/rcg/ Drone & Radio Control General

[Anonymous No.2615900]

No time for edition, Edition

In /rcg/ we discuss anything & everything radio controlled: multirotors, fixed wing, cars, rovers, helis, boats, submarines, battlebots, lawnmowers, etc.

>How do I get started with racing drones?
https://oscarliang.com/build-racing-drone-fpv-quadcopter/

>What about planes?
https://www.flitetest.com/

>What about aerial photography, is DIY viable?
If you want a practical flying camera platform, DJI is the sensible option. If you want a fun DIY project instead & aren't too concerned about the practicalities, then by all means DIY something. Another alternative is to make/buy a Cinewhoop.

>I want a dirt cheap drone to fly around my yard/garden
Syma X5C/3" Toothpick

>I want a dirt cheap drone to fly inside my house
Tiny Whoop/Eachine E010/Hubsan X4

>What radio should I get?
Radiomaster TX16S/Boxer/Zorro for general purpose, or TBS Tango II if you really like Crossfire.

>What radio protocol should I use?
There is a lot of overlap here, but:
General purpose: ExpressLRS
Long-range/penetration: Crossfire
Racing: Ghost
FinDom/Cuckoldry: FrSky

>What are some good YouTube channels for learning or fun?
Chris Rosser - https://www.youtube.com/@ChrisRosser
Pawel Spychalski - https://www.youtube.com/@PawelSpychalski
DrainMan - https://www.youtube.com/@DrainManFPV
PhantomFPV - https://www.youtube.com/@PhantomFPV
Limon - Ivan Efimov - https://www.youtube.com/@IvanEfimovLimon
Painless360 - https://www.youtube.com/user/Painless360
Flite Test - https://www.youtube.com/user/flitetest
Peter Sripol - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7yF9tV4xWEMZkel7q8La_w
bonafidepirate - https://www.youtube.com/c/bonafidepirate
ArxangelRC - https://www.youtube.com/user/Arxangelxr
RagTheNutsOff - https://www.youtube.com/user/moggiex


PREVIOUS >>>2604296

[Anonymous No.2615916]

First.

[Anonymous No.2615924]

If you are looking for a good off-the-shelf aircraft to start R/C planes, look into buying a used Hobbyzone Champ. They typically sell for $50 ready to fly and are a blast.

I am not one to usually promote a certain brand, but too many people who go to buy off the shelf stuff get a 4 channel with stabilization and then do not learn how to fly without it. Do not make that mistake stabilized aircraft are for intermediate and advanced pilots looking at long range flying and the like.

[Anonymous No.2616004]

Recommendations for a good quality drone that could handle close quarters indoor / outdoor flight? Am interested in using it for abandoned industrial complex exploration. Thanks

[Anonymous No.2616039]

>>2616004
If all you're doing is poking around, DJI is probably your best bet. They take no skill, hold real still, and you can get them with guards.

[Anonymous No.2616212]

>>2616004
A Cinewhoop is what you want for that, if you enjoy actually flying instead of just scrolling around in different directions like >>2616039 recommended.

[Anonymous No.2616343]

>>2616212
Speaking of which, the Foxwhoop has stupidly high durability. Watched Nick Burns ram the 2.5 inch version into a brick wall at full tilt like 20 times in a row and only managed to mangle one prop.

[Anonymous No.2616351]

This has been helping me out so much lately. Anyone disagree with any of these points? Is there anything that should be on here that isn't?

[Anonymous No.2616512]

>>2616351
there's easily 20+ hours into PID tuning before you're even competent.
I just blackbox record and pay some guy who's a pro to set my rates for me.

[Anonymous No.2616733]

Did anyone try to build an fpv drone optimized for flight time? Like if you don't need to do the tricks and don't need to race, how to build best fpv for flight time (under 250g)? No way nobody did this before for filming something like a sports event.

[Anonymous No.2616737]

>>2616733
You’ve essentially just described a DJI Mini or a NanoLongRange.

[Anonymous No.2616744]

>>2616737
They are not fpv and they are not to build by myself, so no.

[Anonymous No.2616757]

>>2616744
The NanoLongRange is exactly that. At least Google stuff before you discount it.

[Anonymous No.2616763]

>>2616757
> you shouldn't expect any sort of spectacular flight performance out of something that weighs 100g and runs on only 3V
Thanks, that's not what I asked about. Please anon read carefully.

[Anonymous No.2616866]

>>2616512
>I just blackbox record and pay some guy who's a pro to set my rates for me.
I'm an engineer, so that was never on the table.

[Anonymous No.2616872]

Hello sers

I have a really ambitious drone project. Part of it requires distance detection. I'd use object detection with a Jetson Nano, but I don't know which camera to use or what is the most cost-effective solution.

I have encountered the following:
- Zed2 depth camera
- Intel Realsense depth camera
- Stereovision
- Lidar
- Laser

I think the project necessitates using a gimbal, so I think it would be a bit problematic to have the object detection system (the camera) separate from another sensor like lidar or a laser. Is this idea a tall order?

[Anonymous No.2616929]

Figured out I have been flying my quad in stick mode 4. Now I gotta switch to mode 2 and get used to that. Dammit.

[Anonymous No.2616982]

>>2616763
You asked about sub 250g FPV builds with the longest flight time, where acro ability isn't important. That's exactly what something like the NanoLongRange is.

[Anonymous No.2616996]

>>2616929
Be sure to film your first couple of retarded flights!

[Anonymous No.2617049]

>>2616982
> That's exactly what something like the NanoLongRange is.
No, it's not. Although 100g is technically smaller than 250, but when someone in this hobby talkes about "sub 250g" it means 249g or close to that, so he can dodge the government regulations. 250g drone will have much better flight time than any 100g drone.

Moreover NanoLongRange has long range only in his name, the guy didn't do any long range optimization or anything, he just printed the frame. There are videos about that drone in YouTube, and it's range is 2 km, which is a joke.

So please read carefully what I asked in the first place.

[Anonymous No.2617053]

>>2617049
If you're so knowledgeable about the hobby, why are you asking such basic questions only to bitch when people try to help? Fuck off to Google.

[Anonymous No.2617055]

>>2617053
This useless nigger finally showed depth of his knowledge and helped by suggesting to google the answer. I could google and show that you are wrong here again and there's no simple answer elsewhere, but I better lay a huge pile shit on your face here.

[Anonymous No.2617112]

>>2617055
So you're mad because that other anon is not more knowledgeable than you. You're a dick. Crocodile Baby 4 is as close as you'll get

[Anonymous No.2617118]

>>2617112
It's totally fine to not know something. It's not fine to pretend you do and end up searching the answer in google.
Like I have no problems if I dont know something to come and ask.

[Anonymous No.2617135]

>>2616733
there's off the shelf ones, they are pretty optimised. Failing that, you could just make one yourself with an AIO, some whoop components and a li-ion battery pack.

[Anonymous No.2617139]

>>2616512
Huh, that's funny. I've managed to tune several quads just fine while barely knowing what I'm doing. They all fly beautifully. Have fun paying somebody though.

[Anonymous No.2617140]

>>2616733
Saw one configuration that did around 35 minutes with 2S Li-Ion, but you must make sacrifices to achieve such a thing.

[Anonymous No.2617156]

>>2617139
Good for you anon, enjoy your "fine" flying.
My time has a value associated with it, spending $20 one-time for someone who knows what they are doing is value enough for me.

[Anonymous No.2617212]

>>2617156
>/diy/
>pay somebody else to do it

[Anonymous No.2617257]

>>2617156
I rather do enjoy it. I like to make a multitude of tweaks to everything I assemble, so being able to retune it is valuable as hell. Changing props, batteries, and motors all change how something will behave, meaning the tune needs to change with it. It's even possible for the temperature and humidity to have enough of an effect that a perfect tune will be too much later.

[Anonymous No.2617391]

>>2617212
you don't have to DIY everything anon. Just things you enjoy. for me, that's not pid tuning.

[Anonymous No.2617396]

>>2617391
>he doesn't fabricate his own flight controller chips from raw silicon

[Anonymous No.2617407]

>>2617396
>He doesn't mine his own silicon and copper
>He layup his own FR4 sandwiches
Back to /vg/ with you, casual.

[Anonymous No.2617439]

>>2616512
>pay some guy who's a pro to set my rates for me.
There are dozens of different tunes online done by "pros" for different types of drones, why not just use those?

[Anonymous No.2617446]

>>2617439
unless you've got a RTF/bind and fly, you're not really getting a tune specific to your drone.

[Anonymous No.2617452]

>>2617446
>find a tune for the same size and motor KV drone
>start tweaking from there
Shouldn't be that hard.

[Anonymous No.2617456]

>>2617452
>start tweaking
Yeah, no thanks.
You're right, it's not hard, but it's a time investment that I don't want to make. If you like tweaking PID profiles, or if $20 is too much for you, go ahead and tweak till your hearts content. I'd rather spend my time building and flying than PID tuning.

[Anonymous No.2617490]

>>2617407
*Doesn't layup

[Anonymous No.2617640]

>>2617456
You don't have a spare half hour?

[Anonymous No.2617733]

>>2617640
Time to shitpost on 4chan, but not to tune a quad.

