Hello from Western Massachusetts

[jbrumberg]

It started with a Christmas gift of a large clone of a clone of a clone "indoor"/outdoor coaxial helicopter in 2012, and now much to the dismay of my wife I have recently ordered what I believe to be all the parts I believe necessary to build my very own quadcopter as I believe the RTF and ARF quadcopters in the marketplace currently are overpriced, troubled with glitches (thank you I can create my own glitches; really good glitches without even trying) and have all this fancy stuff I do not need yet. When I need that fancy stuff I'll kowtow to wifey until my forehead, nose, forearms, and knees are bloodied and even do some housework until I get what I think that I need. (It's really disturbing to me that a middle aged man like myself has to resort to these kinds of submissive behaviors, but sometimes a man has to do these kinds of things :cold. Anyways my toy list of RC stuff includes 2 SYMA S107G's, 2 SYMA S107N's, 3 WL Toys V911's, and 4 SYMA X1's. All these are operational and all have been modified. I also picked up a Fly Sky FS TH9X transmitter along the way as well. From my toy list one can kind of figure out my regression back to childhood. In my defense there never was any regression at all- I never matured beyond maybe 12. And so it goes. I look forward to both contributing to this site, but more importantly learning from this site. I have a lot to learn before I start dirt napping.

 

[jbrumberg]

Just to follow up. My quadcopter kit arrived the other day.

It's the Turnigy H.A.L. 585. I am basically following the "Britt Design" as posted in oddcopter.com with some ideas I have picked up along my RC path. I thought that I ordered everything that I needed

, but apparently I am 3 esc's short

. This oversight has been addressed; now the wait ":02.47-tranquillity:". 8 Hours of time spent in basic assembly yesterday. Quite a bit of

and

as the "X" configuration is not as easy (or figure out) to assemble as the "+" configuration at times. Plus 2 hours so far today. The airframe is "aligned" and basically ready, and motors are mounted ..... This will definitely need some mods :friendly_wink:. There is no need to rush assembly due to the ESC's. We'll see how this "noble" experiment goes. I am quite sure I will be asking a lot of questions real soon.

 

[Motopreserve]

Welcome to the forum! Where are you in Western Mass? I'm a recently relocated noob to the great state of Vermont - which has exactly...NONE of the shops I need up here for this new obsession! Seems like others in certain parts of the country run into this issue as well, but when I stopped into my local hobby shop, I had to spend 30 minutes explaining what a quadcopter was.... Not sure if you have any better luck a little further south?

Congratulations on your parts delivery. The build gets fun when you can see the whole thing taking shape. Frustrating about the ESCs, but at least you have them on the way. Gives you time to figure out the frame, the mods you may want to do, and get an overall picture of where the build should be headed...

Scott

 

[jbrumberg]

Thanks Scott. I have the FCB and Rx installed and wired together. And now I have a whole lot of waiting to do. I really should have checked out HobbyKing's USA warehouse for the ESC's and the components before I ordered overseas as everything was available and in stock. HK appears to have done a fairly decent job at building up inventory on LiPo batteries and select products and parts. Like every in this new and developing hobby there is a lot to be learned and new stuff to be learned all the time which is part of the attraction of this hobby. Hobby shops are few and far between, but there are a couple of fairly decent ones that have some limited electronics, etc. stuff that I know about within an hour to 1.5 hour drive if I was desperate enough to make the drive. I do almost all my purchasing online.

Good luck with your build. I am following your progress. I went the "easier" flight controller route with the KK2.0 for my first build. My Rx came with my Tx.

 

[Motopreserve]

I actually ordered ONLY from Hobby King USA. If I was looking for a part - it almost always came up as an international item, and then I had to backtrack to search the basic terms to find it in the USA. A little annoying - but it ended up getting me everything I needed "locally." I think the KK2.1 is only available overseas, so you would have been stuck there anyway - the wait was going to happen regardless

Very true about this hobby changing at a remarkable pace. I have read posts about "old" technology - and when I look at the post date, it may be 2 years ago or LESS!!! Incredible really...

 

[COMike93yj]

Hi J!

Welcome to the forum! I am going the "inexpensive" route as well and have a KK2.1 on the way .... SLOW from overseas! Been piecing together my build over the past couple of weeks and I too have been following Scott's progress (he is my guinea pig.....don't tell him :highly_amused.

The KK controller is supposedly a very easy board to work with. Something I need in the beginning. I also couldn't justify spending $100 or more on a FC just starting out and for what I want to accomplish with this, I do not need the other options of the higher end boards at this time.

Best wishes,

Mike

PS....I grew up in Eastern Mass....Chelmsford to be exact.

 

[jbrumberg]

Thanks for the welcome and best wishes, Mike. The KK2 is supposed to be easy to set up. We'll see how easy it is. It's too bad about my old eyesight did not picking up the esc mistake in the order to HK or my "old" thinking about HK USA warehouse. I am definitely thinking about modifying/beefing up the landing struts. I've had some fun modifying some of my other flying RC stuff "on the cheap". I intend to share the process. Jay

 

[Motopreserve]

I intend to share the process. Jay

Please DO share your build. I think the more people post these builds here - the more others can learn what to do, and more importantly, what NOT to do. This is a great forum and I have learned a ton from researching here, but it seems that some of the more basic stuff goes unanswered or unaddressed. So for me, each time I read about a new build I pick up more of the rudimentary knowledge needed to advance from my infancy in this hobby.

Im in sure your experiences with other types of RC gives you a leg up, which will make your build even more educational. I'm assuming my landing gear on the HK x650f will need some support. It looked horribly weak when I lifted it off the ground under power a couple inches. I can't believe that I'll be landing this thing too smoothly at first

Looking forward to watching your build progress....

