"Drone from AliExpress": Russia's GRU shows off new UAV to hunt Ukrainian air defence
The Defence Intelligence of Ukraine has published on the WarSanctions portal the components of a new Russian drone, which Russia uses as a reconnaissance and decoy target to identify Ukrainian air defence positions and overload its work. According to intelligence, this UAV is also capable of carrying a warhead of up to 15 kg.
Chinese components in a new Russian UAV. Illustration: GUR
The UAV has a delta-wing fuselage similar to the Shahed-136 (Geranium-2), but it is much more compact. Its electronics are almost entirely of Chinese origin. About half of the components (flight controller, navigation modules, sensors, antennas) are manufactured by CUAV Technology, which in 2022 announced a ban on the supply of its products to Russia and Ukraine to avoid military use.
Nevertheless, in 2023, Russia introduced a vertical take-off UAV of its own design, which turned out to be a standard CUAV product sold on AliExpress.
Other components include DLE (Mile Haoxiang Technology) motors, KST servos, a Razer FPV camera from Foxeer Technology, Mayatech RFD900X data modules, ReadyToSky video transmitter, Hobbywing power regulators, and HRB Power batteries. Some of these parts have already been used in Gerber, Parody, Shahed-136 and V2U.
Components of the drone, named GUR CBTS.611000. Illustration: WarSanctions
Interestingly, the Chinese copy of the Australian RFD900x module allows drones to transmit data up to 40 km in line of sight. This enhances the Russian Federation's capabilities in aerial reconnaissance and organising a network of UAVs for massive attacks.
Source: WarSanctions