[Anonymous No.2617800]

>>2617640
you learning PID tuning in and testing in 30mins?
>>2617733
I enjoy shitposting on 4chan, that's the difference.

[Anonymous No.2617801]

>>2617800
After I found the right guide, I learned it in 15.

[Anonymous No.2617802]

>>2617801
Great, enjoy!

[Anonymous No.2617820]

>>2616512
>>2617800
Wait, you’re genuinely saying that pay somebody to tune your quads just from logs, without actually flying the thing?

This is a fucking fabulous scam. Where do I find more idiots like you?

[Anonymous No.2617843]

>>2617820
blackbox and video, yeah, that's how it's done.
if FPVexchange was still up, you could have made millions bro, You could also tune idiots cars, thats a total scam too bro.

[Anonymous No.2617893]

>>2617843
I do all my tuning based on behavior. Once you get a feel for what each setting is for, you send it up, do a quick stress test, and do a quick tweak in the OSD. Then you send it right back up and see if it was enough. No blackbox or recordings needed. The place I really enjoy a blackbox is the vibration data. Makes filter tuning a cakewalk. Compare filtered vs not, boost filtering in places where it still sucks. That, or you find the source of vibrations and fix it.

[Anonymous No.2617910]

>>2617893
>do a quick tweak in the OSD
This is the way to go. It was suck a pain in the ass to tune DJI V2 quads, I'm so glad they figured it out with the Goggles 2. Now the only advantage (besides latency) of analog over DJI is the psychedelic colors you can tune the image to.

[Anonymous No.2617943]

>>2617910
I'd say that analog still has plenty of other advantages. It's got weight, simplicity, cost, audio, and durability. There's also the fact that some flight controllers have camera switching. The image can be pretty crusty, but holy shit is it a flexible standard.

[Anonymous No.2618017]

The copper tape shielding did kind of work! Well, it's not losing GPS completely now, although it still is fluctuating a lot between 6-10 sats so it's not perfect. But at least it's not dropping out to zero sats any more. Not sure I'm confident to fly long range as is though.
I will try the Matek GPS as well, although it seems the PID tune cannot be carried across from betaflight 4.2 to 4.3+ ?? so I may have to learn PID tuning too...

[Anonymous No.2618030]

>>2618017
Bruh... you must cover it from all the sides.

[Anonymous No.2618148]

I have an old hobbyking 6 channel tx and an extra receiver (I used to fly planes), is there a cheap quad kit with motors/esc/flight controller/frame/propellers that I could just plug the rx into?

[Anonymous No.2618155]

>>2618017
Your PID tune can be pretty darn close. Just copy the numbers if your tune is acceptable. As for the GPS, I just recently tried the Matek M10Q. Makes the M8Q look like a damn joke. Got 22 sats under my roof. Fucking wizard magic!

[Anonymous No.2618211]

>>2618148
By the time you've bought goggles ($300-600), a quad ($300), batteries ($50-200), and a charger setup ($80-150) you might as well spend the extra $100-140 for a new transmitter too. No sense severely handicapping yourself without EdgeTX.

[Anonymous No.2618268]

>>2618017
You put ventilation holes in the thing that’s supposed to be blocking interference?

[Anonymous No.2618272]

>>2618268
As long as the holes are smaller than the wavelength, it's like they aren't even there. Provided the shielding is grounded, of course! Otherwise you're just putting dollar store masking tape over a bright flashlight.

[Anonymous No.2618294]

>>2618030
really? I thought I would only need to block the path to the GPS.

>>2618155
Sounds good. I have the matek M10 GPS and will try it in the next week or so.

>>2618272
I will try grounding it... :^) that was just my 10 minute in the field (literally) attempt

[Anonymous No.2618299]

>>2618294
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near_and_far_field

[Anonymous No.2618372]

>>2616996
I went to the school to fly last night in my new stick mode. Two kids come up and wanted to watch. I warned them that I'm not very good and say I've only flown twice (lie go cover my retardation). One kid goes "I've seen you here a lot" "must have been the two times I came" "no, you always have the same goggles and radio and the cast on your leg" (broken foot). I swear i never have seen those kids. Damn I got called out. They watched and chased the drone around as I flew like a drunken retard.

[Anonymous No.2618417]

>>2618372
And everyone had a fun time. All that matters

[Anonymous No.2618486]

>>2618211
I was thinking just line of sight, and I have a pretty good lipo charger already. All my batteries are 10 years old and need to be disposed of though. Is it insanely difficult to do line of sight flying? But $300 for the quad eh?

[Anonymous No.2618538]

>>2618486
You can bum around in angle mode just fine LOS, but the real fun in drones is fpv. As for quads most bnf ones can be bought without a receiver, you're looking at like $600 minimum investment for a 5" which is where all the r&d is going now days so you won't be disappointed on the performance side, plus they're basically indestructible providing you don't hit a wall at 130km/hr. Other sizes tend to be fragile or just boring. For analog goggles get the eachine ones, they're shit but not that shit that they would have any affect on your ability to fly and cost fuck all.

[Anonymous No.2618541]

>>2618538
>you're looking at like $600 minimum investment for a 5"

You're not seriously suggesting a 5" quad is $600 minimum.

Even if you're including the price of box goggles, a radio, a charger & a few batteries, you can still keep the total under $600.

[Anonymous No.2618545]

Can anyone explain me, why goggles cost so much if the cost of receiver module is like $50 and display is maybe another $30?

[Anonymous No.2618557]

>>2618545
What you’ve described is box goggles, which do indeed cost <$100.

However Fatshark style goggles use a pair of microdisplays, rather than one much larger smartphone size LCD. Microdisplays are a tiny, niche, low volume market & as such they are very expensive.

[Anonymous No.2618671]

>>2618545
you're severely underestimating part cost here. The cheapest DIY VR i can think of that gets anywhere near 'competent' would be this, and it has $200 bill of materials just for HMD alone, no controllers:
https://github.com/relativty/Relativty

but if you'd look for the most expensive part, it'd be mostly tracking, i'd assume
>index
index uses specialized circuits for lighthouse tracking, google DIY solutions and you'll see that people use relatively expensive general purpose boards just to get 1hz tracking refresh rate on lighthouse system
>quest
cameras and costs of camera-based tracking development

[Anonymous No.2618676]

>>2618671
oh my fuck i'm retarded, i thought i'm in vr thread. disregard

[Anonymous No.2618679]

Rotten little bitch cut her own tail off! Range is cut about in half. Time for repairs.

[Anonymous No.2618722]

>>2618679
Neat lawn mower

[Anonymous No.2618808]

>>2618679
Turns out it just fell apart. The driven element is still the right length.
>>2618722
Thanks.

[Anonymous No.2618814]

>>2618808
Soldered back together.

[Anonymous No.2618818]

>>2618814
New heat shrink and some glue to help it stay put this time. Hooray! No waiting for parts.

[Anonymous No.2618825]

>>2618814
What's the weight on that canopy? Looks chunky, I bet you could drop a gram with a printed TPU one.

[Anonymous No.2618828]

>>2618818
We're flying again.

>>2618825 What's the weight
Dunno. One of those yootoob doods broke all that down in his review. Forget which one. This is my trainer bird, so I'm more concerned about durability than weight. Obviously she's a vegenarian.

[Anonymous No.2618951]

>>2618372
try not to cut them to pieces

[Anonymous No.2618981]

>>2618211
Since we're in /diy, anon could make his own transmitter. He should go over to the ham radio general and ask for some help. Either way he can make himself a 5W RF amplifier pretty easily, compared to spending $100 for a new transmitter.

[Anonymous No.2618986]

>>2618538
>Other sizes tend to be fragile or just boring.
Bro, have you not seen what even a 2 inch quad can do these days? Honestly, you can get plenty of power out of smaller stuff, and smaller things tend to be tougher. My 3 inch quad hits 80mph, has been smashed up all year, and I've only slightly bent a motor shaft. Possibilities are far more open than you're claiming.

[Anonymous No.2618987]

>>2618545
Shitty little LCD with no optics vs high quality OLED with fancy optics.

[Anonymous No.2618988]

>>2618828
give it a clean before you go flying anon.

[Anonymous No.2619004]

>>2618981
That's a bit like saying you could make your own computer because you can make a 12V power supply. A hobby transmitter is not just a RF amp.

[Anonymous No.2619005]

>>2619004
Correct. Assembly of one is possible, but to use any of the modern protocols, we're going to need some fancy ICs.

[Anonymous No.2619035]

>>2618541
You won't be wishing you got other/better things for $600 though, minimum for guaranteed fun.
>>2618986
No I have not, which smol drones do you recommend? I am thinking about getting something for indoors since it rains 9 months a year in this shit hole.

[Anonymous No.2619046]

>>2619035
>You won't be wishing you got other/better things for $600 though, minimum for guaranteed fun.

$600 for everything, sure. But $600 just for a 5" quad on it's own, you've got to be joking?

[Anonymous No.2619053]

>>2619046
When did I say that? Drones like half the cost. Though you could spend $600 on one of those O3 ones and still have another $600 to go on goggles lmao

[Anonymous No.2619079]

>>2619053
>you could spend $600 on one of those O3 ones and still have another $600 to go on goggles lmao
I don't know why anyone would do anything else. It would be like buying a gaming computer from 2012 because it's half the price.