 

[jbrumberg]

The long awaited ESC's arrived and I got the quad put together yesterday.

Plugged in the battery- no magic smoke

, bound it to the Tx and the initial preflight testing and tests were promising

. Bench testing and bedroom hovering is planned for today

I really like the KK2.0 FCB. The KK really walked me through the FC set up. I did have to reverse ELE, THR, and RUD on the TX settings. I will probably have to reverse the AUX as well to get the gear switch to activate self leveling. I have so much more to learn.

 

[Motopreserve]

That's awesome Jay! Make sure you get some photos up here. Can't wait to see the progress.

Can I ask you to explain the "gear" channel? I know that it may be for another type of RC craft - but I renamed mine and made the aux do what I wanted. Is there something special to the "gear" channel??? Can't self-leveling be put to any switch, at any position?

Thanks and congrats!

 

[COMike93yj]

Way to Go Jay!!!!!! I am going to be picking up my motors and esc's tonight hopefully....still researching the damn thing. I can't wait to see it up and running!!!! Do you have the KK2.0 or did I recall you saying you had the KK2.1?

I have the KK2.1 and there are some new firmwares available that even allow for a "bubble level" when setting it up on the LCD!

Scott....from what I can gather you can assign just about any one of the switches to do whatever you would like. I am pretty certain my Spektrum DX8 can do this as when I setup the Nano QX I used the red button to swap between agility and self leveling.

Mike

 

[jbrumberg]

Mike so you are on crutches? Get better soon. There is a "bubble level" function on the 2.0 as well. The board sets itself to the "level" it "sees" during the setup. It's pretty cool. I did not do much if any "drone stuff" as wifey would call it today. It was snow and wood management stuff today. My "open air" operator's platform on the tractor was awfully "open air" earlier in the AM. You moved to the Rockies to avoid these nor'easter's :highly_amused: More set up, some bench testing, and pictures tomorrow.

 

[COMike93yj]

Thanks Jay! Will do! It got to the mid 50's here today with nice sushine! Kind of funny as I do live in the Mts ! We are scheduled for 6 inches of snow tomorrow and the lows at -1....but I am sure it will brighten back up in a week or so. This has been an unusually mild winter here and for that I am grateful as I am on the crutches still...LOL!

Can't wait to see your setup soon!!!!!!

 

[Motopreserve]

Mike,

I changed the aux's to be what I wanted - but I've seen the "gear" listed on all the Tx I've encountered, so I wondered what it was. I changed all the default names as well, but maybe I should be using the gear channel for something particular???

 

[COMike93yj]

Mike,

I changed the aux's to be what I wanted - but I've seen the "gear" listed on all the Tx I've encountered, so I wondered what it was. I changed all the default names as well, but maybe I should be using the gear channel for something particular???

Still trying to figure that out Scott. Since I haven't built it and messed with my FC yet, I have to wait until I get mine setup so that I can test it all out.

 

[jbrumberg]

"Gear" is the outer (of two) toggle switch on the top right face of the Tx (at least on the Flysky Tx). The "Throttle Hold(?)" is on the top right top of the Tx (That sets the countdown timer for this Tx.) You can assign channels to switches. I chose "Gear". I thought that channel assignment was automatic with the Tx. It was not as I found out. It needed to be programmed into the Tx. It definitely works according to the KK board. Now I need to set set the subtrim settings on the Tx to "zero out" the KK settings.

 

[Motopreserve]

But what is the gear it refers to????

 

[jbrumberg]

Scott- I am guessing on this, but I think "gear" goes back to the days of RC airplanes and retractable landing gear. It's an arbitrary designation of a toggle switch. The bench tests went well. The different motors kicked in appropriately to stick commands. I tried the old bedroom hover test. That did not go so well. No lift off at throttle. I got the old rpm's up there pretty high and got no movement whatsoever. I did not play around with self leveling; I had it on. I'll think about this tonight do some more research. I'll probably re-calibrate the ESC's tomorrow as well. I also was not impressed with the fit of those little plastic collet gaskets for the props. Now the writing on the props should be topsides? or not?

 

[Motopreserve]

That's what my gut was saying about the gear channel.

I'm pretty sure all manufacturers have writing on the top. Mine definitely were. You'll know if they're upside down, there would be no way for air to lift the quad, it would push downward only if upside down. It's hard to tell by your photo, but they look correct. Whether they are set up correctly for quad-x direction, a whole different matter.

Make sure theyre on there the correct direction (with motors headed correct direction) and you should have it lift off a bit in the house. But be careful! It's very obvious once it starts to lift that you should be outdoors

Does it looks like THIS:

 

[jbrumberg]

"But be careful! It's very obvious once it starts to lift that you should be outdoors."

Thanks Scott. I have had more than my share of less than effective ceiling/ceiling fan-RC aircraft interactions already with a variety of RC aircraft :black_eyed:. I did not want to chance a "Full Power Scotty" moment:hororr:. My thumbs can get pretty dumb :stupid: That was one reason for the static bench test. I had that thing "C" clamped down to the work bench. The sound of those motors is awesome. I tested the motors and motor spin direction with little pieces of tape flags that I put on the motor shafts. I got that idea from Bartman's thread. It's a great idea, and those flags look pretty funky spinning around. Figuring all this stuff out is part of the challenge and the fun (at least for me). If I need to go flying I have my "toys", and I am still actively flying. I would have today (-10F, calm), but frozen water pipes got my attention as a priority. Right now my record for cold weather flying is 5 degrees F (with video at 7F).