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58 Report | AUVSI Xponential virtual 2020 Target Arm has unveiled the newest version of its Tular universal launch and recovery system for fixed-wing and multi-rotor UAVs in military, civil and commercial applications. “Tular 3.0 enables launch and recovery from any moving vehicle, autonomously and even in windy conditions,” said Jeffrey McChesney. “The primary innovation, patented for air, water and space, is two sets of counter-opposed pin arrays that extend or retract electromechanically from top and bottom panels to enable a drone to remain in the free airstream for launch and recovery. Our proprietary pin designs have been tested with more than 50 different versions.” The Tular was originally developed in response to a DARPA request for concepts that could launch and recover a UAV from a C-130 aircraft, which Tular is designed to do, in addition to launching and recovering from C-17s and C-5s at higher airspeeds. McChesney added, “Unit #1 of Tular v3.0 is being assembled this month [November 2020]. It is at TRL 8 and is now commercially available. The first unit is for the US Air Force as a demonstrator for nuclear convoy protection.” The pins are designed to conform to any size and shape of UAV within the volume between the top and bottom panels. Tular v3.0 measures 122 x 122 x 152 cm, for an internal volume of 2265 litres – 10 times that of the Tular v2.5. Tular has been tested to launch and recover UAVs at high cycle rates every 20-30 seconds, and at road speeds above 65 mph. It has an MTBF of at least 230,000 pin actuation cycles. FLIR has unveiled two new products suited to UAV integrations and missions. The FLIR Hadron is an EO/IR module integrating a 12 MP RBG camera and a FLIR Boson thermal camera with shutter as well as an IMU. It has a video performance of up to 60 Hz (with full resolution in both RBG and thermal modes), and has been designed for SWaP-C optimisation to enable its use on small UAS airframes constrained by battery life and flight time. “Two companies have already integrated the new FLIR Hadron – Teal Drones with their Golden Eagle UAV, and Vantage Robotics on their Vesper UAV,” said Randall Warnas. “A priority for both companies was making their platform as light as possible, to allow the drones to fly further and for longer.” FLIR also launched the Vue TZ20, the first gimbal with high-resolution dual thermal sensors built for the DJI Matrice V2 200 Series and Matrice 300 UAVs. Key applications include police, fire and search & rescue operations “We developed the Vue TZ20 with the DJI Payload SDK and DJI Skyport 2.0 platform, to offer simplified, plug- and-play operations through the DJI Pilot software,” Warnas said. “Payload functions include thermal video streaming, video recording and still- December/January 2021 | Unmanned Systems Technology Target Arm’s Tular 3.0 enables launch and recovery from any moving vehicle Key applications for the FLIR TZ20 include police and fire operations