[Anonymous No.2619084]

>>2619079
While if I was starting new in this hobby today I would definitely go DJI, the reality is that there are a lot of people who simply don't have $600 to drop on a set of goggles.

People who can't afford a gaming computer with a 3070 can buy an Xbox Series S for a fraction of the price.

[Anonymous No.2619089]

>>2619084
You're right, some people will want to just dip a toe in at first. This hobby quickly turned into full blown FPV AIDS for .e though. It was the single best thing to happen in the 21st century so far.

[Anonymous No.2619098]

>>2619035
If you want indoors, I'd highly recommend a Mobula 7 1S. I'll absolutely be grabbing one later this year. Would be nice to recommend the smaller Mobula 6, but the efficiency falls off a cliff and getting even 3 minutes isn't going to be common.

If you go that route, consider swapping out the battery connector from PH2.0. Happymodel needs to get their heads out of their asses on that one point. BT2.0 and GNB27 won't wear out after double digit connections while offering less voltage sag.

[Anonymous No.2619350]

>>2618988
>give it a clean

LOL, that WAS clean Anon. It'll get much worse.

[Anonymous No.2619630]

>>2614353
A small update I'd like to share, stable flight achieved. Crashed like a retard later (out of frame unfortunately) purely due to poor flying skills. Gotta re-print everything, but overall I can't say I'm having a bad day, plane flew straight despite the wind and it felt nice, turns out design is perfectly fine as it is.

[Anonymous No.2619656]

>>2619630
>Gotta re-print everything

And this is why 3D printing is such a poor choice for this sort of thing. If you had used foamboard & popsicle sticks, you could just have slapped some tape on it in the field & kept on flying.

[Anonymous No.2619670]

>>2619630
fuck yeah dude, looks great, flys great. >>2619656 does have a point, my suggestion would be to look at using subtractive machining on critical components, a hunk of PA6 with some features drilled or cut into it with a box knife is nearly 10x more durable than FDM is at the moment, just design for manufacturing and remove anything unnecessary so you can knock out replacements as fast as you can break them.

[Anonymous No.2619765]

Anyone buy HDZero goggles recently?
Bought mine two weeks ago. No mention of shipping yet

[Anonymous No.2619888]

>>2619765
Yeah, I'm still waiting to send them back so they can get the optics right. Got them last month and I haven't flown anything with them yet. I've also got abnormal errors in my video. Kinda miffed.

[Anonymous No.2620001]

Crashed my zohd drift. R9 disarmed about 100m up and 300m away. This wasn't a problem - I was able to rearm and start returning. Then it disarmed midair again. I was able to rearm but somehow had gotten into the stick-controlled menu and couldn't exit the menu in time and the plane flew into the ground. I'm guessing the midair disarms were related to failsafe - there was no indication of failsafe on the OSD, but I had the r9 antenna horizontal, which is not ideal and has dead spots on the turns and I could hear the flex firmware amping up power on my turns. I suspect the plane disarmed instead of rth (it's configured correctly in inav) because I had my qx7 set to no pulses and pawel spikowsku says on a video that non-pwm protocols should be set to hold on failsafe. 4th fixed wing flight of 5 flights that resulted in a catastrophic crash. Do I kms? Anyone know where to find a zohd drift vertical stabilizer with carbon rod in stock?

[Anonymous No.2620016]

>>2620001
>there was no indication of failsafe on the OSD

It probably wasn't a failsafe then.

>I had the r9 antenna horizontal, which is not ideal

Literally doesn't matter at all at that sort of range.

>pawel spikowsku says on a video that non-pwm protocols should be set to hold on failsafe

This is so dumb it hurts. Your failsafe should be no pulses.

Check the log to see what actually happened. It could have been any one of dozens of different things, but it doesn't sound like a failsafe.

Inb4 'buy elrs'. That doesn't address the problem here if it wasn't actually a failsafe.

[Anonymous No.2620027]

>>2620016
>Inb4 'buy elrs'
*Flash ELRS on the R9. FTFY

[Anonymous No.2620113]

>>2620016
>This is so dumb it hurts. Your failsafe should be no pulses
With a frsky reciever and INAV it DOES matter. Setting to No Pulses will be interpreted from INAV to the lowest time (988ms) in every channel. This happens BEFORE failsafe is triggered. That means if you e.g. disarm at about 988ms you lose the quad.

[Anonymous No.2620133]

>>2620027
does elrs have sensor telemetry back to tx like fport or s.port?

[Anonymous No.2620143]

>>2620113
>Setting to No Pulses will be interpreted from INAV to the lowest time (988ms) in every channel.

If iNav seriously interprets no pulses from a SBUS receiver as 998ms then that's a fucking massive screw up by iNav.

Why would the iNav developers alter the Cleanflight behaviour (it's a fork, remember) to something so fucking dumb?

[Anonymous No.2620146]

>>2620133
Those are ancient marketing terms to make you buy new FrSky hardware, the new stuff like Crossfire and ELRS have always had telemetry.

[Anonymous No.2620155]

>>2620146
FrSky has had telemetry longer than most people in this thread have been in the hobby. It was old news when I started ~8 years ago.

[Anonymous No.2620208]

gawd dayum, i'm sold on li-ion packs,
barely notice the difference apart from the weight, 4S1P would basically be the same.

[Anonymous No.2620224]

>>2620113
>>2620143
I just bench tested this and on my setup, after unplugging my r9 module from the qx7, the arm switch still appeared high in the inav receiver tab, not down to 988.
So now it's a mystery why matek/inav/frsky decided to disarm twice mid flight.

[Anonymous No.2620246]

>>2620224
I wouldn’t trust the sliders in the receiver tab for failsafe behaviour. They may well just show the last received value, especially as afaik they have no way to show no pulses.

[Anonymous No.2620346]

22 satellites. wew. The Matek M10 GPS is indeed awesome. Although it took a while for that, but it reached 12 quickly. And unlike the HGLRC one it has no interference from my naked gopro either.
I will have new confidence flying LR. Wish I had upgraded before.

[Anonymous No.2620352]

>>2620346
That must be multi-constellation then... there's typically only like 32 operational GPS satellites in orbit at a time, and you definitely can't see 22 at once from ground level. It must be receiving from GLONASS and Galileo as well
http://www.mateksys.com/?portfolio=m10-5883#tab-id-2
>MAX-M10S supports concurrent reception of four GNSS (GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, and BeiDou).
Cool shit
t. used to work on GPS stuff for the US military

[Anonymous No.2620378]

>>2620352
Pretty much any receiver in the last decade handles multiple concurrent constellations, generic $20 AliExpress Max 8 units everybody uses included.

[Anonymous No.2620444]

>>2620001
just make a new stab out of foamboard and carbon fiber. You can buy CF strips and tubes individually for cheap.

[Anonymous No.2620591]

>>2620208
They're amazing as long as you're not trying to tear around like a maniac. Hope you're not pushing them to the limit or you're gonna have a flying fireball some day. Vapefags keep getting cells that can't supply enough current, so they get hot and explode.

[Anonymous No.2620637]

>>2620591
>Vapefags keep getting cells that can't supply enough current, so they get hot and explode.
They are also getting recycled shit more than likely.
You're really, really not supposed to be getting bare cells and all the big names are trying to make damn sure about that. I'd be weary of even "legit" suppliers because they are damn sure aren't getting cells directly from retards like samsung or LG.

[Anonymous No.2620640]

>>2620637
> You're really, really not supposed to be getting bare cells

This simply isn’t true. There are now stricter requirements for compliance stamping so that individual cells are traceable, to dissuade people selling/using them for unapproved applications like vapes. But cell manufacturers are perfectly happy to sell bare cells to wholesalers who agree to take the necessary steps to ensure they don’t end up getting used by vape builders.

[Anonymous No.2620642]

>>2620640
>But cell manufacturers are perfectly happy to sell bare cells to wholesalers who agree to take the necessary steps to ensure they don’t end up getting used by vape builders.
IDK how they could even do this beyond making them agree to some BS promising they won't use them in a vape. Most vape smokers are individuals.

[Anonymous No.2620643]

>>2620642
It really just comes down to passing the liability.

Cell manufacturers don’t sell individual cells to vapers. They sell wholesale quantities of cells to retailers, who are bound by things like the EU Battery Directive (2006/66/EC). Those retailers then require their customers to agree not to use any individual cells they might purchase for non approved use.

If those customers just tick the box & then use Samsung cells in a vape build regardless, then when the thing catches fire in their pocket & burns their house down, the fault/liability is theirs - not the retailer’s & not Samsung’s.

But ofc if you do want to build a vape, you can just buy something like Molicell cells, which are officially sanctioned for use in vape builds.

Point is, there is no difficulty in sourcing legit bare cells & the manufacturers aren’t trying to stop people like us buying legit bare cells.

[Anonymous No.2620724]

>>2620591
There's no way you can explode a 18650 LiFePo4 cell by just drawing it's current.

[Anonymous No.2620727]

>>2620642
You can never check every cell that goes out as a distributor, but if you are willingly putting them into vapes yourself, or selling directly to vape shops, samsung will cut you off.

