Hi there, from windy Wellington, New Zealand

[Samsord]

:livid: So Hi, Im Rory, I'm totally new to RC Flying, and Multirotors for that matter, although I have been fascinated with them (multirotors) since they first started appearing in the skies and on Youtube. I am going to start building them and have been collecting information with regard to this and have an, albeit rough, understanding of how they work and how one would go about building one. I intend to spend some money, so my budget isn't as restricted as some which makes it easier for a newbie, although for my first 2 builds I want to keep them under $1500 for both.

Video flyovers and aerial photography look amazing, so you know I'm going to try and mount a camera on a multirotor at some point, so I'm going to need to learn how to fly and how to build something that can lift! I have only owned and flown a 15cm-ish long RC helicopter (although I thought I was a natural), and spent a lot of time playing flight simulator games as far as flying experience goes.

I'm not sure how important GPS is really going to be for me, although I certainly see the utility and would like to build an autonomous drone with GPS for wayfinding and holding alt and pos etc.

I signed up because I want to share my experiences and I am looking for advise from experienced RC pilots and Multirotor DIYers. At some point I want to publish a few tutorials that cover the information I found to be the most illusive to find, like a simple series of diagrams showing different wiring configurations with standard parts!

I'm quite new to Forums in general too, so take it easy on me.

I don't know anyone locally who's into this hobby and it seems there is a lot you have to learn from experience so hopefully someone can pass on some of the lessons they learned from their experiences, before I start having painful and costly ones of my own :dread:

I have some parts in mind I plan to use to build a Quadrotor, based on the H.A.L frame from Hobby King. This will be a small, slow, but capable build to practice with and to mount inexpensive and light weight camera gear to. I would like to build/buy an even smaller one too for indoor use, preferably with some sort of FPV gear attached, but essentially just to annoy my flatmates and coworkers with. Primarily though I want to build a Large Hex capable of Lifting a DSLR for aerial photography and high-speed fun (although not sure of those requirements go hand-in-hand) - I'll build this last most likely as I want to learn how to fly and tweak a more basic (more expendable) one first.

I have to get back to work (I work in IT), but when I get a chance today I will post the specs of my first proposed build and ask everyone keenly, will it fly?

 

[dazzab]

If you are NZ and have the budget then you can't go past one of the best MR companies in the world not far from you located in Raglan, Droidworx Aeronavics. Top notch gear and great people to work with IMHO. I live in Australia and own three of their copters. I fully intend on flying over to catch up with them at some point in time.

 

[Samsord]

Droidworx Aeronavics

If you are NZ and have the budget then you can't go past one of the best MR companies in the world not far from you located in Raglan, Droidworx Aeronavics. Top notch gear and great people to work with IMHO. I live in Australia and own three of their copters. I fully intend on flying over to catch up with them at some point in time.

Awesome, didn't know they existed. I'll give them a look. Thanks.:highly_amused:

 

[RyanMcCrae]

Hi, im also located in wellington. Theres a few people located down here.
Il try and help with any questions you have.

Ryan

 

[Samsord]

If you are NZ and have the budget then you can't go past one of the best MR companies in the world not far from you located in Raglan, Droidworx Aeronavics. Top notch gear and great people to work with IMHO. I live in Australia and own three of their copters. I fully intend on flying over to catch up with them at some point in time.

Droidworx Aeronavics; I think the price range of these guys' stuff is a little beyond what I would spend and I do want to build my own, but good to know they exist, I could use them for parts and/or use them for ideas for my "heavy lifter" when I built it. If I had a spare 20K laying around I'd get there top of the line model, oh yes. I think I could build their top of the line model with a more budget frame and the same motors and electronics. They sell the motors cheaper there than I could import them from Tiger motors.

Which of their copters do you have Dazzab?

 

[Samsord]

Hi, im also located in wellington. Theres a few people located down here.
Il try and help with any questions you have.

Ryan

Hi Ryan. Sweet! Tell me about your copters, how do they fly in the wellington wind, and what do you get up to with them? :shame:

 

[Stacky]

If you are planning to build your own and then possibly build a bigger one then Rustys frames are perfect. Rusty is over on RC Groups and has his own thread. probably one of the most respected sellers around, he has free replacement parts and his system is really simple, very flexible and the parts are reusable time after time. I have built many different configurations over the last 3 years reusing the same parts. He also ships very quickly and replies to all emails very quickly. You can build to what ever size you want using his system, from very small to huge. His frame plates cover everything from tricopter, to quad, to hexa, to Octo as well as X8 and Y6. I just discovered yesterday that you can also do a spyder quad shape with his frame plates. You can buy your own booms locally, Heli 500 size tail booms from any RC model shop are perfect.

