I am planning to add drones as a Pirate-only tech.
If you add the regular drones without further modding, they'll be really messed up as to speed. Pull out the movement bonus, and watch the mass/engines per move setting.
You will need to alter the following entry in techareas.txt to get your drones available for research:
code:
Name := Drones
Group := Applied Science
Description := A dummy tech area
Maximum Level := 5
Level Cost := 10000
Start Level := 5
Raise Level := 0
Racial Area := 999
Unique Area := 0
Can Be Removed := False
Number of Tech Req := 0