[Anonymous No.2620730]

>>2620724
Nobody is using LiFePo4 18650s on miniquads.

[Anonymous No.2620733]

>>2620591
>not trying to tear around like a maniac
kek

[Anonymous No.2620751]

>>2620733
I'm talking more like freestyle. Aggressive cruising is fine as long as you're not exceeding the amp limit. It's sad that more people don't appreciate cruising.

[Anonymous No.2620850]

>>2620640
Why do they hate vape builders?

[Anonymous No.2620861]

>>2620850
They hate people using their cells beyond their rated limits, then complaining when they fail (sometimes in a dangerous fashion). It’s bad press.

[Anonymous No.2620883]

>>2620730
Why not?

[Anonymous No.2620891]

>>2620637
>You're really, really not supposed to be getting bare cells
Supposed by whom? I get what I want.

[Anonymous No.2620897]

>>2620883
Because the discharge of LiFePo4 18650 is far too low?

[Anonymous No.2620987]

>>2620897
Isn't discharge depend on number of parallel cells? Anyways I see high drain lifepo cells, that output continuously 9 amps, can't find 18650 though.

[Anonymous No.2620999]

>>2620987
I specifically said miniquads, where you're normally using a 1P or possibly 2P pack. This isn't like an electric skateboard where you have dozens of cells.

9A LiFePo4 is pretty much useless for anything RC except large, efficient fixed wing models where you can run at least 4P if not 6P. For miniquads you need the 25-30A that is now commonly available from LiIon 18650.

[Anonymous No.2621007]

As a newb to the hobby starting off with a 3" toothpick, should I blow big money on HDzero goggles or go for some cheap Eachine slim goggles?
If I chose to buy a cheaper pair and resell later to upgrade or just found that I wasn't super into it, how much resale value could I expect in either case?
While the $600 price tag wouldn't break the bankI still wouldn't really want to spend that much if it's not really worth it for a beginner.
I've been practicing flying in sims but I haven't used any goggles yet.

[Anonymous No.2621011]

>>2620999
I dunno, my friend. I watch ukrainian soldiers send their 5 inch quads with an RPG shot mounted underneath, and the current draw on the OSD shows around 10A. You think they show wrong number?

[Anonymous No.2621016]

>>2621011
10A in docile forward flight, maybe. But the other half of the throttle stick exists for a reason & many people want to use it.

[Anonymous No.2621017]

>>2621011
Ukrainian soldiers sending quads on suicide missions don't bother to calibrate the current sensors.

[Anonymous No.2621025]

>>2621016
Well maybe those who use 18650 don't need the other half of the throttle.

It's just two different use cases. For a race drone it won't work.

[Anonymous No.2621033]

>>2621017
Was about to say this. There's no way they've got their suicide quads hauling a payload around with that kind of efficiency. Every bit of OSD footage I've seen was either unburdened, uncalibrated, or both.

[Anonymous No.2621038]

>>2621007
If you'd like my personal experience with that system, it's been defects everywhere. Have given them an unreasonable level of forgiveness, but fucking everything I get from them is defective. Only the cameras and one VTX hasn't been goofed up, and the goggles I got have two defects at the same time. Gonna sell as soon as they repair. I love their community engagement and their support, but that's all I like. Fucking done putting up with bullshit.

[Anonymous No.2621040]

>>2621033
Is there a way to figure out how do it as efficient as possible? For example I need to haul an RPG round, what's my the most efficient combination of motors and batteries?

[Anonymous No.2621041]

>>2621040
I'm not helping somebody figure out how to suicide their quads. The fucking government is already looking for excuses to remove hobbyists from the sky, and suicide quads let them push the idea that they're just flying weapons.

[Anonymous No.2621044]

>>2621041
Bruh.. that was an example. I can say it should haul a camera gear or insecticide, the important thing it should carry a weight.

[Anonymous No.2621056]

>>2621040
https://www.ecalc.ch/motorcalc.php

[Anonymous No.2621057]

>>2621040
>>2621056
wrong link - https://www.ecalc.ch/xcoptercalc.php

[Anonymous No.2621089]

>>2621057
B-but how to do it?

[Anonymous No.2621117]

>>2620850
Because vaping is for fags

[Anonymous No.2621159]

>>2621038
Thanks for the info. What sort of defects have the goggles had?

[Anonymous No.2621181]

>>2621040
>>2621044
Fuck off glowies

[Anonymous No.2621188]

>>2621040
A good rule of thumb with explosives, is that if you are too dumb to figure it out on your own, you are definitely too stupid to be messing around with them.

[Anonymous No.2621189]

>>2621181
At this point I'd expect it is a glowy but he also wants a genuine answer because he was asked to find a way to cut costs on the ukrainian's IEDs

[Anonymous No.2621196]

>>2621188
Nonsense. They give guys with room temperature IQs RPGs. They're (almost) idiot proof.

[Anonymous No.2621198]

>>2621159
The one that basically all batch 2 goggles got was loose optics. They just aren't in tight and tilting your head forward and back will cause them to shift. The uncommon one I got was a faulty receiver, so I've got colored speckles that appear at random, regardless of signal strength. I know they're not supposed to be there as I tested it against the standalone VRX.

As for my other defects, the first Race V2 module I got was putting 15mW max, and the Freestyle module will sometimes blank without recovery if I do a flip or roll.

[Anonymous No.2621219]

>>2621196
Those guys are expendable though. They are supposed to die, even.

[Anonymous No.2621235]

>>2621025
The point is that people who use 18650 on quads (myself included) use LiIon 18650, not LiFePo4 18650.

[Anonymous No.2621236]

>>2621235
LiPo batteriesin general make me nervous. It's not the fire hazard I worry about, so much as releasing the Polonium somehow. People are way to nonchalant about tharging hunks of that stuff up inside their house.

[Anonymous No.2621241]

>>2621236
Having lithium batteries in your house is not more dangerous than having bleach or a can of deodorant. None of these things are a concern unless you're a complete idiot.

[Anonymous No.2621418]

>>2621241
Again, it's not the Lithium, it's the Polonium.

[Anonymous No.2621430]

>>2621418
That's why EVs switched to LiFePo, as LiPos tended to cut a person's LiFe in half.

[Anonymous No.2621500]

>>2621418
Okay.

[Anonymous No.2621537]

>>2621007
Have you flown in the sim already? And would go analog for now and wait until all th hdzero problems are fixed + they have more vtxes etc

[Anonymous No.2621553]

>>2621089
put numbers in, get results. put more numbers in, get better results. rinse and repeat until you see a trend, pick the optimum numbers. EZ

[Anonymous No.2621736]

>>2621430

[Anonymous No.2621776]

Either I suck at building, or CMW sucks at designing...

[Anonymous No.2621796]

>>2621430
Carlos!

[Anonymous No.2621803]

>>2621418
Lol no

[Anonymous No.2621813]

>>2621803
Take your chances, I guess: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Alexander_Litvinenko

[Anonymous No.2621821]

>>2621813
Don't see where he was poisoned by batteries.

[Anonymous No.2621845]

>>2621198
I have to retract the Freestyle VTX being bad. My regulator was cutting off at around 14.66V despite having a rating of 2-6S. The flips and rolls must've been sending small transient dips in voltage which was enough to knock it out.

[Anonymous No.2621846]

>>2621776
Just RPM filter that shit. Will probably cut 95% of the noise out.

[Anonymous No.2621858]

>>2619004
Oh, I thought it only needed to transmit the data to the drone for it to fly around. If it also need to receive digital data then I dunno how to make one.

[Anonymous No.2622009]

>>2615924
If you're getting into fixed-wing seriously then you ought to start with a four-channel plane and go to your AMA club. First of all, the bigger planes are easier to see and less impacted by wind. Second of all, there are lots of crusty fuckers who will teach you to fly for free. Many of them can't can't do other types of flying due to medical reasons etc., but the quality of their instruction is extremely good, because they have the experience and because they're they have fun and they're not there for the hours. If you take flying lessons from some 20-y/o dumbass you'll pay $100/hr and never learn anything, so you can do the math and figure out whether it's worth the drive, paying for the equipment etc.

[Anonymous No.2622015]

as for,
>but ima teach myself to fly!11111
You will have to teach yourself either way. The point of the instructor is to stop you from crashing initially and to provide some guidance on what to practice. And if you think you can attain any respectable level of skill without crashing, then I don't believe you.

[Anonymous No.2622024]

>>2622009
While I agree that the old dudes are super valuable for learning the hobby, the AMA has proven to be a bunch of FAA yes-men. Under the CBO rule, the FAA can basically request more rules out of thin air and bypass Congress. The AMA can eat shit for that.

[Anonymous No.2622121]

>>2622024
good thing you're not going there for legal advice then.

[Anonymous No.2622152]

>>2622024
>He doesn't LR Bando Bash in a ghillie suit

[Anonymous No.2622183]

>>2622121
Of course not. Just saying the organization sucks government cock with too big a smile.

[Anonymous No.2622347]

>>2621846
That is with RPM filtering though :(

[Anonymous No.2622367]

>>2622347
Holy hell! I was expecting that to be your unfiltered data.

