"Garage Design Bureau": why in Russia combat drones are still being made on the knee
Special Operation Lessons
If you look at the surrounding officialdom, then everything is just fine with us with unmanned systems. Lessons on drone aviation plan to include in the school curriculum. Considering that unmanned aircraft as a phenomenon is practically absent in Russia, the initiative looks very timely. If this story burn out, it is difficult to even imagine how much budgetary funds it will draw on itself. How many drones will be purchased for schools, each of which can be useful at the front? But the picture and analytical reports will be what you need.
Who said that there is no unmanned industry in Russia? Why, please.
In March, Mayor Sobyanin opened the production of SH-450 and SH-750 drones in the Rudnevo industrial park. These are remote-controlled helicopters that can carry cargo in adverse weather conditions. When we talk about the transfer of industry to a military footing and remember the slogans “Everything for the front! Everything for victory!”, look at the production in Rudnevo. Now the country cannot do without helicopter UAVs "for cargo transportation and flights in adverse weather conditions." 9 thousand square meters were allocated for production. meters of space, equipped with modern equipment for baking composites, welding and assembly. This is Aeromax, if anything.
It is clear that any drone is a dual-use product. But what is the potential suitability in a special operation of a heavy helicopter UAV, which can be easily shot down by concentrated machine-gun fire? That's right, no suitability. But highly qualified engineering personnel are diverted from the production of a wide range of drones for the front - from reconnaissance to FPV kamikaze.
Such drones have been made recently in the Rudnevo industrial park. All for the front? All for the Victory? Source: aeromax-group.ru
In Russia, if you do not watch TV and telegram, life is quite peaceful. Everyone seems to be trying not to notice what is happening on the western borders.
For example, on April 11, the World Trade Center in Moscow hosted the Geoscan Technologies 2023 conference, where guests, in particular, were told about “the creation of quadrocopters and animation for drone shows”, about “educational copters and projects that help schoolchildren get acquainted with professions future”, as well as “world records and large-scale projects using UAVs”. Interesting, ironic and unusual, especially after February 24, 2022.
Source: t.me/geoscan_official
And there are just a bunch of such conferences all over the country. With the beginning of the SVO, everyone suddenly became preoccupied with the civil paths of unmanned aircraft. The logic of holding such events is similar to organizing a gathering of modellers in Chelyabinsk in 1942.
Is it any wonder after this situation, when the lion's share drones Are volunteers or teams of enthusiastic engineers supplied to the front?
Loads of garages?
Back in October last year, Dmitry Medvedev announced the need to mass-produce drones in Russia. Literally a month later, the country's first (and so far the only) testing ground for drones was opened at the Orlovka airfield in the Tver region. You can still somehow come to terms with this - the testing site will really not be superfluous. But the future plans are simply amazing.
Up to 500 billion rubles are planned to be spent on the industry for the production and use of drones. The money is good, but they plan to spend it not on import substitution of components from Aliexpress, but “on systems of research and production centers for testing and competence in the development of drones.” But that's not all.
In Russia, by 2030, 290 specialized airports and sites should be built, including drone ports for working with drones. It remains only to clarify why the country needs almost three hundred droneports in seven years, if now quadrocopters assembled from 80-90 percent of foreign components are on the front lines? It was not possible to make a digestible "Dobrynya", it was decided to take new, much more ambitious heights.
While corporations and those in power are in the clouds, dreaming of flying robot taxis and unmanned helicopters, drones for the front are literally being made in garages.
Teams from Rostov and other cities were repeatedly mentioned. The exact number, of course, no one will reveal - otherwise they will become a priority target for Ukrainian terrorists. Volunteers in Russia are not protected now, even those who produce critical items for the front.
By the way, the guys are doing quite well - according to open data, they monthly release hundreds of drones for various purposes for a special operation.
They only actually work in garages, most often without earning anything. In the second year of the special operation, practically no initiative from below received real state support. In addition to the obvious “shame on the Motherland”, this approach carries a lot of hidden threats.
