Sunday, 1 May 2016

ZMR180 [BUILD]

Hi , after a long time watching the cool youtube videos of the amazing mini quad, wanted to get down to building a quad myself. This is a cheap mini quad build, with decent parts and as builds go, this was my first and it was more of an exercise in teaching myself to actually build this machine. The parts used are here:

ZMR180 frame
1303 3100kv motors
DYS BL20A 
Frsky D4R-II CPPM
Naze 32Acro
Gemfan4045(3s) / Gemfan 3030(4s)
Tunigy 1300mah 3s 
Dinogy 1000mah 4s 65C 



As you can see these are not the high end parts you would find on the pro racing quads, but its a tidy setup. The build was a learning process for me, although you can find so much information on the internet, its different to when you are building something yourself. These are just some tips when building these things:

  • Insulate the electronic parts from the frame, proper carbon fibre frames conduct electricity 
  • If using heat shrink never shrink the casing before testing everything. 
  • Use a clean soldering iron, and move quickly with high powered ones.
  • Loctite all screw and nuts.
  • Don't apply loctite before finishing the build, otherwise you will have a bad time trying to open up the quad again.
  • When ordering parts , always order some spares just in case.

The final quad was not so bad, even if I was not entirely happy about the result. I have done basic programming and tried it out on hovering. Unfortunately one of the motor did not last long and , during bench testing it was already showing bad signs, and after a couple minutes of flying it gave up. Lesson learned, always buy spares, otherwise you will get stuck just  when things are getting good. 

On another note, the ZMR180 frame is not so bad, but it has some thing that I do not like very much. It does not have an adjustable fpv camera mount, it is fixed inside the frame. The anti vibration mount for the recording camera, is a bit flimsy, the carbon plate is enough but rubber mounts will be ineffective in my opinion. also it comes with a flat mount and no option of changing the angle again. those are the only real grumbles about it. 

The good points are, its very cheap to buy, it has different motor mount holes for larger motors if needed. The carbon parts are clean cut and seem quite tough which is good as its my first mini quad and I am still trying to learn multirotor flying properly. For a frame this size, there is enough space to place all the component onboard without any issue.

Later on I will update this with some maidens and my programming experience, this is the first time tuning these boards. Until then Happy Flying!!

Wednesday, 24 February 2016

Ugly Wonder [BUILD]

Hello everyone, this will be a round up of my build of the Ugly Wonder foamie. As usual in my case, I use what i have available. the foam board used is 3mm thick, very light and when covered actually durable. the plans were downloaded from the FliteTest forums, from a thread belonging to a member called SPONZ,  this guys is great, very helpful. he usually improves the plans and makes them easier to use, or in this case the an original design.  


This is the link
http://forum.flitetest.com/showthread.php?17136-SP0NZ-Plans-Index

So basically its as usual, get plans printed, pin them to the foam mark and cut, there are not really that many parts, that make this plane. It came together really fast.
THe Major Components of the plane
Completed airframe
Assembly is really easy, the plane was made without the power pod design and with a permanent electronics.Speaking of which here is the list:

  • Amax G2822 2600KV motor, 6x4 propeller
  • 30A Plush Esc
  • 2x9g servos
  • 1300mah lipo
  • Frsky V8R4-II


All up weight is 450 grams with battery. A small modification was made to the bottom , were a flap was cut to give access inside the fuselage. The flap was beveled all round to seat the flap in place, something that I saw previously but alway forgot to do when building. Below are the pictures of the result. The weather has been quite bad lately and will wait for a decent day with no wind before the maiden flight. If it flies it gets painted.  Until then Happy Flying!
The bevel cut on the flap
Ready for the maiden flight


Tuesday, 23 February 2016

FPV Finally [BUILD]

Hi everyone, here's a little update of what I have been doing lately. Starting off with good news.  I have finally used a setup for FPV that works for me. After many failures in building a good reliable FPV setup, I have found a good setup that works incredibly well. The components that I am using right now are:


  • AOMWAY FPV 5.8G 200mW AV Transmitter Integrated 700TVL CMOS HD Camera
  • Quanum V2 FPV goggles and RC832 Vrx
  • PNP Skysurfer plane(changed to 6x5 propeller)
  • Cloverleaf antennas 
Simple FPV setup


That's it , incredibly simple, but the joy of it, is, that it works so well. I am quite pleased with the video quality, the weather was not at its best here very cloudy, but the camera is more than workable, the colours are still visible and the image is very clear. although it is a 700tvl Cmos camera, it can handle low light conditions decently. Flying is not an issue at all. Its also a very light system, 20mins fpv flights are easily achievable from a single 2200mah battery powering both the plane and the FPV setup.  I am quite pleased with that. 