So you get his frame plates and a bunch of clamps and then source your own booms if you want, source your own esc's, motors and FC and away you go.

On top of it all he is a good bloke.

http://www.shop.aglhobbiesllc.com/

 

[dazzab]

Which of their copters do you have Dazzab?

Yes, they are high end copters. I was flying for a year or two before I bought one. I cut my teeth on 3D Robotics copters which I still have and love. Learned heaps by building and flying them. A friend had a Droidworx XM octocopter and it was obvious to me that if I wanted to do commercial work then that would be the type of copter to use. So I bought a Droidworx SkyJib Lite coax octocopter (two motors on each arm) because I really wanted to fly with a full frame DSLR which are heavy. I was so happy with it that I also bought one of their CX-600 quad copters to use with a GoPro camera.

But I needed something that I could travel with and I really like the results people get from the mirror less dslr class of camera (a Sony NEX 6 in my case) so I was looking around for something between the quad and the large octocopter. Every once in a while Aeronavics has half price sales on older models so when I saw a XM6 hexacopter there on sale I bought it. I've just finished setting it up for travel and will taking it overseas with me next week.

I'm now totally broke but having a blast! I hope to get certified for commercial work in a couple of months which will be the next part of the adventure. If you are interested have a look at my website at http://www.prouav.com.au.

Good luck and have fun.

 

[Samsord]

If you are planning to build your own and then possibly build a bigger one then Rustys frames are perfect. Rusty is over on RC Groups and has his own thread. probably one of the most respected sellers around, he has free replacement parts and his system is really simple, very flexible and the parts are reusable time after time. I have built many different configurations over the last 3 years reusing the same parts. He also ships very quickly and replies to all emails very quickly. You can build to what ever size you want using his system, from very small to huge. His frame plates cover everything from tricopter, to quad, to hexa, to Octo as well as X8 and Y6. I just discovered yesterday that you can also do a spyder quad shape with his frame plates. You can buy your own booms locally, Heli 500 size tail booms from any RC model shop are perfect.

So you get his frame plates and a bunch of clamps and then source your own booms if you want, source your own esc's, motors and FC and away you go.

On top of it all he is a good bloke.

http://www.shop.aglhobbiesllc.com/

Thanks Stacky, I'll pay his shop a visit. I was just wondering about affordable custom frames from somewhere else besides HK. Awesome.

 

[Samsord]

Yes, they are high end copters. I was flying for a year or two before I bought one. I cut my teeth on 3D Robotics copters which I still have and love. Learned heaps by building and flying them. A friend had a Droidworx XM octocopter and it was obvious to me that if I wanted to do commercial work then that would be the type of copter to use. So I bought a Droidworx SkyJib Lite coax octocopter (two motors on each arm) because I really wanted to fly with a full frame DSLR which are heavy. I was so happy with it that I also bought one of their CX-600 quad copters to use with a GoPro camera.

But I needed something that I could travel with and I really like the results people get from the mirror less dslr class of camera (a Sony NEX 6 in my case) so I was looking around for something between the quad and the large octocopter. Every once in a while Aeronavics has half price sales on older models so when I saw a XM6 hexacopter there on sale I bought it. I've just finished setting it up for travel and will taking it overseas with me next week.

I'm now totally broke but having a blast! I hope to get certified for commercial work in a couple of months which will be the next part of the adventure. If you are interested have a look at my website at http://www.prouav.com.au.

Good luck and have fun.

Sick! you are really taking it far Dazzab. That gear is incredible and I can see it bankrupting someone keen to see it in action. I'd like to work for a UAV outfit at some stage, perhaps doing IT work for them since that's my field, maybe get into development of flight controllers etc, that way I could see them in action without having to technically own one. Otherwise, meh, there's always mortages! Thanks for sharing. Heading to your site now.

 

[RyanMcCrae]

Hi Ryan. Sweet! Tell me about your copters, how do they fly in the wellington wind, and what do you get up to with them? :shame:

I have a Coaxial Skyjib that carrys a cinestar 3 axis gimbal, converted to brushless(works so much better than servos in this wind). I also have a small TBS Disco quad which is great fun. The Wind is a real challenge, I went to test the some new gimbal settings on sunday, thought it wasn't too windy until a gust came and almost blew me over; I knew it was time to land at this point.