Quadcopters anyone?

Rcgroups.com, under electric aircraft, multirotor craft. Tons of good stuff there! Some of can be a little overwelming at first though. Luckily, there are a lot of smart mofo's there that can answer anything under the sun!

 

Finally got my spare micro quad in. Thank you slow boat from china! I think I am going to turn that one into the fpv quad and leave the old one for acro and learning.

 

They don't make that Blade MQX anymore?!

EDIT: Just bought the RTF w/ 4 more batteries. Think I might've paid extra since it's discontinued, but ya'll have made it sound like a great starter. Thanks for the info, guys!

 

Oh cool... Didn't realize they discontinued it

 

good friend from college is an aerospace engineer and started up a little side company to keep himself entertained. here are some the multirotors he's built in the last couple weeks.



















this one was taken in the machine shop where i first learned how to fabricate.....oh the memories










he just posted this on the facebook page. looks like he's gotten some nice cooperation from the school we both graduated from.

"
It's official, is going to the Bahamas for Marine research!

We will be searching for various marine life tagged with a GPS tracker, using Florida Institute of Technology ICE LAB equipment and AetherVision Locust vehicles.
...
Our electric vehicles are 100% green and do not disturb the sensitive marine environment. The batteries can be recharged using only solar panels. This expedition will be a great step forward in the ever expanding small URS industry, proving that electric [Battery] technology is evolving."

all of the pictures are pulled from his company facebook page

 

http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/11/5090230/lady-gaga-flying-dress-volantis

 

lol!

"Breaking news: Lady gaga was just killed in what experts in the hobby call a fly-away. The pilot, Michael, from Houston, was quoted shortly after the incident as saying 'damnit, again?' "

 

has anyone ever had one of their motors fail on these? can you still compensate on the other motors to land?

 

haven't had a motor fail, but had a blade pop off of my micro one. not much you can do on a 4 blade if you lose lift on one corner for any reason. i would imagine 6 and 8 blades do pretty well though. Mike probably knows the answer to that.

 

I got rid of that APM bullshit so I'm good to go

 

On a quad, you're done... Watch it crash. On a hex, it will be somewhat controlled although right on the ragged edge.

On an Octo you're good to go and can still maintain control for the most part.

 

sure it's some extra weight, but if you're too worried, like you fly over water a lot or something, it wouldn't be hard to wire up a relay system that would cut power to the opposite motor when one failed. essentially turning a malfunctioning hex into a quad, or octo into a hex. if you wanted to stay lighter, you could go solid state for the opposite motor cutoff as well. that just requires a little more know-how.

 

My MQX is out for delivery and should be here soon!!
It's a disposable quadcopter to train me for something bigger so I can use it for filming. My question is, I've been searching for little cameras that might fit the MQX just for sh*ts and giggles and found this one. What do you think as far as weight, image, etc? Is there another micro camera you might suggest for an MQX that could be better? I'm also thinking of building a small housing made out of wooden coffee stirrers and elastic bands that could lightly hold this camera and keep it from shaking.

EDIT: Ya'll think I should purchase the extra blades and such for this in case of destruction while I learn?

 

blades arethe most common thing to go on my 1-SQ. i keep 2-3 full spare sets on hand for that thing.

 

Cool! Ordered. Thanks, Colin!

 

sure thing.

seems like the blades on my small one break, and the ones on the phantom bend. either way, you need to replace them though.

sucks having a pocket full of batteries, and blowing out a blade halfway through the first one, without any spares.....

 

Aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh!!!! This is fuuuuuuuun!!!!! Bent a blade already. Trim is tough to adjust right now. First time flying and it has a lot more stuff to pay attention to than the r/c cars I built as a kid. So fuuuuuun!!!

Edit: I get the feeling that it's only somewhat easy to get to a hover and move around with a bit of control, but takes a veeeeeeery looooong time to get very good at this.

 

Whole bunches of micro video setup stuff...
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1978140

 

^^ Awesome, thanks, Ben!

So much fun! I've already flown this into a DWP substation, but since there weren't any explosions, they came out and found it for me. This little copter draws a crowd. lol

Questions: when do you change a blade? I've just "straightened" them out so far although I have extras. Does trim re-set after each battery change? And good trim should get me to a hover, correct? Also, what does an aftermarket controller get me over this standard one?

 

People tend to flock to tgese little things, although I just completely lost one. I blinked and it disappeared.
And you can keep flying straightened out blades, just keep in mind the better they are balanced, the better and the more stable the quad will fly.
And I am not sure about being able to bind it with a better controller, I will look more into it when I get a little more time, but a better controller will give you tons more adjustability with things like dual rates and expo rate on the controls. As well as being able to have multiple planes or copter linked to one tramsmitter