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I remember this thread being a lot more popular back in the day. It's a shame that when i finally get into it the thread seems to have broken down a bit. At any rate i'm done ordering all the parts for my upcoming quad builds. Originally i started out building only a super agile one with lots of spare parts and then decided i might as well put those parts on something and planned an fpv setup.

frames:
impulserc.com warpquad
flyduino.com minicp120 warthox
zmr250v2
zmr250

flight controller:
openpilot cc3d x 2

tx:
dx6i

rx:
spektrum ar610

motors:
sunnysky x2204s x 8
for maintenance picked up spare bearings, shafts, retainer rings, oil

esc's:
spider 18a opto esc's x 8

lipo's:
1300mah 3s 35c venom and luminier x 12 total
1300mah 4s 60c luminier x 2

props:
56 sets of gemfan 5045 nylon glass fiber
2 sets of gemfan 5045 carbon fiber
debating on getting some 5030 to reduce wear on the motors with 4s and 6030's

fpv gear:

fatshark attitude v3 goggles
fatshark 600tvl with pan/tilt
immersion 5.8gh 600mw avtx
Circular polarized antennas

random:
voltage monitoring buzzer
power filter for camera/avtx

If i'm missing something please tell me. I've spent the past few weeks making sure i'm not missing the slightest thing because i'm scared that i'll crash, break some random small and silly but majorly significant part and be screwed for a few months.

So today i got out to a field to test the new build, airport tower was friendly as usual and cleared me for an hour and a half, and i used every minute of that time. Used all 14 batteries and couldn't have had any more fun. Didn't so much as scratch a prop. Maybe it's because i've had some mild experience flying line of sight but it was so much easier and more fluid than i could have possibly imagined flying in rate mode.

My 3s batteries were intended to be, and basically are, training wheels. Not only are they slower anyway because of the 3s, the low C rating caps my max output to a more mild level. I did use the 4s batteries though, and the monstrous speed and power is incredible, in fact it's so fast that i can't remotely reach max speed horizontally because my camera is looking straight down at the ground by that point. I'll angle it up when i think i actually should be flying at those crazy speeds. I got a mobius camera so later i'll mount it on there and get some video.

Anyway here's a pic. Thanks to the power of mspaint i was able to remove my reg number which is on one of the props.
23532664124_f47220fb47_o by james rodgers, on Flickr

Neeto. How big is it? The picture doesn't really show scale.

SuperSpy wrote:

Neeto. How big is it? The picture doesn't really show scale.

Based on the prop size 5"x4.5, I'd say the length is about 10" or so.

--SS

Yea that's about right. It's about 12". Today i put it through the grinder. Sure enough i'm already trying to take away the training wheels and it was certainly a break in for the quad.

To start, i have to highly recommend this hobby to people who were concerned with the cost of doing heli's or planes. I crashed 4 times today, the first time was because i angled my camera up and i wasn't adjusted and flew into the ground full speed. The camera went to static, i laughed, and when i took off my goggles it was STILL ROLLING ON THE GROUND and then finally rolled to a stop. This was a seriously abusive crash. The cost? I replace the front two propellers(about 1$ of parts and 2 minutes of time), found the battery which had sent itself flying, put on another battery and started flying. I also flew it into a tree where it broke more props, and one time i stomped it on the ground straight down flat because i was flying down too hard to stop in time. Everything is still in flawless condition.

Also since i angled the camera and was going much harder today i noticed that i have some tuning to do. If i run at max output 3s or put on the 4s battery, the power is amazing, but it oscillates pretty badly to the point it causes the banking to be hard to predict. I already made changes that i think should fix it completely.

I took some video but really there's no point in watching it since i didn't have an angled mount set up yet. It's literally a video of the ground moving really fast, not a lot goin on there.

On an unrelated note, i'm thinking that i'm probably going to get another camera and vtx sent to me at the terminal this weekend and i'm going to slap that on one of the lighter bodies i've already mostly built. Next time i get ready to go home i'm going to order some of these ultralights. http://www.blackboltdesign.com/xbr220/xbr-220

So i built the smaller one. It's using the exact same powertrain, so the lighter smaller body will pay off in agility and top speed by quite a large margin. This one also has an easier camera mount with a fixed 20 degree angle for my current camera. I really need a camera that i can angle more easily but stock on desired quad parts can be really annoying to find.