[Anonymous No.2622505]

>>2622367
Yeah, something is either loose (I checked whatever I could, and remounted the stack). It almost makes me think it's a bad gyro, post flight statistics say I'm pulling up to 10 g's, and that's just from cruising around. Diatone 20x20 F7 was a mistake...

[Anonymous No.2622536]

Has anyone tried doing a large quad copter with a gas generator for power?

[Anonymous No.2622551]

>>2622536
It's been done: https://www.parallelflight.com/

[Anonymous No.2622574]

I can understand why my naked gopro would interfere with a GPS as that is receiving signal. But is it possible for the gopro to interfere with my analog transmission? Well it must be, since I am getting shitty video range with the gopro on. I don't understand why though. It also only happens when flying away from me (with the gopro further away than the antenna) which is weird as I feel like the opposite, with the gopro between me and the antenna, should be worse.
I guess there's a reason gopros are sold with their coverings.

[Anonymous No.2623290]

>>2622009
> If you take flying lessons from some 20-y/o dumbass you'll pay $100/hr

Who the fuck would do that though?

[Anonymous No.2623334]

>>2623290

[Anonymous No.2623408]

I'm new to fpv, just trying to grasp the basics. Given that the max flight distance is kilometers, there's no way a drone is always visible to a transmitter/receiver. Then how does it work so the drone doesn't lose connection if it goes behind some mountain? I doubt 5G can go through everything.

[Anonymous No.2623443]

>>2623408
diffraction, you tried using google or chatgpt? You'll get a better answer and learn faster.

[Anonymous No.2623453]

>>2623443
Thanks, tried googling but wasn't able to properly form a query. Chatgpt should handle it, I guess.

[Anonymous No.2623458]

>>2623453
Even though this is /diy board, you won't get a proper answer because 99.9% people in this hobby don't understand shit how things really work. They have zero clue how radiowaves propagate or how to choose a motor for your model. At best you get something like "just copy what someone else did and hope it will work".

I don't recommend to ask community theoretical questions.

[Anonymous No.2623463]

Why won't dji remake tello but this time with folding arms? Maybe rebrand it to dji micro or something? I would totally buy it even if they jacked up the price by 50%
Seriously the fixed arm/props is the only thing that kept me away from getting one

[Anonymous No.2623469]

>>2623458
Then how would you approach finding answers to theoretical questions?

[Anonymous No.2623478]

>>2623469
I wouldn't, I gave up.

I can however suggest you how to design a whole fucking aircraft at home, because apparently people who build aircrafts have clue how to do that. Dan Rymer 'Simplified Aircraft Design', there's also an Excel spreadsheet. Alternatives John Roncz or Neal Willford design spreadsheets. There's tons of useful theory of how thrust depends on props etc, but you can't scale it down that easily. I tried.

[Anonymous No.2623490]

>>2623478
Yeah, I can imagine it gets exponentially harder the more you dig into that. Thanks for the sources though.

[Anonymous No.2623544]

>>2623408
Trust me, most of the time your signal will fail if you try flying behind any significant body at long range. I've had my signal get extremely weak just by letting a bare tree come between me and my quad at >4 miles. Better hope you rigged a good RTH protocol if you think breaking line of sight is something you're doing to try, as the usual is to just fly straight towards home. (and right into the obstruction)

[Anonymous No.2623757]

>>2623334
>Would YOU buy a racing from a from this kid?

[Anonymous No.2623759]

>>2623408
Mountains will stop RF in it's tracks pretty suddenly, with only a little bit of diffraction to let you get around the corner, whereas buildings and trees will make you lose signal in a more gradual way. All those great LR drone videos that you see that just seem to go everywhere in and out of terrain actually just have a very strategically placed pilot.
Also, If you start to lose video, you can usually just fly a little higher and you'll get reception again. The FAA would probably prefer you to just failsafe, but when in doubt, throttle out!

[Anonymous No.2623760]

>>2623757
*Racing frame

[Anonymous No.2623831]

>>2623759
This here is a perfect example of how little it takes to block a signal. Just a little snow came between him and the quad, and he went from clear video to nothing instantly.
.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPSIQF12--U&t=977

[Anonymous No.2623867]

>>2623544
>>2623759
>>2623831
Makes sense. Thanks anons.

[Anonymous No.2624327]

So I just got my first quad (Baby ape v2) and I was binding my controller and trying to get it set up, and I noticed the quad was getting really fucking hot on my desk.
This makes sense since I imagine it's meant to be cooled by airflow but now I'm worried about frying it just by taking too long to set up the controller and get things worked out in betaflight.
How concerned should I be about this and is there a rule of thumb for how long it's safe to leave it powered while it's on my desk?

>>2621198
>>2621845
Fuck I actually meant to reply to you earlier to say thanks for the info. I only just noticed I guess I never hit submit on my post.

[Anonymous No.2624339]

>>2624327
Was the battery plugged in to the quad? You only need the battery plugged in if you are setting up BLHeli, otherwise for setting up Betaflight parameters you can just plug the USB in for power, and it shouldn't get hot.

[Anonymous No.2624340]

>>2624339
To clarify, you need the battery in for BLHeli and for checking the VTX function. USB for Betaflight and receiver functionality.
You can also get a fan and use that to cool your quad if you have to do something with the battery plugged in for whatever reason, it will be mostly the VTX that generates heat.

[Anonymous No.2624350]

>>2624327
I cooked a VTX on the bench. Here's my /diy/ solution.

[Anonymous No.2624356]

>>2624350
>I cooked a VTX on the bench.
The rite of passage...

[Anonymous No.2624376]

>>2624327
Sure thing! As long as we all share what we can, we all come out better off. It's one of those odd cases where communism works because there's nobody able to rule and corrupt it.

[Anonymous No.2624377]

>>2624350
My dumbass solution is to work fast and blow on it.

[Anonymous No.2624827]

just got an evoque deadcat, first 10 minutes flying fpv irl after 20hrs in the sim. crashed and set motor on fire 2 minutes later lmao

[Anonymous No.2624848]

>>2624827
As long as you had fun.

[fuck u mad janny cunt No.2625133]

>>2624827
Welcome to the hobby anon.

[Anonymous No.2625207]

A while back I bought a dji runcam air unit which was just too massive to fit on any mini drone. Now that I lost my finished fpv, I'm trying to find a way to recycle the air unit instead of getting a whole new camera. Would a 3D printed monoque style "exoskeleton" work with the runcam giving enough rigidity to the shape by filling the middle, or is it absolutely critical to have a carbon fiber frame holding everything together, even for 3" props and smaller?

[Anonymous No.2625222]

>>2624339
>>2624340
Thanks. Didn't realize USB alone was enough.

>>2624350
I'll probably do something like this if I need to keep the battery plugged in for binding again.

[Anonymous No.2625259]

>>2625222
>USB alone
I have a Crocodile Baby 4 and I found that the VTX will run on USB power, but the camera doesn't. I couldn't figure out why I got OSD but not video on the bench. This may be particular to GepRC hardware. I don't have enough experience in RC gear to know beyond my own findings.

[Anonymous No.2625291]

>>2625259
Various flight controllers will power different things off of USB. Some of them don't power shit, while others might power every 5V pad. Usually you just gotta get to know your board.

[Anonymous No.2625462]

Rate my Frankencar and help me ID it. Here's what I know:

The only labels or mfg. marks are on the motor and electronics.
The motor is a UMC era Dymond Gold Label 907.
Futaba 75MHz Wide Band AM radio gear.
It has a Diablo shell that never had a rear wing.
Inch spec hardware, so made in USA.
The chassis is a blue fiberglass sheet.
Front axles are 1/8 inch, rears are 5/16 or 4mm.
Does not use hex-drive wheels.
Rear wheels have two lug bolts for keying to the hub, along with the axle nut.
Original front suspension in foreground. Broke the other one. Do replacements exist?

Obviously, the camera, headlight, front bumper and front axle assy were added by me.

The radio and motor both date to the early 1990s. The front suspension assemblies show up
on numerous vintage cars from that era including some from Team Assciated. Does anyone know anything
about this rolling nightmare? More info or pix on request, of course.

[Anonymous No.2625477]

>>2625462
>ID
Karasique.

[Anonymous No.2625576]

>test on the bench
>everything working
>put everything back together, shrinkwrap, cable tidy, ziptie everything up nice and neat
>power it on
>doesn't work.
Every fucking time, I swear. Need to do things twice or it doesn't work.

[Anonymous No.2625580]

trying to make a super lightweight 7" Long range quad, looking at some other peoples builds and noticed they never use an AIO, am I missing something?

[Anonymous No.2625585]

>>2625580
Most people who build at that size aren't all that concerned with a couple of grams, and AIOs tend to be ultra packed. Reliability is a big deal when you're doing long range. As good as Aikon is, I wouldn't use this for long range.

[Anonymous No.2625589]

>>2625585
was watching this guys video whose channel was posted earlier - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqR46l8KMNo He seems to be putting a lot of emphasis behind the weight of the frame, and he is kinda right, less weight = more flight time.
are AIO's really that unreliable than a normal FC or ESC stack? Not tried many of the bigger AIO's but whoop AIO's seem pretty reliable for the most part, and they get flung around the place.

Just surprised that nobody has min-maxed and went ultra-lightweight, with an AIO for a LR setup.