Some other parts that worked but I am not using right now.

  1. Tarot300 OSD, this was used on some of my failed FPV setups, it offers enough information to help with flying FPV, it offers basic information such as Engine and video voltages and home position, speeds and altitude. which is enough to fly in my opinion and for less than €30 I think its works well.
  2. NTSC HD 700TVL Sony OSD CCD D-WDR, this is a basic board camera which cost less than €15. Came with all necessary cables and that's it. It has the option of connecting a control board to change settings, but I bought mine without it. The thing that I liked about this camera is it excellent low light video quality, and the clear image is amazing. I will use this at a later stage for sure. This was not used because of the issues I had with the Vtx I had.
Now for a low point in this, I started out using the TS832 Vtx. I don't know but I never got to use these properly, here are some issued I found on my units. To be clear, I have bought this unit 3 times from 3 different online shops. 

  • Sensitive to vibrations, for some reason these units are sensitive to vibrations from the airframe, even slight ones. I have tested these extensively, and they suffer badly from this, using multiple types of  vibration insulation and so on, at a certain point they start loosing video, which is not good. 
  • They heat up more than you think they would. I understand that these unit will heat up  when they are on. Yes I have checked for proper antenna connection and all the usual suspects, in just a minute or two of operation they become very hot. 

I am posting these because they what I have have experienced and it is frustrating, when things don't work one time after another.

One last thing, my simple Tricopter has met its end, while flying aggresively, I made the mistake of flying through the direct sunlight, at which point I overturned my tricopter into an unrecoverable fall from a good hieght, this is what I managed to scrape up. Lesson learned. Onto the next build. 

Remains of my tricotper



Saturday, 12 December 2015

Simple Tricopter [BUILD]

Hi everyone, I have finally built my first multi rotor machine. It had to be cheap and it had to be a decent flyer. The components used for this build are not the best, but they work very well and the final result came out to be quite punchy and maneuverable. Again using one of my favorite go to site Flite Test, I used the David Windestal tricopter layout and downloaded the plans for it. I modified them slightly instead of using the original shape I closed the frame plates up so they look like the tombstone designs. Materials used are what I had already, a legnth of 12mm square dowel and 3mm plywood. All cut up and painted in black.




























With that finished I choose all the electrical parts, below is the list :
KK2.1 Flight Control board(with stock firmware)
Emax 2822 1200kv motors
Afro opto 30A escs
Tower pro 9g metal gear servo
Gemfan 8x4.5 props
Frsky V8FR - II reciver

The most expensive of those where the controllers which I bought unused from a friend of mine. All in the tricopter cost around €110 without the batteries of course. Construction is simple, using a lot of  cable ties to tie down most thing, it is one of the best ways to secure components onto the tricopter as it allows the components to break free in a harsh landing or accidents, and repairs are quick and easy, a must for those still learning to fly, as in my case.

The tail motor assembly is very simple, the servo is attached to the motor mount directly and on the other side I use a piece of bent steel and a self tapping screw with washers. again everything is tied down using cable ties and the a little hot glue, which was used to hold the piece in place until tied down.


The wiring was simple enough online there are several videos documenting this and there is no need to go through. The power distribution cable were soldered up and a couple of extra power out used for thing like the LEDs for example.

The final result is a light tricopter, cheap to build and to repair, and yes its untidy for now. The frame is able to close up making it very portable and as well.
 

All that is left is to find a decent day and properly fly this thing, up until this time the Tricopter has only hovered and needed some settings other than that No actual flying yet.

Until then Happy Flying!

Saturday, 24 October 2015

FT Spitfire [UPDATE]

Hi there, this will be a small update on the FT spitfire I build some time ago. It flew great and looks the, it only needed some paint. With that excuse I bought an airbrush and some paint. The airbrush in question is a very cheap generic dual action airbrush. Paints are normal oil based paint, thinned out using white spirit. 

The plane started out like this.

