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Ineptitude posted:Yeah, my PDB has 5V and 12V out Okay, that makes more sense. I call them PWM cables but servo cables are just as good. To be clear, if you have opto ESCs so you do not cut any of the servo cables from your ESC. The black/brown cable is your ground cable, red is power (which you don't have to worry about since you have opto ESCs), the third cable will either be orange, yellow, or white and is your signal cable. As to powering your FC, any multicore wire 20-22 gauge should be fine. You'll have to solder it to the BEC pads. Make sure you have the right connector for your FC. Depending on what connector your FC takes, it might be easier to buy a already crimped connector.
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Apr 12, 2016 19:40
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BedBuglet posted:Okay, that makes more sense. I call them PWM cables but servo cables are just as good. To be clear, if you have opto ESCs so you do not cut any of the servo cables from your ESC. The black/brown cable is your ground cable, red is power (which you don't have to worry about since you have opto ESCs), the third cable will either be orange, yellow, or white and is your signal cable. Thanks  I soldered the wire from the PDB directly onto the pins sticking out of the Naze32. I have no idea where to get connectors like that. (Should i not solder them onto the Naze32? The receiver has no connectors and needs soldering onto the Naze32 so i figured soldering onto the Naze32 is fine)
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Apr 12, 2016 20:19
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Ineptitude posted:Thanks I would be wary about soldering directly onto header pins as it can be easy to short them if they aren't protected with heat shrink or something. They also aren't super structurally strong so it's not ideal but it should work fine. At the very least, either paint them with liquid electrical tape or nail polish to make sure they don't bend and touch another pin or, heaven forbid, each other. If you want suppliers for connectors for header pins for the future, try pololu. Those are the female connectors and then they sell plastic housings that just click onto those. You can get all sorts of housings sizes ranging from individual pin housings to like... 1x8 housings. Up to you. You're probably fine as long as you insulate and don't get a short but I would consider doing it right. Also, I double checked and the Naze draws a peak of 100ma so 20-22 gauge wire is absolutely fine. BedBuglet fucked around with this message at 23:13 on Apr 12, 2016 |
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Apr 12, 2016 21:45
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Well I complained about my banggood orders taking forever, and one of them finally showed up today, five days short of a month in transit. Picked up this camera/tx combo to get into FPV. Need to get an accompanying RX and better antenna, but can someone recommend a decent small-ish LCD screen that I can jury-rig to my Turnigy 9x? I'm not shying away from a headset, but to start off with I think I'd have a better time with a hooded LCD.
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Apr 12, 2016 23:11
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n.. posted:Yes and yes. Make sure your ESC's are beefy enough or they will go up in flames.
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Apr 12, 2016 23:21
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Martytoof posted:Well I complained about my banggood orders taking forever, and one of them finally showed up today, five days short of a month in transit. Picked up this camera/tx combo to get into FPV. Need to get an accompanying RX and better antenna, but can someone recommend a decent small-ish LCD screen that I can jury-rig to my Turnigy 9x? I'm not shying away from a headset, but to start off with I think I'd have a better time with a hooded LCD. You could get both. HK sells inexpensive goggles that are basically a LCD screen that sits in a foam insert. You can use the screen as a set of goggles or in a hood. http://www.hobbyking.com/mobile/viewproduct.asp?idproduct=78125
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Apr 12, 2016 23:23
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BedBuglet posted:You could get both. HK sells inexpensive goggles that are basically a LCD screen that sits in a foam insert. You can use the screen as a set of goggles or in a hood. I have these and they're great for a starter set of googles. You'll probably want to upgrade to something less bulky in the future, but you're looking ~£75 for the Quanum V2's, compared to ~£300 for a pair of Fat Shark Dominators. So start with the cheap bulky ones until you know you want to invest that much money in the hobby. My minimosd problem was as i thought, switched it to PAL in the config software and now I've got a fancy Fighter Pilot HUD on my FPV feed. With regards to OPTO ESC's, I don't know if you've been out the loop a while or not Bedbuglet but these are the typical ESCs people are using for Quadcopters: (LittleBee 20A)  And is seems that the current most popular PDB is something like this one (Matek 5-in1), which you can mount/stack under your flight controller.  On the ESC you'll see that there are 3 wires to go to the motor, a red and white wire to go to the battery (normally via a power distribution board), and also a Black and White twisted pair of wires, which are the signal wires intended to be connected to the Flight Controller. From that pair of signal wires, the black wire does not actually do anything in a typical set up and you're safe to remove it, or solder it to a ground connection. The modern PDB's often provide 5V and 12V regulated output. You can use the 5V output to power your flight controller, and you can connect the 5V and GND connections from the PDB to any of the +/- ESC connections, which will be empty due to using OPTO ESC's. Easiest way to connect all this stuff up is using male pin headers (link) on the board and then either Servo cables, such as these: link Or single connectors like these: link This hobby is moving on so fast it's pretty tricky to keep up to date with it!