2016-01-08_08-54-21 by james rodgers, on Flickr

I've started tuning this one in the truck which is going okay, looking forward to flying next weather permitting chance i get.

On another note, i called the airport twice in one day while i was still in town and they were quite frustrated. I know they have real work to do but i can't help but follow the law. He basically told me not to call unless i was flying on the runway but that puts me in an awkward spot. If i don't call i'm technically not flying lawfully, and if it ever causes a problem i'm sure i'd be on the hook for not having called. For example, what if a medicopter is flying into a field i'm flying in and comes in low from a blind spot. I also don't want to piss off the airport because they might just start denying me my fly time. What you want me to do faa?

About 10 notches below this, Monoprice just delivered a Makeblock mBot 2.4Ghz 'bot. I'm just about to crack the seal on the box to find out (for realz and a lulz or two) what my $70 bought me, and whether it's any good for my nephew and niece’s upcoming birthdays. I'm imagining/hoping they get into a Robot Wars thing, but that's prolly way too optimistic.

MarkG509 wrote:

About 10 notches below this, Monoprice just delivered a Makeblock mBot 2.4Ghz 'bot. I'm just about to crack the seal on the box to find out (for realz and a lulz or two) what my $70 bought me, and whether it's any good for my nephew and niece’s upcoming birthdays. I'm imagining/hoping they get into a Robot Wars thing, but that's prolly way too optimistic.

From the page:

The mechanical body of the mBot is compatible with Makeblock platform and most of Lego parts, while the electronic parts of it is developed based on the Arduino open source ecosystem

There's no part of that sentence that isn't awesome.

Heiwashin wrote:

There's no part of that sentence that isn't awesome.

I have it working from Windoze and Mac OS X. Took longer than it should have because I miss-plugged in the 2.4GHz module. I think the kids would rather program it via their iPads (which would need the BlueTooth version). Given it's 4 AA batteries, I'd have expected it to be faster, and have already smashed into a wall or two

But, so far, it's better than I expected and definitely could be programmed by kids in the mid-single-digit years of age who've already gone all the way through Codeables (apparently now called "Bitsbox"). Dropping out of their drag-n-drop programming environment to Arduino's "C" IDE is indeed really awesome.

My only complaint so far is that it doesn't move very well on the rug in my computer room.

Heiwashin wrote:

On another note, i called the airport twice in one day while i was still in town and they were quite frustrated. I know they have real work to do but i can't help but follow the law. He basically told me not to call unless i was flying on the runway but that puts me in an awkward spot. If i don't call i'm technically not flying lawfully, and if it ever causes a problem i'm sure i'd be on the hook for not having called. For example, what if a medicopter is flying into a field i'm flying in and comes in low from a blind spot. I also don't want to piss off the airport because they might just start denying me my fly time. What you want me to do faa?

I'd basically read that as blanket permission to you to fly anywhere but the runway.

Don't worry about the medicopter scenario, that's a risk anywhere even when you are not in the range of an airport so they'll take a look before landing.

P.S. I'm not a lawyer and this advice is worth exactly what you paid for it

I haven't had much chance to fly, but i've continued hopping out to do a tuning run when i can. The other day it felt pretty damn good while flying but still has high power pitch backwards problems. Honestly i could probably fix that just by putting my battery forward an inch because i know it's back heavy. I'll give that a shot next time i fly.

Did my first maintenance check today since i have some downtime and was unpleasantly surprised to find i have 3 grindy motors. One isn't that bad and i'm going to keep flying it for a bit but not too happy about that since i didn't realize when i got the motors they use two bearings each. So i bought 10 bearings thinking i was over buying by a lot, now i only have 6 spares left. I'm not sure if they were damaged in crashes or were just bad, but i'm thinking they were just bad. I hate, truly hate, removing and reattaching 3mm retaining rings. I mean really hate it. My hands don't fit xl gloves. Trying to manipulate that tiny ring into the groove makes me an unhappy camper. At least the motors purring like a kitten after having finished was worth it.

Also i'm trying to figure out how i want to angle mount the mobius now since i didn't buy a special mount, when i figure that out i'll have some video.

Heiwashin wrote:

Did my first maintenance check today since i have some downtime and was unpleasantly surprised to find i have 3 grindy motors. One isn't that bad and i'm going to keep flying it for a bit but not too happy about that since i didn't realize when i got the motors they use two bearings each. So i bought 10 bearings thinking i was over buying by a lot, now i only have 6 spares left. I'm not sure if they were damaged in crashes or were just bad, but i'm thinking they were just bad. I hate, truly hate, removing and reattaching 3mm retaining rings. I mean really hate it. My hands don't fit xl gloves. Trying to manipulate that tiny ring into the groove makes me an unhappy camper. At least the motors purring like a kitten after having finished was worth it.

