A discussion with Erik, CTO of Modovolo, and another shameless pitch for the Modovolo Lift.
“I’m a commercial drone pilot myself and it was frustrating to me that flight time was so low for all the drones I was using. I wanted something that would give me at least an hour of flight with any payload. But your options are limited. If you want that kind of flight time performance, then you have to pay big money.”
That’s when the Modovolo journey began.
“We knew we wanted a drone that had amazing flight time of at least an hour but was orders of magnitude less expensive than anything on the market. The problem was that as much as we tried, the standard fixed-hub drone design couldn’t do it. Not at the price point we wanted. We needed to find another solution,” Erik continues.
Dozens of prototypes and 1000s of hours of development later, Erik had a revelation.
“The bicycle wheel! It seems so obvious now but it was a big breakthrough moment. The bicycle wheel is light, strong, and rugged. It is an underappreciated technological marvel. And it means that the Modovolo Lift is way lighter than any commercial drone. ”
“When you lift the Lift (pun intended), it’s hard to believe the sensation. t’s so light that it feels like you can just throw it in the air with your pinky. Just over two pounds without batteries and even with batteries it tops out at 7.7 pounds, far less than other commercial drones now without their batteries.”
But that’s not even the best part. There is yet another benefit of the bicycle-wheel-inspired design: it’s endlessly configurable.
Erik explains, “That was the next ah-ha moment where we realized that the bicycle-wheel design meant we weren’t restricted to the standard fixed-hub design. The Lift Pods and Utility Pods could be arranged in whatever way the mission demanded. Need more flight time or payload capacity? Add more Lift Pods!”
The lightness of the design, its configurability, and the unique design of the propeller blade give the Modovolo Lift some exceptional capabilities. The prototype of Quad Configuration, which has four Lift Pods and then a Utility Pod in the middle, can lift up to five pounds of payload and still get well over an hour of flight time.
Ready to get your Modovolo Lift?
“Well, there is only a limited run of 200 pre-orders. Those customers will get guaranteed production priority, special access to our engineering team, a limited edition modovolo t-shirt, and get to direct what kinds of Utility Pods we’ll build first.”
Pre-order now at modovolo.com.
