Another topic about pitot needed or not

Few pilots in my area discuss if the wind speed sensor is really needed or not for autonomous flight, i have been flying for almost a year more or less successfully without it, but i assume that it will be very helpful for special situations like landing or taking off.
Please give me arguments or experiences and recommendations.
Thanks in advance!

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Depends on what you are looking for:

Advantages:
-Squeeze more endurance out of your batteries
-Better turns and altitude control
-Makes auto landings much easier
-Reduces possibilites of stalls

Disadvantages:
-One more sensor to tune
-One more part to break

IMHO the pitot results in a much better flight and I try to use it as much as possible, especially on big airframes for mapping that need maximum endurance. However, if Iā€™m just testing something on a foamie I usually donā€™t install it.

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Taking into account that one of the main functions is the takeoff and landing support, why no height sensors (none of them!) are so common? Arenā€™t those of much more help in precision landings?

How do you get true airspeed from a sonar sensor?

I didnā€™t meant that, what I wonder is why so many pitots around, my understanding about it is that during flight are not so needed, they become really useful during auto takeoff and autolanding, and in those circumstances the dedicated height sensors are also really useful, and are not so commonā€¦
I just try to find an explanation about why so many people have pitots when I dont find them so essential to fly, specially taking into account the extra configuration and troubleshooting potential issues.

Even I had similar Questions . I would love to get some more insight

I have made more than a hundred of automated flights with a fx-78 without pitot. Definitely is not essential, but Iā€™m sure it will improve something somehow xD

Hey guys, I just ran into this discussion. Iā€™ve been on the fence on installing a pitot myself. I particularly am working with a QuadPlane and seems it is a recommended component to have specifically for the transition from vtol to fixed wing. Any of you working with QuadPlanes? Love to hear your insight.

Iā€™m more happy with pitot in automatic flights with fx61 and Skywalker 2014. Charles_c resume it well.
Did you fly in high wind @Andres_Abrego ?

Agree, @charles_c made a good resume of pros and cons, and I consider those true even having all my flights without it. I have made a lot of flights with way to much wind, never stalled in auto flight, with throttle cruising at 30%. Itā€™s true that when turning in high winds between lanes the plane can make strange movements (sudden falling 1 or 2 meters), but it always auto-accelerate when turning therefore it is never an issue.

BUT, I think that a quad plane is a much different thing, and I assume that the wind speed shall be essential to manage the transition process

Thanks for your insight. Itā€™s what I figured. Obviously Iā€™m trying to avoid having additional hardware and dealing with more debugging. But I guess Iā€™ll have to bite the bullet.

Any experience with good results using a digital airspeed and ext compass with I12c? I bought a digital one for my cuadplane but some people reports conflicts with compass.

Hearing about these issues is what has me concerned getting into the AirSpeed Sensor. Cala2, in your opinion, do you think at least the analog sensors work better? How is the setup? Tedious? Have you tried running a QuadPlane without an airspeed sensor?

Alexander: I near you in this task, only that I bought the airspeed but I never use one and I donĀ“t installed yet, IĀ“m flying a Skywalker for long time without it and no issues but today was my first little test with a cuadplane; IĀ“m following Greg and others experiences here and trying to learn too.

Thanks @cala2. Best of luck as well on your progress. Love to see some progress footage on your end.

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Here you can see my progress. As soon as you tube finish to upload I share my first quad test :slight_smile: First Phantom FX 61 VTOL

@cala2 great job! Looks like a successful hover test to me. One thing Iā€™ve learned in this journey is making your fixedwing hover is already half the battle. Keep up the great work! Looking forward to upcoming progress!

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My experience is that an analog airspeed sensor is more reliable, but a digital is more accurate. I had I2C issues with my digital so switched back to the analog and have had no problems. I purchased a 5525 that I will try soon. If a digital is working well for you, perhaps you can fly with less of a margin above stall because it is less noisy, this would increase endurance somewhat.
Without an airspeed sensor the plane uses more throttle than it needs to and wastes a lot of battery. I consider them essential for safe autolandings, efficient mapping, and certainly Quadplanes.

Thanks @iskess for your input. From what Iā€™m gathering from several other users, the route with less headaches is the analog sensor. Is that your consensus as well?