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Apr 13, 2016 10:02
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Slash posted:I have these and they're great for a starter set of googles. You'll probably want to upgrade to something less bulky in the future, but you're looking ~£75 for the Quanum V2's, compared to ~£300 for a pair of Fat Shark Dominators. So start with the cheap bulky ones until you know you want to invest that much money in the hobby. No, not particularly out of date, why?  Little Bees and Matek's might be popular (I use a Matek myself), but I don't like, nor do I think it's safe, to make assumptions about what they are or aren't using. Moreover, I'm confused why you would. For example, if they're flying a fpv drone, it's unlikely they're using a Matek since they have a history of having unreliable 12v BECS. A large number of less expensive PDBs come sans BEC. Indeed, as they later mentioned, they aren't using Matek. Also, it's safe to say they aren't using Little Bees. Their description makes it pretty clear they aren't. Most ESCs, including optos, still use three strand servo PWM cables and ESC output cables can vary pretty wildly in coloring(mine are red, yellow, black, hence my caution). As I mentioned, if someone is asking a question about wiring, they're new to quads, and unsure about the terminology, I'd rather err toward caution and make a worst case assumption. Better to give them advice that doesn't fry their FC than say something that might be misinterpreted. Little note, I wouldn't recommend cutting your Little Bee's signal ground wire. You may not need it to run a drone but you may decide you want to flash your ESCs some day and you'll absolutely need it to do that.
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Apr 13, 2016 11:26
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Have any of you hand made your own frames? My local hobby shop has carbon fibre plate and rods and tubes, and I thought I might grab some and make a new frame for my Hubsan. I've never worked with carbon fibre before, and was originally going to try to make a frame from aluminium when I got around to it.
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Apr 13, 2016 12:25
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I'd not bother with littlebees 20a at this point. xm20 are similar in cost, have a faster processor for those really high kv motors, and don't have the feedback issue that have messed up people's VTX's in the past. I do see a lot of people in my fb groups use the matek pdb, but I'd rather just use something like lumenier's 4power with the slot for a 12v pololu (most flight controllers I use now have their own 5v bec integrated, and while I've been feeding my vtx straight 4s voltage, its best practice to give them a regulated 12v, at least from what I've read through the grape vine). I also have used the brotronics uberdistro for the voltage / amperage measuring but that is never in stock. I like this guys channel a lot as well https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2tWPvIbPnyWwJMKRAt7a_Q/
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Apr 13, 2016 12:50
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A Yolo Wizard posted:I'd not bother with littlebees 20a at this point. xm20 are similar in cost, have a faster processor for those really high kv motors, and don't have the feedback issue that have messed up people's VTX's in the past. I do see a lot of people in my fb groups use the matek pdb, but I'd rather just use something like lumenier's 4power with the slot for a 12v pololu (most flight controllers I use now have their own 5v bec integrated, and while I've been feeding my vtx straight 4s voltage, its best practice to give them a regulated 12v, at least from what I've read through the grape vine). I also have used the brotronics uberdistro for the voltage / amperage measuring but that is never in stock. Hey yolo, do you have any thoughts on the ZTW 2300kv black widows? I know the integrated ESCs mean that you have to replace the whole thing if the ESC or the motor itself fails. I like it from a minimalist standpoint and I've been hearing great reviews. Either that or I'm looking at Cobras. These would be for a racing fpv. BedBuglet fucked around with this message at 13:32 on Apr 13, 2016 |
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Apr 13, 2016 13:10
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Integrated esc bad. Just work on installing them more cleanly on the arm
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Apr 13, 2016 13:49
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A Yolo Wizard posted:Integrated esc bad. Just work on installing them more cleanly on the arm Any reason?
