Ever crashed a drone and found yourself wishing you could just print a replacement part for it? Well, thanks to a Barcelona-based startup called Bonadrone, your dreams might soon come true. The company is on the cusp of launching a new drone called the Mosquito: a modular quadcopter that –aside from the motors, batteries, and control electronics– is made almost entirely from 3D printed parts. If you ever break the chassis or just feel like upgrading to a new design, you can seriously just download a file and print it yourself (as long as you’ve got a 3D printer, of course). The drone’s creators are also building a platform that will provide access to a community of users that (in theory) will help design future versions of drone technology from their own ideas.
Building your own quadcopter may be old hat to some drone enthusiasts, but Bonadrone promises that new drone fans won’t be left out. In order to guide users through the modular construction process of the Mosquito, Bonadrone will provide step-by-step assembly instructions and operating instructions, and even has a readily available support team. The drone comes with all parts included, except for a camera which you can attach to the Mosquito’s gimbal for smooth HD videos. For the less DIY-adventurous, the Mosquito also comes in a ready-to-fly version that is fully assembled in the box. Drone pilots will only have to connect the battery in order to fly the Mosquito with all its features fully configured.
One of the most exciting parts of Bonadrone’s mission is to implement the drone-flying ideas of its community of users. Backers and Mosquito “pilots” will be able to submit ideas that the community will vote on, and Bonadrone promises to develop the most successful proposals approximately every four months. “BonaDrone aims to serve the DIY Drone community,” according to the company website, and with a community program like that, it just might.
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Bonadrone will launch a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo at midnight Eastern tonight, according to the countdown on their website. As such, details on price aren’t available quite yet — but since the drone is mostly 3D printed, it’s probably safe to assume that it won’t break the bank.
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