Crashes, especially with a motor still at speed are immensely hard on bearings, and shafts. The kinetic energy involved in a motor/prop combo spinning several thousand rpm is immense. Consider the gyroscopic force imparted on the rear motors, spinning at speed as the front props dig into the dirt and flip the quad end over end. Then we get into dirt and grime. Unless you are paying a relative fortune, those aren't sealed bearings so that little cloud of dust you kicked up in impact eventually works its way in to the bearings. They are consumables and their lifetime is inversely proportional to your skills as a pilot.

No arguments from me on the retaining rings though.

--SS

SecretSquirrel wrote:

They are consumables and their lifetime is inversely proportional to your skills as a pilot.
--SS

Well i'm not being very well behaved when flying right now so i better order some more soon. Something that i'm still working on is landing while not being able to really see the ground when trying to slow down because of the camera angle. I just put on a wider angle lens so i'm hoping that helps a little bit. But because of that i've smacked the ground a few times because i cut throttle too high and it flipped. That's really the only thing that could have damaged the motors on this body.

I was doing some more tuning today and something odd happened. On one of my attempts to take off it spazzed and flipped itself maximum rate as i applied minimum throttle to launch. I assumed it was a failed gyro zero and tried again and it did the same thing except this time it broke off my antenna on the vtx pads and all. So i bring it in and see in the gcs that it sees itself flipping end over end uncontrollably fast and calibration won't fix it. Don't know what the deal is with that but the problem went away when i reloaded the same firmware onto it. Not really all that bothered since i wanted to redo a few things on it anyway including putting on a different, lighter, vtx, but this time you can be dam sure i'm putting the vtx inside of it and use the frames antenna mount. I don't like that the firmware apparently isn't 100% reliable though. Maybe i'll pick up some different types of fc's next round of purchases.

Heiwashin wrote:

I haven't had much chance to fly, but i've continued hopping out to do a tuning run when i can. The other day it felt pretty damn good while flying but still has high power pitch backwards problems. Honestly i could probably fix that just by putting my battery forward an inch because i know it's back heavy. I'll give that a shot next time i fly.

Did my first maintenance check today since i have some downtime and was unpleasantly surprised to find i have 3 grindy motors. One isn't that bad and i'm going to keep flying it for a bit but not too happy about that since i didn't realize when i got the motors they use two bearings each. So i bought 10 bearings thinking i was over buying by a lot, now i only have 6 spares left. I'm not sure if they were damaged in crashes or were just bad, but i'm thinking they were just bad. I hate, truly hate, removing and reattaching 3mm retaining rings. I mean really hate it. My hands don't fit xl gloves. Trying to manipulate that tiny ring into the groove makes me an unhappy camper. At least the motors purring like a kitten after having finished was worth it.

Also i'm trying to figure out how i want to angle mount the mobius now since i didn't buy a special mount, when i figure that out i'll have some video.

Those retaining rings don't do squat in most motors, in our pylon racers we actually remove them so that rather than changing props we slide the shaft, motorbell and prop off in on piece, then pop a different one in. The magnetic forces hold them on just fine.

I actually worked out a pretty good way to get them changed out by using cuticle clippers from walmart and grabbing them from the side. I have a 50 pack of them so I rip off the old one any kind of way. I did notice the magnetic force is quite strong but I don't think I could fly peacefully without knowing some sort of clip is on there.

*edit also wouldn't the efforts of the motor pulling the bell back in cause some power losses. Seems like it would actually be a fairly significant loss considering the force involved.

Flew some more today, i'm getting pretty good at keeping control and flying under tree branches while flying between trees and junk like that, general low altitude flying control which is what these small ones are all about. Still working out the understanding of exactly how hard to bank to get a flat sharp turn. I made some mistakes.

Again these things take so much punishment. I don't even remember how many times i crashed today, but i do know that i broke two full sets of propellers and somehow even managed to turn my camera sideways. New props, flying good as new.