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Apr 13, 2016 14:01
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BedBuglet posted:Any reason? Lots of reasons. There are compromises made to make the ESC fit in the nasty space under the motor. this makes the board design less likely to be ood The motor is (will) be warm, heat is not good for ESCs.. The motor makes a lot of magnetic noise, and that can have affects on the micro-controller. If something is wrong with the ESC, you can't replace it, without replacing the motor. If there's something wrong with the motor, you can't replace it without replacing the ESC. The one "maybe" advantage is less weight. And that's questionable depending on the base plate design of the motor.
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Apr 13, 2016 14:54
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Brekelefuw posted:Have any of you hand made your own frames? Yes. It is a pain to cut nicely without CNC equipment. The dust produced is likely carcinogenic, wear a mask.
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Apr 13, 2016 15:21
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BedBuglet posted:I would be wary about soldering directly onto header pins as it can be easy to short them if they aren't protected with heat shrink or something. They also aren't super structurally strong so it's not ideal but it should work fine. At the very least, either paint them with liquid electrical tape or nail polish to make sure they don't bend and touch another pin or, heaven forbid, each other. If you want suppliers for connectors for header pins for the future, try pololu. Those are the female connectors and then they sell plastic housings that just click onto those. You can get all sorts of housings sizes ranging from individual pin housings to like... 1x8 housings. Up to you. You're probably fine as long as you insulate and don't get a short but I would consider doing it right. The wires i connected from the PDB 5V-out to the FC are fairly big ones, i scavenged them from some IKEA kitchen counter halogen lamps.I could have used heatshrink on the FC connector, i didnt think of that  While i have always been interested in math and physics type of subjects and am a mechanical engineer by trade, i never understood electricity AT ALL; is there such a thing as TOO THICK wires? When you say that the FC draws 100ma i understand each individual word but i have no idea what that really means. Could my wire be too thick and the FC is unable to draw current through it? I am not worried about them touching eachother, the wires were multiple individual thin strands twisted together so i filled the braid with solder, then pushed it down on the FC connector (with the connector in the middle of the "braid") I have tried rocking them back and forth to see if they touch and am unable to Slash posted:
These are the ones i have! I also have those EMAX "red bottom" 2300kV motors. Are my 20A ESCs too small? Does a motor draw the same amount of A at all RPMs or does it increase as you increase RPM?
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Apr 13, 2016 16:03
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Ineptitude posted:
EDIT: I should do a more effort full reply, shouldn't I? I'll do that in a bit. Ineptitude posted:i never understood electricity AT ALL; is there such a thing as TOO THICK wires? quote:When you say that the FC draws 100ma i understand each individual word but i have no idea what that really means. Could my wire be too thick and the FC is unable to draw current through it? The basic relationship between voltage and amperage is pretty simple. But in the case of our RC stuff, we're playing with whats called digital electronics, and power electronics. Both of which can cause some really weird things to happen to the pixies as they flow. quote:I also have those EMAX "red bottom" 2300kV motors. Are my 20A ESCs too small? Does a motor draw the same amount of A at all RPMs or does it increase as you increase RPM? IIRC, last time I measured my 1806's, they were .2ohms each. If I just applied my 11.1v battery to it, the math works out to 55 amps. That.. would make lots of smoke happen. The motors work, and they don't smoke, so what's providing the resistance, erm.. impedance to the flow of current? That's magnetism. Electric motors are quite literally just a series of coils of wire. You run a motor by turning on coils in sequence to make the motor turn. (this is true of all motors, DC brushed motors use brushes to turn on and off the coils, brushless motors use a computer to turn them on and off for you) When electricity flows down a wire, it generates a magnetic field. This takes time, and energy. The change in that magnetic field, is what slows the current through the motor. So by constantly switching coils on and off, you're stopping the motor from frying itself. As a motor turns faster, the amount of time each coil is turned on, becomes smaller and smaller. By having less time to build the magnetic field, there's less time for the current to flow through the coils. This limits the current the motor can draw. This is why motors draw less current as they spin faster. Nerobro fucked around with this message at 18:08 on Apr 13, 2016 |
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Apr 13, 2016 17:50