The plane just after its maiden flight nice and white
Although this was never going to be a scale model, it was always in my mind to get close to the livery of the Spitfires that served over my country. After some research I found that due to the type of land here, the hues are different from those of the Spitfires flown in the UK. It was a mix of some sort of grey blue with brown colours. The colours were mixed and I got to work. The base coat is a slightly blueish grey which covers the hole plane. 

plane painted in the base colour
Next came the brown camouflage scheme on top of the grey to do this I used masking tape, using a good blade , line were cut along the tape in random wave patterns. Using these pieces the areas where masked off. 
Masking up
Using the airbrush the outline of the brown areas was first done and then filled in with colour. A small tip which I should have done was to first dirty up the masking tape by sticking it to my clothes which reduces its stickiness, thus not pulling away any paint as it was being removed. The result were quite good though. 
After removing the masking tape
The last thing was to paint some insignia, some RAF roundels and tail markings. 
Finished for now and drying 


As it stand now the plane needs only a canopy, pilot and a red spinner. It will not fly before its ready, you never know what could happen in flight and at I want a picture of the completed aircraft before it loses to gravity some day.

Few things I learnt from this. 
  • Mask areas properly otherwise you will have over spray on the unmasked areas. 
  • Prepare all stencils beforehand
  • If you are mixing any paint , mix a lot of it, you never know how much you need to used before. 
  • When using an airbrush start spraying on a scrap piece and ten onto the area.

Until then.
Happy Flying.


Monday, 19 October 2015

Blunt Nose Versa WIng FPV [BUILD]

Hi everyone, I will cover the build of my FPV Versa Wing.  These wings are very popular for FPV and for good reason, they are easy to build, there is a lot of information on the internet and they fly quite well. The excellent Flite Test plans allows for a very easy build. The electronics used are as following:

Motor : Emax GT2215 950KV running a 10x6 prop
ESC: Plush 30A 
Servos : generic 9g servos
Radio system : FRSKY D4R-II receiver
Batteries-  Zippy 2200mah 40c Batteries / Video Battery Turnigy 1300mah 30c

FPV setup:
TS-832 Video Transmitter 600mw 5.8Ghz
Tarot 300 OSD
Eachine 700 camera
Braided/ twisted cables and ferrite rings

The first part was easy, trace out the patterns and cut the parts, I added 4 inches to the bottom part of the wing so as to extend the wing and form the blunt nose part. 
Extended bottom wing panels
This allows a lot of space for the FPV setup as well and space for batteries. Running two 2200mah batteries takes up a lot of space. The wiring setup was than spaced out to keep the Video TX away from other components. As you can see from the next photo you can see how much space this small wing has.
Placement of componenets inside wing

the batteries are placed far forward in later photos you will see the final placement of the batteries. the video signal wire is passing in front of the spar or wing shaper while everything else is spaced out. a simple hatch with magnets is used to cover the components but also allows good access to the inside of the wing. On a later date the batteries were moved far more forward with the video system battery nestled between them like this.  
Battery Positions
This allows for the CG to move forward, reducing the amount of ballast needed to get the CG right. Two wooden spars were glued in , the front one is used to stiffen the middle section of the plane, while the rear one is glued to the top of the wing thus joining the upper parts together increasing the rigidity, and thighs the motor mount to it as well, reducing the twisting from the motor and prop. 

Basic layout and wooden spars

That is basically it, a very simple wing to build, using the FT center section would have been cleaner of course but this allows better access. The wing was painted using oil based paint thinned with spirit to allow better spreading . This allows the surface of the wing to be watertight and a little bit more durable. also it is much easier to spot from the ground. At this point the Wing has been flown for about a minute or two and found it to be just a touch tail heavy, I will perform another flight soon. The FPV system worked quite well without any noticeable issues. For the wing itself it still need to be dialed in, but I think it will be a good flyer. 
Just after paint

After the small flight and landing in wet muddy grass

In the following week I will basically setup the cg again, change the camera angle a bit and try again. Thats it for now and Happy Flying.

Thursday, 17 September 2015

FPV Big Delta [Update]

Hi everyone, I started working on fixing and modifying my scratch built delta wing. The damage to the center section was very bad and left the wing incredibly weak.  The middle 8 inches were removed and a new section was glued in.





Stiffeners were crossed across to ad strength to the wing as I want the this new section to stay open totally giving me very good access to the internals.  As this is an FPV wing the space is a bonus. The camera has been placed in Front used a small 9g servo to give me a pan function. The following pics are a work in progress, the wiring is slowly getting sorted as work goes on. The batteries are place staggered so they actually fit and balance better ( I think).  So Far So Good. All I have left to do until the remaining parts(motor and Video TX) arrive:
  1. New Control Horn and linkages
  2. New Motor Mount
  3. Wire up RX and servos and ESC
  4. Start cable management



Thats it for now and Happy Flying.

Cross braced stiffeners add torsional rigidity lost when wing was cut



The PAN servo thing and 700TVL camera

Hatch in Place fitting snugly


Staggered battery arrangement