Drone Payload Compatibility Checklist: Gimbal + Link + GCS in One System

The aircraft is bought, the payload is chosen, and then the integration meeting discovers the truth: the gimbal speaks to the autopilot fine, but nobody checked whether the video link carries its control channel, or whether the ground station has a port for the second camera. Payload compatibility is a systems question that most teams treat as three component purchases. This checklist runs the five checks in the order that catches problems before money moves.

Check 1 — Protocol path, end to end

Every hop the control signal travels has to speak the same language:

• Gimbal → autopilot: the SIYI pods we supply (ZR10, ZR30, A8 mini) are compatible with ArduPilot and PX4 over Mavlink; the ZT30 additionally lists S.Bus, Ethernet and UDP/TCP/UART control paths.
• Autopilot → ground: the link must pass Mavlink telemetry transparently. The MK15 ground station carries 15 km dual-1080p digital transmission with control and telemetry in the same link; the HM30 is an all-in-one remote-control/telemetry/video system at 20 km.
• Ground → operator: does the GCS software expose the gimbal? QGroundControl's gimbal page drives the ZR series — the manufacturer's own tutorial covers exactly this chain (watch it).

Write the path as one line: pod → UART → FC → link air unit → link ground unit → GCS. If any hop is "we assume," that is the hop that fails.

Check 2 — Video interfaces match the recorder

The catalogue's output specs exist for a reason:

CVBS on the A8 mini is not nostalgia — it is how you feed an older FPV goggle or legacy recorder without a converter in the vibration path. Ethernet on the ZR30 is how you run video 15 m through a vehicle roof without HDMI falling over. Buy the connector you will actually use.

Check 3 — Throughput budget, not wishful thinking

A link's published throughput is a shared ceiling. The AEROLINK long-range family splits by class: 20 Mbps single-node on the anti-interference T line (HK-T46 at 300 km), 40 Mbps on the M mesh and T27 classes, 80 Mbps on the HK-D35 high-bandwidth mesh. One 4K stream plus thermal plus telemetry fits comfortably in 80; it does not fit in 20 alongside two HD feeds. Count streams at their transmitted bitrates, then add 30% headroom for hops and retransmission.

Check 4 — Power and mass budget

• Air side: pods draw from the aircraft rail; the ZT30's four sensors and the MT11's 10T AI compute are not 5 W devices. Check the pod's voltage range against your actual battery configuration, and its mass against payload-at-endurance (see the TCO comparison for why 7 kg on the AT-G07 is a different aircraft than 1 kg on a 34-minute quad).
• Ground side: the UniRC 10 Pro specifies endurance hot-swapping — the difference between a two-hour sortie and a two-hour mission with a dead controller at the far end. The HK-GC portable ground base station runs 9–36 V, which is vehicle electrical, not mains-only.
• The 1.4 GHz link's ground segment dissipates real watts: the HK-T46 is rated 172 W ±10. Plan the power before the mast.

Check 5 — The pairing table exists; use it

We publish cross-category pairings on every product page ("Pairs well with") because the tested combinations are finite and the untested ones are expensive. The canonical chains in our catalogue:

• Survey/inspection: ZR30 pod + UniRC 7 Pro or UniRC 10 Pro ground station; powerline inspection solution for the mission template.
• Night/patrol: ZT30 or MT11 + HM30 link + security surveillance solution.
• Long-range/BVLOS corridor: AT-G07 VTOL + AEROLINK T-series sized to corridor length + UniRC 10 Pro.
• Ground vehicle: D100 + M-series mesh link (moving ground end) + UniRC 7 for the operator.

The one-page version

Before you sign any of the three quotations:

1. Protocol path written end-to-end, no "assumed" hops.
2. Video connectors match the recorder/goggle/display you own.
3. Stream bitrates summed against the link's published throughput, with headroom.
4. Voltage ranges and wattage checked for both air and ground segments.
5. At least one link in the chain is a manufacturer-documented combination, not three independent guesses.

Component pages carry full published specifications, MOQ and the 5/20/50-unit tiers; if your combination is not in the pairing table, send the three part numbers and the mission — integration questions are free, and answering them before the purchase is the cheapest hour in the whole programme.