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Ineptitude posted:I also have those EMAX "red bottom" 2300kV motors. Are my 20A ESCs too small? Does a motor draw the same amount of A at all RPMs or does it increase as you increase RPM? Amp draw goes up as throttle goes up, but more important is your prop choice. Those motors will pull well over 20A on 4S with 5045BN props (even more with tri blades). That said, a good quality 20A esc should be OK (I've no problems with them on my RG20a's), though a guy in my local fb group had two of his DYS 20a's go up in flames running them with 5045 tri props. Here's a good video showing amp draw and thrust data using various props on the red bottom's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV245gBaR5Q CheddarGoblin fucked around with this message at 17:54 on Apr 13, 2016 |
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Apr 13, 2016 17:51
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Ineptitude posted:I also have those EMAX "red bottom" 2300kV motors. Are my 20A ESCs too small? Does a motor draw the same amount of A at all RPMs or does it increase as you increase RPM? So, the amount of current the motors draw depends on how hard they're working... Well, really, it depends on how hot they are but they get hotter the harder they work. When you're doing something like hovering, or even moving in one direction, they draw a lower amounts of current. If you do something like vertical drag race (go directly upward) or make a sharp change of direction at high speed, they're going to draw significantly more current. Also, if you run your quad at a higher voltage like using a 4s instead of a 3s (this will explain what we mean by #S) then it will cause your quad to run hotter and draw more current. It's also worth noting that weight plays a significant factor here too. When you look at what Amp rating your ESc should be, you're asking yourself what your peak amp draw will be. Most sites list the specs for their motors which are reasonably accurate and will list the max amp draw of your motors. Now, just because your motors can draw over 20 amps doesn't mean your 20 amp ESCs will necessarily burn out. Depending on the quality, they might be able to handle the higher load but it'll wear them out. Also, if you're running your quad in a way that doesn't require a lot of thrust then those motors obviously won't draw over 20 amps in the first place. If you plan on switching to 4S, doing any racing, or if your ESCs are extremely hot during operation, I would strongly recommend a beefier ESC.
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Apr 13, 2016 19:05
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So the eBay seller hosed up and sent me the taranis with the x8r receiver instead of the d4rii receiver. Will this work with my tyrant 215 or should I return it? Was kinda looking forward to using it this weekend.
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Apr 13, 2016 19:12
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I've had nothing but bad luck with those Matek 5v/12v PDBs. THey work fine once or twice but inevitably I'll be at the field plugging a new battery in but it'll do that pop, with a bit of smoke. When I get home and check the board all + and - pads are shorted. No idea why it keeps happening, but I am 3/3 on bad Matek boards and 0/1 for Armattan super simple PDBs with a 5v pololu soldered on. The armattan PDB is just bulletproof, keeps managing to find it's way onto my new builds. like I'm suuuure the Matek problem is user error on my part but all I'm doing is plugging batteries in. Everything works fine for a few batteries but dies at random when you plug a new pack in. Sometimes you get 10 flights in, sometimes it dies the 2nd time you do a motor spin test. Sometimes it takes an ESC with it, but never more than one. Wtf? I want to try one of these RROSD's next: http://rotorgeeks.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=446 Google Butt posted:So the eBay seller hosed up and sent me the taranis with the x8r receiver instead of the d4rii receiver. Will this work with my tyrant 215 or should I return it? Was kinda looking forward to using it this weekend. If you're building a 250 for the first time having one servo lead per channel isn't going to be a big deal. It's the micros where you really want to start reducing your wiring. bring back old gbs fucked around with this message at 22:04 on Apr 13, 2016 |
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Apr 13, 2016 21:27
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Well, I got the package and it's got the dr4ii, even though they said they sent the wrong one. Thanks for the info though!
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Apr 13, 2016 23:07
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Trying to find a decent 2-300 starter FPV drone, there seems to be like dozens of options any good recommendations? I know its a long shot but it would be cool if one of them worked with my Gear VR.
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Apr 14, 2016 01:31
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Do you want something like a 250 size? If you want something in the micro size, the Hubsan x4 h107d+ is a 720p FPV and the controller has a video out that works with some goggles.
