Target blocking ability can make small FPV drones much more effective
Small drones, especially FPVs, predominate the battlefield in Ukraine, destroying approximately twice as many enemy equipment than any other united weapon. Their main will is blocking, which anecdotally brings at least half of the FPVs before reaching the target.
Jamming can be opposed with a function “blocking in target”: the operator selects the target, the drone flies the rest of the road, so no control signal is required even though the blocking area. FPV with this feature has been tested on the battlefield since last year. I talked to a Ukraine front line user about their experience with this technology.
By Walleye to PI in the sky
AGM-62 Walleye Bomb with video blocking in target skill
Back in the early days of directed weapons, a camera able to close on a target was an expensive skill. Walleye AGM-62, a tireless bomb with a television camera on her nose was first used in 1967, marking a direct hit in the main power plant in Hanoi the first time she was used in action. Walleye 1,100 pounds cost about 160,000 dollars ahead of modern, but the lock marking needed good lighting and contrast to work reliably. Even in the clear conditions of the desert storm in 1991, Walleyes scored only a hit rate of about 60%, much less than the laser -led bombs.
Computers are now millions of times more powerful, and many consumer quadcopters, up to $ 199 humble DJI Neo, now boast of an active track function. This allows the operator to draw a box around an object and have the drone to follow it. Handless surgery means the drone can follow you skateboarding, skiing or cycling. It doesn’t take much imagination to see how similar technology can block a drone on a target and clash into it.
Captured Ukrainian FPV with Raspberry Pi Zero processor
Added pricing is a major FPV issue costing about $ 400 each. Expensive equipment of it is unbearable; The systems of the one developed and used by the salar for drones with reusable bombs are in another FPV league. Ukrainian FPV developers appear to use the lower cost device they can get. While there are some very capable units Auterion Skynode available, Ukrainian developers are more likely to use a free zero raspberry-costing perhaps $ 100 or Google Coral AI De Dev, with software developed using the popular Yolo Vision family.
A year ago we began to look at the first results, the approximate and ready -made results enabled drones that were closed and flew through blocking for the last few hundred meters. But how well did they actually work?
Non -involuntary results
‘Michael,’ Commander of the Drone Typhoon unit of the Ukrainian National Guard, told me about his experience with early drones activated with him.
“We have tested this solution several times, and the results were quite inconsistent,” Michael says. “While it was able to be targeted, the target had to be very distinct from the background.” [The same problem as the Walleye in the 1960s] “When dealing with well -camouflaged targets, it became very challenging to discover the objective at all, or the exact point where the strike should happen.”
Developers claim that the drones, who have rapid reflexes and never panic or distract, can reach an 80% hit rate that they say exceeds human operators. So far, Michael says, people are continuing.
“A skilled pilot with a good technical configuration and properly configured settings can achieve this level of success,” says Michael.
He also notes that the degree of shock of drones depends heavily on the type of target. Vehicles moving in the open are easy for the machine vision to close and follow. It is a different story with smaller, less visible targets moving behind the cover – like dismantled infantry.
“Nowadays, Russian forces do not rely heavily on armored vehicles during attack operations,” Michael says. Instead, they mainly use small infantry teams. Even if the system is able to recognize a target in the forest, I’m not sure it will be able to navigate all obstacles along the way to target. Target purchase is especially difficult in summer conditions. “ [i.e. when there is dense foliage]
Michael sent a video of a recent operation showing how difficult it is to track the soldiers moving through the woods even in winter. From the point of view of the vision of the machine, they continue to change the size and shape and disappear after the cover. It is easy to see why automated blockage has difficulty pursuing a target.
The challenge of vision
Others in Ukraine have observed similar problems.
“Machine Vision is not developing as fast as we would expect,” Olexia Babenko, CEO of Ukrainian Drone Vyriy Drone, told Ekonomichna Pravda recently. He notes that manufacturers sent drones to the front with powerful guidance algorithms that are now improving.
Russia Lancet-a high-level, high-level military ammunition using NVIDIA processors produced by the US-has also experienced problems with its intended blockage function in 2024. These are now resolved, and the function is used in about a third of the attacks.
In February 2024, Breaking Defense described the drones of him as a “revolution that was not” but added “just yet”.
But while they may not be suitable for everything, the drones activated with it look effective against some objectives.
“This feature can be especially useful for engaging unarmed vehicles such as cars and motorcycles, as well as small infantry groups on the road,” says Michael.
This suggests that such drones would be effective in the ambush role, a tactic in which the FPV is landed near the roads to host potential targets when evaluated by a scout drone. Technology could even automate the ambush process, turning the drone into a long-range anti-tank mine.
Michael notes that most FPVs tend to have cheap, low resolution cameras. Historically, FPVs used an analog data link, so everything better would be spent, but a better, high-resolution camera could fuel a better image for it and significantly improve the system’s ability to stay closed.
Michael also says the drones and what they tested were not so effective in getting armored targets very much because they simply flew directly to them. An capable operator knows how to fly to hit the most vulnerable place of the target, such as French armor thinly of Russian tanks, where a stroke from an FPV can destroy the vehicle immediately. He will have to match this.
“The main question is whether a system driven by that directed by it will be able to recognize these specific weak points,” Michael says.
With the correct target of a small FPV can explode the stored ammunition of the tank, sending the turrets … [+]
The youngest drones activated with him are allegedly more capable. In November, the Ukrainian government announced that it had commissioned the first group of 3,000 drones with machine vision. Mykhailo Fedorov, deputy prime minister and minister and driving force after Ukraine’s drone attempt said a month later they planned to “significantly increase” the proportion with autonomous targeting.
Low -cost drones have not yet included the battlefield. But in the last 18 months they have been moved from laboratory experiments to applicable if limited weapons. As Deepseek reminded us of recently, technology and he is getting better quickly and can make unexpected rapid advances, even without new equipment.
This will definitely be a space to see in 2025.