The 2019 Drone Racing League Allianz World Championship Season is due to take off on August 11, where a dozen top pilots will be racing 600 custom-built Racer4 drones. For the first time, the Drone Racing League is making a street-ready version of its latest pro flyer available to consumers.
"We're incredibly excited to launch the DRL Racer4 and the street model for everyone to experience the thrill and speed of professional drone racing," said DRL CEO Nicholas Horbaczewski. "The DRL Racer4 will make our 2019 DRL Allianz World Championship Season more competitive than ever and finally give our fans what they've been asking us for: a DRL drone they can fly."
The DRL Racer4 Street FPV drone has launched on Kickstarter, and features the same power system as the Racer4 pro racing drone, comprising a 2,200 mAh lithium polymer battery pack, 1,250 Kv motors and four tri-blade props that combine to generate over 16 lb of thrust. That means it should be quite the performer, though not as quick as the hand-built RacerX that claimed a Guinness World Record in 2017.
The polycarbonate body features 100 LED lights up top – the pro racing version has a thousand – which can animate designs and patterns as you fly. This canopy has been designed to take a few hits and live to tell the tale, but in the event of a crash, DRL says that the modular drone can be repaired within 15 minutes using plug-n-play off-the-shelf electronics.
Pilots new to flying will be able to take advantage of complimentary access to DRL's Simulator, which will teach you how to fly a FPV drone.
As of writing, there are 57 days remaining on the Kickstarter campaign, where pledges start at US$599. If all goes to plan, shipping (to the US only) is estimated to start in April 2020. The video below has more.
Sources: DRL, Kickstarter