Excluding the vtx that broke because i didn't mount it properly the first time it's about a grand total of 10$ on damaged parts so far, an average of about 50 cents a crash. I was really expecting far worse when i started, but time will tell how it adds up. A while back i picked up another 25 sets of abs props which are far less likely to just snap like mine but aren't as good for flying. I'll keep them as backups.

Funny thing, one of the times i crashed i smacked THROUGH a trees branches somehow, it kept flying straight to my surprise, but then smacked into another big branch in a different tree. By the time i get there to pick it up, there's a 60-70 year old man gently kicking at it with his foot as if it were possibly going to bite him or something. Him and his wife saw me because of my laughter.

I'm assuming that some of you guys are picking up on how attractive i'm trying to make this seem financially compared to previous flying rc hobbies cus i'm trying to make some more of you pick it up I'm still working on tuning my 4s setup which is what i'm planning to use the camera on, and since i reorganized the quad i don't have a good way to mount it still. If i can get one full day of decent weather on a saturday i can finish all of the tuning and make some fun videos.

Heiwashin wrote:

*edit also wouldn't the efforts of the motor pulling the bell back in cause some power losses. Seems like it would actually be a fairly significant loss considering the force involved.

The pylon racers we do that on run 115 MPH with out with out the clips, they don't care, same goes for every other thing I have done it on. There might be a motor out there that you need it but I have never seen it.


Spent most of the day today working on the wiring in my new toy.

IMG_3682 by Hance1976, on Flickr

Are you planning to ride in that thing, it's huge

89 inch wingspan, 60cc engine. I agree it is huge, biggest one I have owned by a way. Its baby size compared to what some of my friends fly.

Hance wrote:

89 inch wingspan, 60cc engine. I agree it is huge, biggest one I have owned by a way. Its baby size compared to what some of my friends fly.

What airframe? Could be an Extra (260 or 3x0), an Edge, and MX2 or something else. Can't really tell from that angle without seeing the cowl as well.

I think quads are really cool from a tech perspective, but I have never been drawn to them as a hobby (enjoyment) platform. As a camera platform, that I have considered, but suddenly you are in the price range of that 60cc bird.

I have a 1/5th scale Mustang kit that I really need to get started on...

--SS

89 inch Slick from 3DHS, good buddy of mine owns Northwest RC, he is the west cost 3DHS/Extreme Flight warehouse http://northwestrc.com/3d-Hobby-Shop--8 ... _p_16.html

Had one hell of a smash today. It looked like one side of a prop broke midair over pavement so it slowly rolled onto it's side while losing altitude then slammed nice and hard. Had to replace the bearings in two motors and lost an angled antenna connector. Considering the degree of crash that's a very mild cost of about 8$. Either way next time i head home i'm buying 6-10 sleeves of bearings, i can see this is going to be a routine thing. Looks like both of my shafts made it out with no problems. I still can't figure out how to comfortably mount my mobius at an angle. The fact that there's nothing to grip on top of it causes a risk of coming lose mid flight. I'm even parked at a lowes and i'm wandering around in there looking at possible things to use and finding nothing. I guess i'm gonna have to wait until i can get my hands on something designed for the purpose to do any videos. That's a shame too, i reckon i can fly within an accuracy of a few feet of where i want to be now and i was hoping to get some fun vids posted.

Well that project is done. Time to find something else to work on I guess. IMG_3709 by Hance1976

IMG_3702 by Hance1976

That thing is a monster.

Come to think of it, where the heck do you even fly something of that size. You need a runway for that monstrosity.

Heiwashin wrote:

Come to think of it, where the heck do you even fly something of that size. You need a runway for that monstrosity.

That's my club's runway. 640'x30' paved with a 20' grass strip along side. For something as big as what Hance built, you go fly off grass as long as it is smooth. Now, having space to fly is a whole different discussion.

--SS

What's the deal with the elevator? Is one side fixed for trim and only the other moves?

Hance wrote:

Well that project is done. Time to find something else to work on I guess. IMG_3709 by Hance1976

IMG_3702 by Hance1976

Are you about to find out that you can't remove it from the house because it won't fit through any of the doors?

Buub wrote:

Are you about to find out that you can't remove it from the house because it won't fit through any of the doors?

"Doors? Where we're going, we don't need doors."

I'm thinking about going back to my parents' house for the summer, and doing a motorized bike project of sorts. Only problem is, I don't actually know how to fit a regular bike in my Civic (sedan/low trunk is the problem), never mind something like that. Time to get a bike rack maybe? Or dremel out everything past the C-pillar and call it good?