You think the "Banshee" looks cool on picture?? You should see it live!
I flew drones when i was in the army, and that was one fun year!
An even better page is this one:
http://www.jerofuel.no/dro.htm
It's in Norwegian, and is written by Per M. Strømmen, the second in command of the Norwegian Drone Service (He served as a regular pilot the same year i did).
It basicly says:
The large drone is a Banshee 400, produced by the British company "Meggit Defence System Limited", and that it has been in use for 13 years in 25 countries. There has been made 2500 Banshees.
It's a multi-role drone with possibilites to carry smoke-cannisters, stationary flares on the wingtips (to attract missiles i guess), and drop flares (the usual way). It can also be fitted with a camera for recon and UAV-missions.
The Banshee is launced by a catapult, and is recovered either by parachute, or bellylanding it.
Wingspan: 2,49 meters
Length: 2,84 meters
Height: 0,71 meters
Weight: 54,5 Kg.
MTOW: 70,3 Kg.
Fuel: 17 liters og 100LL AVGAS
Speedrange: 75-400 km/h
Endurance: 1:20
Payload: 16 Kg.
Banshee is used mainly as a missile-target for the Navy, and mostly missiles like Sea-Sparrow and Mistral is used. It has also been used as target for the laser-guided Robot 70 in Norway. It's about to be introduced to the Air Force as a target for the F-16's and their Sidewinders.
The Banshee can be operated either manually within visual range, or with autopilot and telemetry.
It has to engine-options:
A 350 ccm boxer (26 BHP) driving a 24x27-prop, or a 250 ccm wankel (39 BHP) driving a 26x30-prop.
The a few words on the light-drone "MATS-C" that is built in Norway. I flew these my self, and it's a very basic model with a fibreglass-fuselage and a OS 1.40RX for power. They switched from OS 1.08 to the 1.40 while i was there, and that was most certainly a positive change.
The MATS-C is used for target-practise with everything from light personal weapons to 40mm AA-guns, and it can sure take a good beating before you end up using the parachute for recovery (or bellylanding it). We'd just patch it up, and send it up again, so one got used to quick field-repairs. It has no rudder, reaches maximum speed at 170-180 km/h, and has been flown in winds above 20 m/s, and handled it better than the pilot (Iv'e tried 28 m/s wind with it myself, and it was easier to keep in the air than on ground as it was way above the stallspeed).