Commence Building

[hitchcockgreen]

You'll have to upload a video of that thing in the air.

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[Blunt Force Trauma]

Came up with a MUCH better landing strut or leg. The foam board legs were breaking much too easy when there was any lateral impact, pivoting them and breaking the foam at the boom.

My new design below works immensely better and is as cheap and light. I took about 8 inches of a large 3/8" wide heavy-duty nylon tie, drill a small hole on the ends, take some insta-morph and press it thru the hole for a mechanical lock (epoxy nor CA bind well to nylon) and make a small hook or catch (pic #1). Then take a small eighth inch tie and VERY tightly bind both ends of the larger tie to the boom. It's light and works great. On hard impact the large tie slips out from the two small ties and absorb the impact (pic #2). I simply pull each hook tight against the tie again and it's ready to go. Pic #2 displays a moderately hard landing. It even keeps a record of the energy it absorbed.

(nylon zip ties and insta-morph are amazing inventions)



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It's flying great, flight videos coming soon.

[Dx.]

That looks pretty heavy.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Oh goodness no. Two eighth inch wide, 2" long ties and an a 8" segment of 3/8" tie with 2 small pieces of insta-morph. . . times 4, must weigh less than 18 grams. But you have my curiosity up, I'll check.

[Dx.]

I mean the wood and motor look heavy. (could be the camera too i guess)

[Blunt Force Trauma]

I weighed the leg ties, the insta-morph and the binding ties and was a little low. All together they come in around 26 grams for all four, or just shy of an ounce. The whole quad, including the 3S LiPo weighs in at 2.7 pounds. In theory, with the 9050 3-blade props I should be able to lift around 5.1 pounds clear of ground effect or an additional 2.4 lbs.

But yes, wood is one of the heavier materials to build booms. It's right there with aluminum tubing. The heaviest is thin-walled PVC, like schedule 30 or 40 and aluminum bar. The lightest is of course fiberglass and carbon fiber. Great thing about wood is, it's about the best material for absorbing a wide spectrum of vibration.

Oh and I know it's been almost 3 months since I made this thread. . . but it's winter so the days are short, I had the flu for almost a month and Christmas interrupted my progress, but it's time for at least one video. . . Here ya go, a quick hover.

[Dx.]

Speaking of aluminum tubing.. i was thinking the aluminum tubing from an antenna would work well. (and very light)

[Blunt Force Trauma]

If you mean a TV array type antenna, you might be right, but it'll need to be cut. But what I've seen most, is guys get towel rack square tubing, it's quite strong and usually just the right length of around 18 or 24 inches.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

HERE'S a quick video with a cheap #11 808 720P camera onboard. LOL, it's a great example of what's called the "jello effect" (the wavy result when the camera's frame rate goes in and out of resonance with the motor vibration) because I switched over to + config and put the camera on the end of the front boom as the pic shows. I knew it would probably look like crap, and I was right. Easy enough to fix as I talked about earlier. I'll put the camera in the center with some vibration abortion, and it should improve greatly. Be sure to turn down the sound of the vid as the motor vibration and noise is resonating directly off the boom and into the camera body and it's annoying. The foam under the camera is only to prop up the rear to see the ground better.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Found another great use of Insta-Morph.

I was frequently poking and scratching my fingers whenever I would grab the quad, so I put some of it on the 2mm or so of the threaded screw that is sticking past the nuts on the underside. The advantage of insta-morph on the threads as opposed to a soft plastic cap, is I press it into the threads which require it to be truly unthreaded to be removed.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Very thorough NOVA documentary covering the history and explosion of UAVs and the coming ramifications in society.

Rise of the Drones

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Made a few mods after a small crash. Replaced the 3 year old KK2.1 board with the year old KK2.0 board. Amazing jump from the older Atmega168PA IC to the Atmel Mega324PA 8-bit AVR. The stability difference is instantly noticeable and supports 8 motors.

Used my Galaxy S2 to check how my props are balanced.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Added some low lumen colored lights. And some average... maybe 40 lumen white lights to the front and rear. I still have 2 crazy bright 800 lumen lights to put on, but I need some heat sink paste and a small heat sink. I'll try and find a dead video card or something similar and scavenge one off of those and cut it into a few pieces.

And of course. . . the four 20mw lasers.

Also a quick video. I think I've improved from raw noob to solid beginner in the last few weekends. Now with rotating wing fliers, I have maybe four flight hours with this quad, at least a dozen hours with the Phoenix 4 sim and several hours with little toy co-axials.

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Next project begun.

[Dx.]

Today, drones, tomorrow... over unity devices huh BFT?

[hitchcockgreen]

I found a potent that can be controlled by an android device for $300. The temptation to drive my crazy neighbor even more crazy was rather great.

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[Sno]

Does this run off a frequency or something like? Put a camera on it, set trajectory to college campus girls locker room ...

[Blunt Force Trauma]

Does this run off a frequency or something like? Put a camera on it, set trajectory to college campus girls locker room ...

And do it for pennies on the dollar compared to just 3 years ago. Quality is a dice roll, but in theory, yes.

My transmitter is the standard 2.4ghz.

[hitchcockgreen]

There are already some prebuilt models with HD cameras on them. Not sure about the quality but still... I imagine those are pretty loud though.

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[Blunt Force Trauma]

The multirotor phenomenon is exploding before our eyes.

Here's two excellent documentaries.

NOVA - Rise of the Drones

Journeyman: Rise of the Machines