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Apr 14, 2016 02:11
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bring back old gbs posted:I've had nothing but bad luck with those Matek 5v/12v PDBs. THey work fine once or twice but inevitably I'll be at the field plugging a new battery in but it'll do that pop, with a bit of smoke. When I get home and check the board all + and - pads are shorted. No idea why it keeps happening, but I am 3/3 on bad Matek boards and 0/1 for Armattan super simple PDBs with a 5v pololu soldered on. The armattan PDB is just bulletproof, keeps managing to find it's way onto my new builds. What ESCs/Batteries are you using when the PDBs blow up? It seems like certain combinations of ESCs with 4s batteries cause huge transient voltage spikes when the battery is connected. Scottw330 fucked around with this message at 03:50 on Apr 14, 2016 |
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Apr 14, 2016 03:30
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The X8R does SBus, tho. What recent flight controller doesn't do SBus these days? More reliable and less latency than CPPM.
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Apr 14, 2016 03:40
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So, switched from Quanum goggles to Fatshark Attitude V3's and holy poo poo, what a difference. It might not be a huge difference for FPV cruising, but for racing/proximity, it makes a world of difference. Still doesn't stop me from running into stuff, though:  Running out of carbon on my Morphite V2...
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Apr 14, 2016 08:09
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ImplicitAssembler posted:So, switched from Quanum goggles to Fatshark Attitude V3's and holy poo poo, what a difference. It might not be a huge difference for FPV cruising, but for racing/proximity, it makes a world of difference. I just won some Dom v2's on ebay 
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Apr 14, 2016 08:57
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Great, my red-bell EMAX motors are being held hostage my Ebay Global Shipping.
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Apr 14, 2016 13:00
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I think I'm going to replace the props on my F450 with APC 10x3.8 slow fly ones. Since the quad uses both CW and CCW props, would this translate to normal and pusher versions? I'm a bit concerned about the hub too as the DJI motors have keyed shafts, but will probably need to improvise. Unfortunately the only DJI props I can see are 10x4.5 and those are supposedly garbage. Combat Pretzel posted:Great, my red-bell EMAX motors are being held hostage my Ebay Global Shipping.   Combat Pretzel posted:The X8R does SBus, tho. What recent flight controller doesn't do SBus these days? More reliable and less latency than CPPM.
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Apr 14, 2016 19:21
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Yes
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Apr 15, 2016 01:23
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There's plenty of stores in the us that will do very comparable pricing for fpv or miniquad components. No excuses
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Apr 15, 2016 01:25
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I just unboxed my Taranis, but uh, is there a guide that you guys would suggest for setting this thing up? Pretty god drat daunting. I'm currently waiting for all my other poo poo to arrive before I can actually fly my quad, so I figure I would just try one of those sims with it.
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Apr 15, 2016 05:06
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Google Butt posted:I just unboxed my Taranis, but uh, is there a guide that you guys would suggest for setting this thing up? Pretty god drat daunting. I'm currently waiting for all my other poo poo to arrive before I can actually fly my quad, so I figure I would just try one of those sims with it. http://open-txu.org/ Welcome to the fun to program radio! Update the firmware and download companion and start learning new things. If you are interested, I can upload my radio's image, I have models for quads, wings, all sorts of other planes, and for liftoff, real flight and fpv free rider.
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Apr 15, 2016 05:18
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nerox posted:http://open-txu.org/ yes I would like that very much
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Apr 15, 2016 05:21
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Google Butt posted:I just unboxed my Taranis, but uh, is there a guide that you guys would suggest for setting this thing up? Pretty god drat daunting. I'm currently waiting for all my other poo poo to arrive before I can actually fly my quad, so I figure I would just try one of those sims with it.
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Apr 15, 2016 05:34
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1) update new firmware 2) set default channel order to AETR http://open-txu.org/home/undergraduate-courses/radio-setup/beginning-radio-setup/ - I just prefer this so I don't have to change anything in cleanflight about channel order later. 99% of the time all I do is go to the model page, make a new model, choose quadcopter from the wizard, use all the default channels as it suggest, and then set the left 2 position switch as channel 5, and the skinny 3 position as channel 6. Thats all you need for most quadcopters.
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Apr 15, 2016 12:21
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A Yolo Wizard posted:1) update new firmware Thanks! Got my firmware updated and I had to spend 3 hours trouble shooting the usb drivers to get it working. But I'm up and running inn freeride. Fpv is sooo much easier than los, drat.
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Apr 15, 2016 17:34
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How do you guys secure your receiver? VHB tape, velcro, zip ties?
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Apr 16, 2016 09:34
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Google Butt posted:How do you guys secure your receiver? VHB tape, velcro, zip ties? yes. I'm litterally using all of those on different airframes right now.
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Apr 16, 2016 09:45
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