The mini Drak like its big brother is also a high performance mini mapper fpv crossover plane.
As far as 5s on the Drak, I did a huge amount of testing on 3s 4s 5s 6s 8s and had found for mapping at cruise there was one motor that had worked on 5s with lower wattage and with substantial performance gains that was far better than many of the others tried. This was nice and we got to loose some cells doing so.
With all of this rambling I am doing I will say some people get what I try to do,, some people do not see the full effect of my efforts. If you are having some issues please look for help by the guys who are having the good luck.We all like to help!!
Either way , have fun, listen and learn. I read all you have to say in here and use it to take things to the next level if I can.
Billy boy, I am not trying to convince you, you said you do not believe me,LOL
FYI All of my planes are designed to be heavier wing loaded than most others available.
This is one reason they are more stable than most.
Taking off like a feather and landing super easy and slow are not my main goals. I will sacrifice some to get better more stable flights
If you want light loopie super easy to launch stuff then you are not getting that from me.
I do offer some good discounts on multiples to the UK since there is no active vendors here.
Thnx for the feedback guys.
Here is a few vids from DR Deon about it as a mapper.
He is a leader in the Ag industry for Agriculture and water way mapping.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WY0a6Ww6OtY (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WY0a6Ww6OtY)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx1lGIdzZ7U (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx1lGIdzZ7U)
Hey Chris, thanks for dropping by and keeping us up to date.
Had a good summer with the Drak and posted a vid on YouTube. It was the two comments that made me smile about me slowing down the vid to make it look smoother or having a gimbal, nope it was filmed using a Runcam2 @ 60fps and posted at normal speed in manual mode. Hats off to you Chris, it's a stunning airframe to fly and just pips the Z3 as my go to airframe because it's rock steady and really tough.
Looking forward to doing a build/review of its little brother for the forum, my ritewing Christmas pressie off the wife. :overexcited: