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DanielR

Jul 17, 2024 • 10 tweets • 4 min read • Read on X

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1. The air data computer from a Shahed-136 #drone was reversed engineered by Le labo de Michel @lelabodemichel5162 with a detailed explanation given in a YouTube video. This computer supplies airspeed and altitude to the drone’s flight computer.

2. The circuit board is fairly small and has two air pressure transducers. One transducer is used for measuring altitude and the other is for airspeed. The board transmits data over an old-school RS232 serial line. A JTAG port is for programming a microcontroller.

3. The pressure transducers appear to be from the Slovenian company, HYB Sensor. It is difficult to determine the exact models but possibly HPSD 3100 or HPSD 3000. Feel free to ask HYB Sensor if (and why) their products are in these drones.

4. The back side of the board holds an STM32G071 microcontroller made by ST Microelectronics. This is a relatively basic microcontroller. There is also a regulator for supplying a reference voltage for the analogue-to-digital converter.

5. The controller measures temperature & pressures, and outputs (somewhat verbose) air speed & altitude data 5 times per second. The verboseness suggests this might be a commercial off-the-shelf product.

6. For those with electronics knowledge, Michel also supplied a schematic of the air data computer. (In case you want to make your own 🙂).

7. I highly recommend watching Michel’s excellent video. It shows how much effort and skill is required to reverse engineer a circuit board. His work will be useful in better understanding the capabilities and limitations of the Shahed-136 drone.

8. If anyone recognises this air data computer please comment. If you found this thread useful, please repost as a quote. Comments are welcome. Also consider reading my previous threads listed under “Highlights”.

9. (ps) Turns out this air data computer has the model number ADC-PLS-002.
en.defence-ua.com/weapon_and_tec…

10. (ps) The Iranian company Monjigraphic makes labels and showed the following decal as an example of their work. (A big thanks to @VelkeB for finding this.) This is the decal used on the Shahed’s air data computer. This places the computer’s origin solidly in Iran.

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More from @DanielR33187703

DanielR

@DanielR33187703

Aug 14

1. It is beautiful but is this reconnaissance drone too good to use in a war? The various reconnaissance drones flown in Ukraine are well made and usually expensive. But are they too expensive?

2. At the start of the war, Ukraine obtain several Penguin-C military drones made in Latvia by UAV Factory (now called, Edge Autonomy).

3. This aircraft is fairly small but has a number of fancy design elements. The wing and tail are removed for transport. The red triangles show where the fasteners go.

Read 26 tweets

DanielR

@DanielR33187703

Aug 8

1. Here is something a little unusual. It is a Zlin Z137T agricultural aircraft (crop duster) equipped with two R-73 air-to-air missiles for shooting down drones. There is no obvious gun so this is likely only for large drones like the Geran-2 (Shahed 136).

2. For reference, here is a Z137T in its tradition role of applying chemicals to a crop. A maximum cruise speed of 252 km/h will be a constraint as a drone hunter.

3. The R-73 missile uses infrared homing and has a maximum range of about 30 km. It is not clear how many of these are in inventory.

Read 5 tweets

DanielR

@DanielR33187703

Jun 20

1. What would have been unthinkable a few years ago is now routine. Several Ukrainian drones successfully attacked a russian drone factory located in Dubna, only 115 km from the kremlin. This is a smart move by Ukraine, and there may be more to this attack than at first seems.

2. Importantly, one video showed several drones attacking, one after the other. Oddly, there was remarkably little air defence heard as each drone approached over a lake. What happened to russia’s air defence?

3. This shows the factory with the lake on the left (west) side. This building is very large. The camera operator (for #1) was quite close and was almost hit by shrapnel.

Read 24 tweets

DanielR

@DanielR33187703

Apr 23

1. Developing a new weapon is hard so why not just copy another company’s design? Fibre optic drones are a hot product and part 4 of this series looked at a company (Skywalker) who developed their own. Other companies have rushed to make similar weapons.

2. Here are two fibre optics kits made by the Chinese company, Skywalker. Opening the boxes is the likely owner of PGI Technology, which operates in China but is effectively russian. Initially, this photo was confusing. Was Skywalker collaborating with PGI Technology? Nope.

3. PGI bought these two Skywalker kits with the goal of copying the technology and selling their own version. The following photos are very unusual since they show the design process. Here is the Skywalker canister with a large drone frame.

Read 25 tweets

DanielR

@DanielR33187703

Apr 4

1. Need to ship weapons? The previous thread in this series showed a small russian company, PGI Technology, making electronic warfare systems in China. But how do they ship these systems & other equipment to russia?

2. PGI Technology showed this photo of equipment being prepared to ship from China to russia. The packing tape has a company name & phone number on it. Note the Wallace restaurant and #24 bus across the street.

3.PGI also showed a video of this heater but it is the background that is interesting. Visible is the company name (3188 Kapro) and a phone number. There are also signs on the steps written in russian.

Read 14 tweets

DanielR

@DanielR33187703

Mar 21

1. This is a look at a small russian company that operates in China and exports military equipment to russia. One interesting aspect is this company manufactures some equipment, including electronic warfare kit, and places its logo on the products.

2. It currently calls itself “PGI Technology” but there are also references to “Dongguan PGI Technology”. Its location is murky but a now-defunct website gave an address in Tangxia Town in Dongguan.

3. This is a very small company likely run by the single person shown here. He is easily identified by a distinctive tattoo on his left arm. Oddly, his face is obscured in some videos but not in others. Here he is testing a drone jammer.

Read 18 tweets

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