[Anonymous No.2625593]

>>2625589
The weight does count, sure. But yeah, lots of people have had spotty reliability with AIOs. It's probably gotten a little better in the last year or two, but that's their rep. If you wanna find out with your expensive long range quad, go for it.

[Anonymous No.2625595]

>>2625589
It's about power requirements versus heat dissipation. Heavier quad needs more current to fly, longer flight time prolongs the heating cycle. AIOs may not have enough thermal dissipation capacity to reliably stay sufficiently cool for extended flights. I said may. There are of course other variables to consider.

[Anonymous No.2625622]

I haven't been flying in 2 years. Have banggood stopped selling batteries?

[Anonymous No.2625710]

>>2625580
This would go great on a big toothpick, or tucked in a Tinytrainer. Otherwise, AIO is basically putting all your eggs in one basket. I've killed several AIOs, a couple of 20x20 ESCs, and not a single 30x30 ESC so far. I fly the 30x30s a lot harder too.
Plus, it's not like you are going to be cramped for space in a 7", and the weight difference is essentially nothing. A 7" quad can barely tell if it's hauling a GoPro around or not.

[Anonymous No.2625745]

>>2625622
The more important thing right now is whether you should buy from them at all. They've been destroying their reputation by fucking their customers lately.

[Anonymous No.2625795]

when flying LR, is there much point to having diversity and more than one directional antenna?
it will give me a slightly easier time pointing my head in the right direction if I can cover more area with two, but other than that it's not going to magically make the signal better... right?
>debating whether to drop another £50 on a second TrueRC X2 Air.

[Anonymous No.2625841]

>>2625745
what do you mean specifically?
i've noticed their stock beeing messed lately, selling but then delaying delivery for weeks/months
generally reducing drone part listings radically
looks like all of it now goes to the parent company (ali) and BG becomes more and more consumer gimmicks

[Anonymous No.2625854]

>>2625841
Some people have been complaining that their stuff simply never comes, and Banggood gives no fucks or refunds. I simply decided that I'd buy from domestic online shops who can deal with China in my place. Means I get things to my door quicker, and these guys actually care if I like their service.

[Anonymous No.2625857]

>>2625795
You are correct in that it will make aiming much easier. While many spec sheets will claim something like 120 degrees or something, but once you hit enough range, only about 20-40 of that is actually going to serve you. Having another at an offset allows you to have a vastly more consistent picture. It's a strange feeling to suddenly be flying blind. You know you're at zero risk of harm, but your equipment could just be broken or lost in seconds if you don't have a plan.

[Anonymous No.2625859]

>>2625857
I should note that by consistent, I mean that while it will be more stable, it will likely still suffer just as much as a perfectly aimed single. But, this may not be the case if you use a mixing receiver which can blend multiple inputs. These include Steadyview, Radipfire, Fusion, Wildfire, and any digital system.

[Anonymous No.2625949]

>>2625622
bangoods shit now, they were on the brink of bankruptcy not giving a fuck like 2 months ago.

[Anonymous No.2626030]

>>2625745
>>2625949
Huh more you know.

Any Canadians know where's the best place to buy 11.1V lipos now?

[Anonymous No.2626288]

>>2626030
I don't personally know which stores are based in Canada, but I have had good experiences with rcbattery.com. They're based in the USA, have decent prices, and the packs seem to be accurately marked. My biggest gripe is that there's one of those annoying offers to help me that pops up on the side of the screen.

[Anonymous No.2626759]

>>2625841
If you look at any negative reviews on any bg item, there's always a horror story of a buyer who got sent the wrong item, got fucked around making a youtube video for proof only to just be ignored for months, I never had anything bad happen aside from order delays but that's the risk you take with shitty chinese wholesalers.

[Anonymous No.2626914]

Damn, these FPV systems out there are all shit.
DJI - pay 500$ and get locked into their ecosystem. Fucking Apple vibes.
Walksnail - same, or get some other glasses + a module just to pay even more and get worse performance.
HDZero - which seemed like an open-source long-awaited miracle, turns out to cost 600$. Really? More expensive than DJI for an open-source product?
Or just fly analog and get a crappy image. What a choice.

[Anonymous No.2626923]

>>2626914
>HDZero - which seemed like an open-source long-awaited miracle, turns out to cost 600$. Really? More expensive than DJI for an open-source product?
give it 2 years and there will be 50 different chinese clones at whatever price point you feel like paying. dji, hdzero, etc know this and are going to milk the early adopters for all they can. in summary, if you're poor stick with analog, NONE of the current digital systems will be around long term.

[Anonymous No.2626941]

>>2626759
never had anything bad happen either. that's why i wondered
those reviews are also full of retards so i always take them with a grain of salt

>>2626914
DJI goggles for 500? not here. amazon lists the latest version at 664 for me
and the idea with the hdzero goggles is that they can be used for other systems and even good analog ones are near that price (1080p 100HZ OLED)
so with and analog adapter and module for ~70$ you can do analog
~230$ for the WS receiver
openHD for ~100 if you got the parts laying around since pre-pandemic times

[Anonymous No.2626952]

>>2626941
Well, it's 500$ for me excluding the 200$ delivery, lol.
I know that about the HDZero and the coolest thing about it is that it actually can be reprogrammed if you so desire. But still, 600$ without an antenna is too much.
I'm seriously considering going analog at this point, wasn't expecting to spend ~800$ on a video system at all.

[Anonymous No.2626972]

Realistically, is there any chance to get in trouble if you adjust the firmware on your remote to workaround the FCC and LBT power limitations?
Also, if I order a radiomaster boxer, will it have any menu options to disable/switch between these regulation domains?

[Anonymous No.2626982]

>>2626972
As long as you aren't interfering with HAM boomers or any critical bands no one will give a shit, I regularly jam my cunt neighbors bluetooth speaker at 2 watts.

[Anonymous No.2626985]

>>2626982
Sounds good. Do you know anything about the radiomaster part of the question? Maybe there's no need to tweak anything at all.

[Anonymous No.2626988]

>>2626985
No clue about the specific hardware, sry m8. If you want higher TX power you could add an RF amplifier in the signal path and hook your antenna up to that.

[Anonymous No.2626989]

>>2626988
Oh yeah, good idea. Thanks!

[Anonymous No.2627001]

>>2626972
you should be able to flash the firmware to whichever you want.
https://www.radiomasterrc.com/pages/firmware-updates

[Anonymous No.2627027]

>>2626982
>HAM boomers
they are old, fat and mostly sit at home
even their successful foxhunts take multiple days to locate a stationary target
they are basically impotent against a sporadic, mobile signal

[Anonymous No.2627097]

>>2626914
buy once, cry once.
if you want good looking video then you need to invest in it. buying used is a viable option, used goggles v2 + vista will be around $400.

[Anonymous No.2627100]

>>2626972
>is there any chance to get in trouble if you adjust the firmware on your remote to workaround the FCC and LBT power limitations?
absolutely ZERO
>will it have any menu options to disable/switch between these regulation domains
You flash it with the 1W max profile, and you can then reduce that in the menus to whatever you want, but i don't know why you'd even want to do that.

[Anonymous No.2627117]

Did some calculations for different fpv video entry options based on what was on the oscarliang site:
DJI (Integra): 650-730$
HDZero (eponymous goggles): 800-830$
Analog (any goggles in the 300-500$ range): 420-620$
Having doubts about the low-end analog goggles but otherwise, the difference doesn't seem to be that compelling. Meh, was expecting the analog route to be way cheaper.

[Anonymous No.2627126]

>>2626972
Like the government has the time or resources to chase every wayward signal. By the time they see it, it's going to be like <10mW anyway.

[Anonymous No.2627128]

>>2627117
It's the repeat purchases of video transmitters and cameras that will make the biggest difference. A person can send analog video for under $20 if they really want.

[Anonymous No.2627129]

>>2627126
>>2627100
Makes sense, but I'm considering scenarios like border control or something like that. Could be the case like they take your drone for some compliance check but I'm just speculating.

[Anonymous No.2627130]

>>2627128
Okay, then I guess for someone who just gets into fpv HDZero works best since you can go analog later on if you want to build an expensive fleet.

[Anonymous No.2627136]

>>2627129
what border control has RF measurement devices on hand? Nobody will every check your radio for compliance, unless you're racing in a league with strict RF requirements.
just do it

[Anonymous No.2627168]

>>2627130
I have found that HDZero has the worst performance with weak signal. At least, that's been my experience. Analog night turn black and white with everything looking like a ghost, but at least you can still muddle through. HDZero just displays garbled random colors in the corrupted space. Others have had better luck, so maybe I'm just retarded.

All that said, I think it's the best system if you're a racer. Otherwise, I'd always recommend another system.

[Anonymous No.2627173]

Lmfao just get a DJI and forget about problems. Everything costs pretty much the same anyways.

[Anonymous No.2627178]

>>2627173
It's closed source so I have a gut feeling it won't gonna last. Plus no way to use anything but DJI VTX since goggles 2. At some point, there will be compatibility issues and lack of firmware support so I'll just have to upgrade to new goggles.
But yes, it seems like a solid option if you don't care about future needs.

