"CRPF to buy advanced UAVs to fight Naxals"

http://www.suasnews.com/2012/10/19071/crpf-to-buy-advanced-uavs-to-fight-naxals/

"They can function in extremely windy and rainy conditions"
Will they be able to accomplish this with multirotors(assuming from the given picture) that "have low heat and noise which is inaudible at 3000 ft." ? Moreover are these two requirements contradictory as to handle extreme weather they have to be heavy which makes them both noisy and results in low flight times?
Fixed wing aircrafts seem more sensible to me..

Fixed wing aircrafts..... Can they do vertical landing and takeoff? Are they as easy to control as a multirotor is? Payload capacity???

Those are some valid points But are fixed wing aircraft not more durable and efficient than their multirotor counterparts? Maybe a tilt rotor is the way forward, but then again complexity creeps in.. I really am interested in what the various organizations come up with keeping the crpf's requirements intact! That would then be a wicked cool quad

Yes, that would truly be an amazing quad once ready, but I don't really understand what makes you say a fixed wing (which is made of some wood or ply) is more *durable* than a multirotor (which is made of some fiberglass or aluminium)
Plus, a fixed wing because of fast forward flight, cannot be used for surveillance. Like I can only imagine a 40" wingspan plane trying to enter a building through a window and hovering for a few secs to get a smal footage or something.

IMHO these UAV s would be practically completely useless because NAXALS operate in deep tropical indian forests and they know the fighting grounds much better than the CRPF jawans. Sadly the CRPF jawans are sent into the forests without proper jungle fighting training and the attitude of the CRPF jawans is also not good. The jawans need correct equipment, training and recognition for what they are doing so bravely without proper training and without correct equipment. They should also be trained to develop the mind set of a Soldier.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Quote from: hyd_quads on October 09, 2012, 06:28:53 PM
I don't really understand what makes you say a fixed wing (which is made of some wood or ply) is more *durable* than a multirotor (which is made of some fiberglass or aluminium)

Most, if not all, multirotors have exposed props which will break on the slightest contact with anything rendering it useless. Fixed wing aircraft, especially hand launched drones, eg the Switchblade used by the US Army, are of composite construction and very tough. Launching a multirotor and clearing the dense forest canopy safely would require highly trained personnel. To overcome this one may need to launch the craft from afar. In this respect fixed wing airplanes have superiority in both range and stealth. They are of simpler construction and with less moving parts which equals to greater combat survivability. And if someone tried to sneak in through a window with a quad, it is as good as ringing the doorbell This is just my opinion as we are talking about forested areas with less built up space. Off course multirotors give us a better ability to get much better footage but these can be had with UGVs which are much more stealthy.