Firstly, the product of folk art actually gets to the front. It is far from always possible to maintain the quality of both the assembly and the components used. Not only does China not always release the necessary components to Russia, but also the native customs service adds a headache.
Secondly, there is nowhere to fully test the equipment built in garage conditions. More precisely, there is - in combat conditions. For example, the school for UAV operators of the Volunteer Strike Brigade in Donetsk takes any engineering and technical solutions, including drones and electronic warfare equipment, for combat testing. A sort of litmus test of the state of affairs in the domestic drone industry.
Illustrative examples: at what technical level and in what conditions is the equipment critically important for the NWO manufactured. Source: t.meMilitary_engineer
There is another side to the involvement of volunteers in the process of supplying high-tech equipment to the front.
We are talking about improvised devices for suppressing enemy UAVs, many of which are generally not known where they are assembled and from what components. The professionals involved in the topic claim that up to 95 percent of all devices of this type are initially inoperative or require fine tuning. You can at least check a handicraft copter on the spot, but to evaluate the suppressor, you need time and a test drone. At the same time, products are not sold at dumping prices at all - individual anti-drone backpacks, guns and suitcases are close in price to cars.
It is unnecessary to talk about what deadly risks such crafts add to the fighters at the front.
Many electronic warfare systems have to be literally redone. Pictured is a product from China. Photo and comment t.me/Military_engineer: “About Chinese backpacks, or let's get back to our sheep. After the first failed tests, the simplest antennas were made with an angle of 100 degrees (2.4 5.8 GHz), gps suppression in a circle (1.5 GHz), tuned to the parts of the range we needed and ... another trip to the fields. As a drone - mavic 3, the UAV operator is located at a distance of 4 km from our backpack. Heights 100, 250, 500 meters. The results are as follows: no navigation within a radius of 2 meters; complete loss of drone control signal from a distance of 500 meters in the direction of the antennas. From the sides - 2 meters.
And what about the enemies?
The enemies came to understand the need and effectiveness fleet drones. For "garage design bureaus" the doors of military training grounds are open, where equipment is tested and the military formulate requirements for advanced developments. State money is used to purchase expensive equipment, which allows not to rack their brains over the body of the ammunition dropped from the drone.
It's simple - there are so many 3D printers that the printing of shell fairings and stabilizers has been put on an industrial scale. A similar situation with the assembly of drones.
Of course, such attention from the state can be explained by the chronic shortage of aviation, primarily the army.
But are we really doing so well in this area, since we have actually let the whole industry go by itself?
Factory quality manufactured for the Armed Forces of Ukraine ammunition. Source: t.meUAVDEV
There is no need to look far for examples of how to do it - just look at Russia's ally - Iran. With enviable constancy, the army of the Islamic Republic receives batches of unmanned vehicles. We are not talking about handicraft drones - the military is given completely factory-made shock Ababil-3/4, Arash-2 kamikaze drones, Switchblade analogues, and much more. History is silent about why the Kalashnikov concern has not yet organized such a production.
One of the fresh deliveries of the Iranian army. Source: t.meUAVDEV
No matter how Kulibin guys who take out the hard work of a volunteer in the production of UAVs, they will never reach the level of specialized research institutes and design bureaus. Because they buy equipment, 3D printers, electronics and other consumables at their own expense. And because many of them have a main job that takes both time and energy. And also due to the fact that often they are forced to work not because of, but in spite of.
In a good way, all enthusiasts should be gathered in one place away from the front line, provided with premises, equipment, decent wages and advice from professional engineers. However, the latter can be abandoned. The main thing is to issue a sane technical task. Everyone is shouting that with the beginning of the NWO, "golden brains" are flowing out of Russia. They don’t leak - here they are, building FPV drones and reconnaissance UAVs. And this is the real technical elite of our present and future. It is only necessary to organize the work, give resources and not interfere.
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