[Anonymous No.2627210]

>>2627178
NTA, but you really need to stop being autistic. if you want open sores then you have very limited options. DJI isn't going to disappear overnight.

[Anonymous No.2627226]

For building a custom frame, is there any info about the effects of how much the path of airflow straight through the props is blocked by the frame? (Basically what % of the area of the spinning props overlaps the frame) I know the ideal amount is probably 0 but I'm wondering if itsna big effect or hardly noticeable

[Anonymous No.2627317]

>>2627226
it's a drone, aerodynamics don't come into it, you're changing the attitude of a falling rock. if it's a 5" then most frames have arms at 6x10 to 8x15mm, anything around those numbers will be mechanically suitable.

[Anonymous No.2627391]

>>2627210
>you really need to stop being autistic
There's no chance a non-autistic person will get into diy fpv with that learning curve, so no, I'm not gonna stop.

[Anonymous No.2627439]

>>2626982
Yeah? why would anyone want to do that? How would they even go about it? Horrible people yadda yadda.

[Anonymous No.2627534]

Hey ya anons. Pretty new in the Drone hobby. I've been reading Oscar liang's beginner tutorial and I plan to make my very first racing drone. Question is, should I just follow Oscar liang's guide on building a drone or do you guys have any recommendation for other racing drone build guides?

[Anonymous No.2627551]

>>2627534
just follow Oscars guide. once you're more familiar with the topics you can search other more specific builds
but racing is boring AF

[Anonymous No.2627572]

I want to make a small RC "rover" (4x4 capable offroad car to explore (not drive fast)). I want to use 21700 cells and have a supplemental solar panel on top for the lulz. Not interested in criticism of this plan and "that's like not gonna put out any power". I don't care. I'll also add a pan tilt camera on 1.3ghz and a GPS. Want to control it with my radio master tx16 instead of the normal car thing. I'll be using inav rover.

What cheap body would you use for this project? I was thinking about using something like this
https://a.aliexpress.com/_mMA2z5E and cutting down the body to be more of a platform to mount my stuff. Anyone know if I can hook these sort of motors/ESCs up to a speedybee or matek or something?

[Anonymous No.2627581]

>>2627572
carefull, that model is tiny
you want a larger scale if going over terrain like grass
also you want to get the antennas high up

those toys usually cut corners by integrating all electronics into a single board so you will have to hack that to find and interface the motor ESC as well as the steering servo. you might be better off at getting a more expensive model that already has exchangeable components of maby even none at all

and i would suggest a controll link that's not 2.4GHz as you have 1.3GHz video. consider crossfire or elrs on 868/9xx MHz. or go for dragonlink at 434MHz for a full telemetry link (so you can see the location of the rover on a map) and even better penetration

[Anonymous No.2627584]

>>2627581
Good thought on the size. I thought a 9.5mm wheel would be suitable but perhaps not.

I'll be using a 915mhz elrs for control link.

[Anonymous No.2627619]

Anyone know if this is a COTS airframe?

[Anonymous No.2627650]

>>2627619
Where did you get this photo from?

[Anonymous No.2627661]

>>2627173
Don't forget to activate your VTX online, goy.

[Anonymous No.2627664]

>>2627572
I've been interested in a rover myself. Would be pretty neat if you dropped updates in here about how it's going.

[Anonymous No.2627682]

>>2627650
Russia

[Anonymous No.2627689]

>>2627619
never seen that before. Planks and flying wings are very sensitive to CG so slapping a gimbal on one side is dumb.

[Anonymous No.2627699]

>>2627689
Interesting, they are doing a really neat chest launch with that pusher style prop where they throttle up and just sort of hump the thing forward. Any comparable airframes for a similar launch style? All I can find are pusher type wings
>CG issue
Yeah id imagine they are counterweighting it and the whole deal is using chute recovery

[Anonymous No.2627704]

>>2627619
Can try googling it for you in russian if you provide a bit more details to go from.

[Anonymous No.2627706]

>>2627699
keep posting pics if you have more. Most hand launch tractor planes are similar, you throw it like a football or grab the leading edge and swing your arm. Most wings are pushers so you can put an FPV camera in the front. A plank or wing is convenient since it's one piece so there's minimal assembly in the field. It's probably built in a way that the mobiks can only put the correct battery in the correct spot.
>ardupilot
fucking russians using free open source software.

[Anonymous No.2627710]

>>2627706
>>2627704
Ive got a whole sell sheet for the thing and a launch video left but really it doesnt give me anything I dont already know. I just really like that launch format compared to like whipping the thing like a disc or trying to carry a catapult around.
Launch video:
>https://files.catbox.moe/giq2rn.MOV
Sell sheet is attached.
I mean shit ive got a phone number but im not going to post it because it will get me banned for dox

[Anonymous No.2627711]

>>2627710
Forgo my image

[Anonymous No.2627712]

>>2627711
Zala 421-08M

[Anonymous No.2627713]

>>2627712
Ah clearly its a bootleg of that
Ok but now where is the aliexpress bootleg of either of them? I dont think I can call Izhevsk right now.

[Anonymous No.2627721]

>>2627713
You really expect industry-grade drones to be sold around like some fucking toys?

[Anonymous No.2627722]

>>2627721
You've been able to buy 1:1 copies of the Elbit Skylark off aliexpress for a hot minute now anon. Obviously if the russians are using ardupilot its not quite as "industry grade" as one would expect. Like clearly that shit is hobbled together, hence my original question about it being a COTS airframe. I like the formfactor and size and want one.

[Anonymous No.2627742]

>are you going to fly that assault weapon, citizen?

[Anonymous No.2627758]

>>2627572
Why you cheaping out on the body? No point having a rover that always breaks or gets stuck and nothing will kill the passion in your project more than to find out your cheapo chinese car doesn't even have a spare parts market.

[Anonymous No.2627787]

>>2627758
What do you recommend? Why is the frame going to break if I'm driving around slowly? It's not a basher. Why will it get stuck if it's 4wd? Based on the other guy's suggestions, I'm not going to use that body, but you sound wrong.

>>2627664
I'm probably two months out from even ordering a part, but I'll post what I do or info as I find it.

[Anonymous No.2627794]

>>2627787
Thanks bro, I look forward to it!

[Anonymous No.2627812]

>>2627787
It's a 1/16th scale no-name toy grade car, it's going to break in 5 minutes of just test driving it out of the box and you won't be able to buy/repair any of the cheaply made parts. Better off throwing it all on an Arrma Mega chassis or something.

[Anonymous No.2627834]

>>2627812
NTA, but is the MT10 evrything they say, or am I better off with something else in that price range? I plan to do some LR FPV with it, and I want something reliable that won't eat my toy budget in repair parts.
G4HJOY

[Anonymous No.2627841]

>>2627834
Never tried one myself but hear everyone raving about them, they're apparently more durable than RTR bashers but at the cost of having to build it all yourself, worth it imo.

[Anonymous No.2627851]

>>2627841
Thanx

[Anonymous No.2627861]

>>2627851
Just wish they made a 1/8 or 1/5.

[Anonymous No.2627880]

Are asymmetrical props available to purchase yet?

[Anonymous No.2627881]

>>2627861
Associated makes an MT8 but I hear that it isn't as good as the MT10.

[Anonymous No.2627882]

>>2627880
Ive been wanting to experiment with different prop configs for reduced noise, or a less obnoxious sound. asymmetrical props is one way.

other ways include having different number of blades on front vs back.

you could also have asymmetrical props that are naturally balanced, unlike pic related which has a counter-weight. for example, if you super-imposed a 2 blade over a 3 blade, youd have an uneven spaced 5 blade, but itd be balanced.

anyone here doing stuff like this?

[Anonymous No.2627884]

>>2627882
then heres an example of symmetrical with unequal spacing

[Anonymous No.2627885]

a differently spaced 5 blade than the one I proposed here: >>2627882

[Anonymous No.2627886]

>>2627884
top down angle of this, showing different spacing

[Anonymous No.2627905]

>>2615900
Can a simple quad with SpeedyBee F405 V3 or some alternatives on board go on autonomous mission without GPS?

[Anonymous No.2627911]

>>2627905
How's it going to know where it is without a GPS?

[Anonymous No.2627915]

>>2627911
That's exactly why I'm here. For planes you can use IMU's and everything would be ok. But quads don't have aerodynamics for this type of scenarios. I hope that someone can guide me in that.

[Anonymous No.2627916]

>>2627915
>For planes you can use IMU's and everything would be ok
lol no
>But quads don't have aerodynamics for this type of scenarios
you're retarded. you need a GPS or RF ground stations.

[Anonymous No.2627920]

hello frens. newfag to /rcg/ here.

I am moving to a new house on a decent sized lot in a nice neighborhood.
I would like to get something for videography in the backyard for filming some projects. More hobbyist, or some low altitude stuff for different POV for some vids.

But mainly I would like to get one I could use perhaps to launch from my backyard porch (or even remotely from inside office room if possible) to launch this drone to launch in air vertically (quadcopter most likely) to fly up above the backyard/roof area, mostly straight up, and be able to rotate to see around the property and down to the street while viewing this from below and be able to possibly record even, and then fly it straight down in descent and land. Ideally this would be something that can be remote launched from PC in office room viewing cam feed on monitor, record if needed, point down the street or over the neighbors house onto those surrounding streets, and pan and possibly even zoom if needed, and then descend and land it when I need to. It doesn't have to be that capable or automated, it could be very manual as long as I can see a live view of the drone cam pov as I'm controlling it or checking in on it, maybe a few minutes of flight max?

