Industry-Leading Drone Winch Continues to Evolve with New Safety Features and Operation-Expanding Hardware
Since its launch in 2020, our industry-leading commercial drone winch, the Rapid Delivery System, has been adopted by a litany of UAV operators around the globe to streamline logistics operations, aid disaster relief efforts, speed medical deliveries, and more. Thanks to the constructive feedback of customers and the innate drive of our engineering team to continue to refine the winch, it has truly become a living piece of hardware that adopts new features on a regular basis. Most recently, we have rolled out new safety features designed to help streamline regulatory approvals for UAV operators seeking beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) waivers alongside new hardware components that extend the operational capabilities for our customers.
From Cookie Trials to Commercial Operation
While the latest model of the Rapid Delivery System, the RDS2, has now completed thousands of deliveries in a myriad of use cases, back in 2016 it was still an extremely innovative concept for company CEO and Co-Founder Aaron Zhang. In 2016, as an undergraduate at Brown University, he and a small team were imagining ways to make the nascent drone delivery industry safer and more efficient. He developed the first working prototype of the drone winch and early trials were conducted in 2016 delivering concert tickets around the university campus. The following spring an even more robust version of the RDS system took flight for a more delicious mission demonstrating food deliveries with a locally-loved cookie shop.
As commercial drone delivery trials began to spread around the world, A2Z Drone Delivery released its first market-ready drone winch, the RDS1, in 2020. This first generation was designed to be integrated with the then-popular DJI Matrice 600 or DJI Matrice 600 Pro, or it could be purchased as a ready-to-fly system mounted on the Matrice 600 Pro. From its most early stages, the Rapid Delivery System’s design placed a premium on safe, energy-efficient flight operations. Like its follow up generations, the RDS1 featured automated payload monitoring throughout the flight, pre-flight weigh checks to ensure the airframe would not be overloaded, intelligent onboard systems to manage payload delivery while ensuring pilots could manually control the deliveries, an emergency tether abandonment feature allowing the tether to be release should it become entangled, as well as a passive payload lock to safeguard against tether slippage in case of an unforeseen power loss.
By 2021 commercial customers were leveraging the A2Z Drone Delivery winch across numerous industry sectors. The winch served customers conducting missions that captured the nation’s attention like introducing a new flavor of Coca-Cola in Georgia, but was also hard at work delivering tools and spare parts to offshore energy platforms in the North Sea, and enabling innovative search and rescue trials in Canada.
As with any aerospace component, the first-generation Rapid Delivery System struck a balance between overall system weight and performance. The RDS1 was designed to deliver payloads up to 2 kg (4.4 lbs.) and leveraged a freefall delivery approach with the winch intelligently slowing the payload for a gentle touchdown. This made the most of every drop of battery power by reducing time-on-station for each delivery. While it was a hallmark of the early version of the industry’s first purpose-built commercial drone winch, this freefall delivery approach would be phased out for a controlled descent of the tether. As testing hours piled up, the engineering team and early adopters of the RDS1 learned that transitioning to a controlled descent only cost a fraction of a second per delivery, but allowed the winch to operate more efficiently and ensured a longer life cycle for its onboard winch motor.
As we continued to refine the Rapid Delivery System, the second-generation winch rolled out in 2022 with a new form factor and a litany of improved capabilities. Like the adoption of the tether’s controlled descent, the RDS2 integrated several new elements based on hours of customer feedback. The RDS2 offered a slimmer form factor profile than the original allowing more space in the cargo bay to accommodate larger payloads and enable logistics providers to work with any off-the-shelf boxes. An upgraded drive motor meant the new winch could now deliver payloads up to 10 kg (22 lbs.) making it the highest payload capacity delivery winch on the market. The RDS2 was also the first drone winch to offer our patented payload auto-release so boxes could be deposited without a recipient needing to await the delivery. The second-generation winch could also now pickup payloads up to 5 kg.
New Safety Features for The BVLOS Age
Drone delivery has taken massive leaps since the original Rapid Delivery System was launched. Recent years have seen trials demonstrate the unique advantages of the technology. Extending logistics operations into hard-to-reach rural areas, speeding deployment of life-saving medical tools, etc., all while helping to minimize harmful emissions from traditional terrestrial delivery methods. Regulatory changes have also sped the rollout of new drone delivery operations. In the US more and more providers are securing BVLOS approvals from the FAA, and countries around the world have relaxed regulations to streamline integration of delivery drones into their logistics networks. As more of our customers have been seeking to navigate these regulatory processes, new customer feedback has prompted us to continue to revise the safety features built into the RDS2.
Earlier this week we rolled out a new firmware update that brings several new safety features to the winch that provide added peace-of-mind these regulators need to grant the necessary waivers for BVLOS operations. Thos new safety features include:
Entanglement Auto-Detection: In the event the winch’s tether becomes entangled, the RDS2 is able to auto-detect and abandon its tether to safeguard the airframe. With this new update, customers can now customize the winch’s entanglement detection parameters. This allows the smart winch to detect whether the entanglement is an obstruction on the ground, if the hook or tether is entangled at altitude as with a tree or wires, or at the top of its reel-up sequence for a situation where the tether has entangled the UAV’s landing gear. These parameters can be fully customized to fit the unique demands of any customer use case.
Overweight Payload Rejection: The RDS2 now automatically confirms payload weights are within its 5 kg payload pickup allowance to prevent overweight loads from causing unsafe flying conditions. While operators are able to easily confirm payload weights when they personally load the winch, when making pickups from third parties, this safety check becomes less reliable. With the winch automatically confirming payload weights at pickup, operators can confidently proceed with a mission following payload retrieval.
Tether Lifecycle Alerts: Operators can now customize alert messages to remind them when to replace the winch’s braided Kevlar tether. Rated for up to 800 deliveries between replacement, the RDS2 now monitors the total length of spooled out tether and notifies operators when it is time to replace the mission critical component.
Gentle Payload Touchdown: The RDS2 now automatically slows the tether deployment as the payloads approach the ground to minimize time on station and ensure the softest possible landing for mission critical deliveries.
New Hardware to Expand Operations
In addition to these latest safety features, we also released two new hardware accessories designed to meet the growing diversification of customer UAV mission needs. New hardware accessories include:
Weatherproof Winch Cover: As commercial drone operations continue to push the boundaries, both new and existing customers have sought to extend their mission capabilities during inclement weather conditions. With this new RDS2 weatherproof cover, operators are safe to confidently make deliveries in rainy or snowy conditions.
Auto-Release Bag Hook: Since the RDS2 became available, customers have relied on A2Z Drone Delivery’s patented auto-release mechanism to swiftly deposit the boxes of their choosing. With this new auto-release bag hook, customers can now extend their payload options to any sturdy retail bag.
Elevate Your Drone Delivery Business
Our RDS2 commercial drone winch is designed to get work done. The drone agnostic winch can be integrated with just about any commercial drone system to seamlessly fit into your UAV logistics operation. For customers looking to launch a drone delivery fleet, our winch can also be factory integrated with our RDST Longtail integrated delivery drone and RDSX Pelican long range delivery drone.
If you are looking to take your drone operations to the next level, reach out to our team to learn more about these purpose-built commercial drone delivery systems today.