[Anonymous No.2627927]

>>2627915
What you're suggesting is like navigating strictly by using your inner ear. Imagine having your sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell all stripped, leaving you with nothing but orientation and acceleration. Now try not to get lost. Do keep in mind that an IMU is far from perfect.

It's not happening bro.

[Anonymous No.2627943]

>>2627916
>lol no
I didn't say everything would be great. Accuracy is not perfect. For example, in normal condition accuracy of landed things are 4 meters from the target. In conditions when there is no sats accuracy stays on 100m which is far wrom preferable but still. On quads or multirotors it's just doesn't work because copters can't use it's body to stay in the air for some time without crashing.
That's not my idea, I love planes. But this is what someone wants from me to do a research on.

>>2627927
>It's not happening bro.
Yeah, unfortunately. But I'll try to work on scripts. Don't think that it would work out.

[Anonymous No.2628058]

>>2627943
>In conditions when there is no sats accuracy stays on 100m which is far wrom preferable but still. On quads or multirotors it's just doesn't work because copters can't use it's body to stay in the air for some time without crashing.
You don't understand. Localization by IMU doesn't just reduce your total accuracy.
It reduces your accuracy exponentially with time.
It's the acceleration error doubly integrated.
For the purposes of "autonomous mission" it's absolutely unusable both with planes and quads.
I don't understand why you can't use GPS but I guess look up visual odometry.

[Anonymous No.2628062]

>>2628058
Well, I believe the error could be straightened out by installing multiple IMUs and doing some result aggregation.

NTA

[Anonymous No.2628065]

>>2627943
Determine altitude via barometer/calibrations/downward facing laser range finder
Use downward facing camera to compare known objects in terrain to size, measure scroll distance between them to determine distance traveled.

If you have plenty of processing power and storage onboard you can also do precise downward looking terrain mapping radar/ranging and compare against an onboard bank to discern location in relation to given terrain
>>2628062
if this was the case the 6 dozen people working on this task for military applications at sandia labs in NM would be out of the job

[Anonymous No.2628066]

>>2628062
wow, why hasn't noone over thought about that!
quick, sell it to the military so they can turn off the GPS sats

[Anonymous No.2628067]

>>2628058
>visual odometry
Thanks anon, looking for optical flow info rn. Thank you a lot.

[Anonymous No.2628068]

>>2628066
I didn't say there will be no error, but that exponent could become more linear.

[Anonymous No.2628070]

>>2628068
good luck with that
how about first using 10 GPS receivers to get centimeter level precision

[Anonymous No.2628139]

Do I understand correctly that the only open source fpv out there is hdzero? I'm thinking of things like custom osd overlays and other stuff that you can implement by modifying the firmware of your goggles/vtx.

[Anonymous No.2628161]

>>2628139
There's analog as well. OpenVTX and pixel OSD exist but aren't super common.

[Anonymous No.2628200]

and there's openHD

[Anonymous No.2628245]

>>2628139
you can already customize your OSD in whatever configurator software you're using. How custom is custom?

[Anonymous No.2628270]

>>2616872
detection at what distance?
depth cameras usually have pathetic range.
What you want it a standard camera on a gimbal with a laser mounted to it. Point camera at object, lase it, get coordinates of object. This way you just need to get the image detection algorythm to calculate where the object is in the image, move the gymbal to center it, then lase it.
What are you trying to detect? I had a project like that for tracking a vehicle from another vehicle automatically.

[Anonymous No.2628275]

>>2628245
On digital OSDs, it's actually an overlay generated by the receiving end. The icons and fonts can be of significantly higher detail and include color.

[Anonymous No.2628330]

>>2627882
>>2627884
>>2627885
>>2627886
does no one here have any sort of unevenly spaced props?

[Anonymous No.2628352]

>>2628330
i have a full set after each flight

[Anonymous No.2628367]

>>2628352
Kek

[fuk u janny cunts No.2628397]

fuck janny tests

[Anonymous No.2628633]

is there a free open source standard for battery connectors other than XT?

I want something that uses crimping instead of soldering. And if I release a commercial product I want to be able to advertise the connector it uses without paying royalties.

[Anonymous No.2628641]

>>2628633
What a canny goyim! No, you must pay royalties, eat bugs, own nothing, and be happy.

[Anonymous No.2628896]

>>2628633
>other than XT

The XT range isn’t open source, it’s proprietary & the only licensed manufacturers are TGY/HXT/Amass.

[Anonymous No.2629039]

>>2628896
well shit. so whats an open standard power connector? that uses crimping? does one exist?

[Anonymous No.2629041]

>>2629039
>>2628896
>>2628633
actually i dont mind soldering if i can do it before the pins are inserted into the connector

[Anonymous No.2629043]

>>2629039
you're never going to commercialise shit, stop being delusional and pick one of the 30 different connectors out there.
you freetards are the worst

[Anonymous No.2629053]

>>2629043
>pick one of the 30 different connectors out there.
which ones are royalty free including for commercial products? and also open source? and also free to use for any purpose?

[Anonymous No.2629085]

>>2629053
No chink is going to sue you over saying XT connector

[Anonymous No.2629089]

>>2629041
It sounds like you need to run your iron hotter, or use a bigger tip, or get a soldering station with more power. If you aren't getting enough heat into the connector fast enough, that's what makes you melt the plastic (which I assume is why you don't like XT connectors).

[Anonymous No.2629099]

>>2629089
I was traumatized by that bad batch of TGY

[Anonymous No.2629107]

>>2629041
The XT60 connectors I've soldered were extremely heat resistant. Got those fuckers hot enough to blister my fingers and they showed no signs of distress. Before anyone asks, I was building a ghetto parallel battery connector.

[Anonymous No.2629172]

>>2629039
invent one. You can also just shove bullet connectors onto an XT-60. Make crimp-able bullet connectors that have insulation along the sides. Then hope people don't plug it in backwards.

[Anonymous No.2629236]

>>2629099
Disgusting. Why not just use Amass like everyone else?

[Anonymous No.2629303]

>>2629236
>>2629107
>>2629089
one problem I have is that on shorter wires, the heat shrink on the wires often starts prematurely shrinking.

Ive been intending to buy pic related. you can clamp them on the wire being soldered, and it will act as a giant heatsink. this not only stops heat traveling up the wire, it also stops solder from wicking up the wire.

[Anonymous No.2629339]

Could someone explain me why do I have to use Cube with Pixhawk and can I use just Pixhawk in a standalone versions? What the features will Cube give me if I use it along with Pixhawk?

[Anonymous No.2629358]

>>2629339
the cube is just the electronics of pixhawks since version 2
you can still use the OG pixhawk just fine

[Anonymous No.2629362]

>>2629339
>Could someone explain me why do I have to use Cube with Pixhawk and can I use just Pixhawk in a standalone versions

Your question doesn’t really make sense.

The Pixhawk project publishes open hardware designs/specifications. The Pixhawk project itself doesn’t actually make hardware.

Various manufacturers then produce physical flight controllers that implement the Pixhawk specs. The Cube is one example of a flight controller that has been produced to one of the Pixhawk specs. But there are many other flight examples, from CUAV, Holybro, mRo, etc.

You don’t use a Cube ‘along with’ Pixhawk, the Cube simply ‘is’ a Pixhawk. But many other flight controllers are also Pixhawks.

It’s also worth noting that if you’re planning to run Ardupilot, you don’t need to use a Pixhawk for that - you can use much cheaper flight controllers (from Matek, etc.) which don’t meet any of the Pixhawk design specs.

[Anonymous No.2630059]

Shit, seems like I'll never decide on which goggles to buy. HDZero seemed to be a good choice all around but now I'm reading a lot of reports on some loose lenses issue which is still not fixed. And fucking DJI and WS are locking me into their ecosystems. And no open source at all, even in the analog world: OpenVTX seems to be only about the FC to VTX communication, no camera control, no features HD0 has, no goggles firmware, nothing. OpenHD is a joke.

Why is the FPV market so limited...

[Anonymous No.2630099]

Tried my first foamie today. Didn't know how to set CG. Stalled and fucked the nose. Will have to see how well I can reassemble. Wish me luck bros!

[Anonymous No.2630100]

>>2630059
Because most people don't want to learn anything or put a little effort in. They're just consoomers who buy DJI shit and make us look bad.

[Anonymous No.2630154]

>>2630059
>HDZero seemed to be a good choice all around but now I'm reading a lot of reports on some loose lenses issue which is still not fixed

I'm in the HDZero discord and follow Carl's announcements. Afaik that issue has been fixed as they're actively looking for optics issues after assembling them. I bought them in early February of this year and have had no issues with loose optics. These are my first set of fpv goggles so take my experience with a grain of salt, but so far I've been very happy with them and have had no issues.

[Anonymous No.2630163]

>>2630154
Oh nice. I can't find that announcement though. But if that's fixed, I'll probably try my luck with HD0.