Aeronavics / Droidworx Pete's VM-6 Hexa build blog...
- Thread starter Efliernz
- Start date
hjls3
Member
Pete - awesome results! I have been following your build and she is one sweet bird. Previously you had mentioned that she took a bit of care when descending. Were you able to make some improvements there? I am curious if you resolved that with props, gains or a combination of things.
Thanks for this great build documentation.
Thanks for this great build documentation.
Efliernz
Pete
I am still using the 10.5x6 narrow-blade "APC Clone" cut-downs and it is awesome. 50% hover at 3500g all-up-weight. I think the extra revs of smaller props are a winner when descending as the prop speed never gets too low, limiting control. I did several too-fast-for comfort descents last night and this thing just rocked! I couldn't be happier.
Pete
Here is a small test vid I did last night. It is the first test of my gimbal so still work to do... but the VM was always built for photos - not video. I am still sorting my downlink so I'm shoot blind.
Pete
Here is a small test vid I did last night. It is the first test of my gimbal so still work to do... but the VM was always built for photos - not video. I am still sorting my downlink so I'm shoot blind.
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nicwilke
Active Member
Looks great pete, you must be happy with the results with video. What downlink are you going to use? I've just put a 5.8Ghz VTX on the XM, and now have record on/off, tilt gimbal, and zoom function for the camera. I'm also getting live downlink direct from the PJ710v, which is really good for framing now.
Efliernz
Pete
I will be fitting a basic "board-cam" on the front of the mount to a 300mW 1.3G downlink. I have a foldout/fold-away bracket sorted for the Tx off the u/c.
The HDMI out of the RX100 is underneath - right next to the tripod mount. Not impossible though - I hope to have the HDMI sorted on my next mount. There is no remote-control capabilty on the RX100 at all so zoom/shutter are servo arms! difficult... I use the side slider control on my Futaba 10C for tilt - using a servo speed-reducer between the rx and the HFP tilt input.
I have done some research this morning about the RX100 Steadyshot - and "standard" or "active". Standard is the gyro stab in-camera. Active adds software-stab-correction as well.
I shot 28M 1080p 50i with Active last night and I was getting glitches every 5-10 seconds. It was cleaned up by Youtubes antishake! I have found a thread or two of others having a similar problem but it has been pretty vague... I just wont run full quality and Active.
Pete
The HDMI out of the RX100 is underneath - right next to the tripod mount. Not impossible though - I hope to have the HDMI sorted on my next mount. There is no remote-control capabilty on the RX100 at all so zoom/shutter are servo arms! difficult... I use the side slider control on my Futaba 10C for tilt - using a servo speed-reducer between the rx and the HFP tilt input.
I have done some research this morning about the RX100 Steadyshot - and "standard" or "active". Standard is the gyro stab in-camera. Active adds software-stab-correction as well.
I shot 28M 1080p 50i with Active last night and I was getting glitches every 5-10 seconds. It was cleaned up by Youtubes antishake! I have found a thread or two of others having a similar problem but it has been pretty vague... I just wont run full quality and Active.
Pete
Efliernz
Pete
I had a bad day before Christmas with the new HFP firmware. I appears the "sweet-spot" is small and despite having 60 minutes of testing time on the new firmware, I had a crash with pitch oscillations over a road. Good bye to the Sony RX100, two VM arms and my diy mount.
A quick rebuild of the VM and some further testing of the firmware resulted in 4 heavy landings. I split several u/c tubes (where the bolts tap in) and the front u/c leg cracked. I considered building a new u/c and this was decided on after I rebuilt the gimbal and it was too close to the groud...
I have built a few multi u/c systems and I had some 8mm carbon shaft in the corner... time to built an entirely new u/c that was taller with little weight gain.
I like building with wood - it absorbs vibes better than ali or carbon, it is cheap and light and easy to work with. I have used 18mm sq pine with great success before so it becomes the standard building block for the new u/c.
The 260mm legs push through 8mm holes in the pine. They were epoxied in position - as were the 10mm ali skids.
The mount connects via 3mm bolts through the 4 holes in the u/c frame. To assist in vibration reduction, the holes were oversized to 5.5mm and silicon fuel tubing put through the holes in the frame. There was an overlap at each side which compresses within the bolt/nut.
All finished. Not a bad day's work...
Test flying was minimal due to the 60kph gusts at the moment... BUT I did a few hops in the yard and (intentionally) touched down while flying slowly forward, causing it to tip on its nose... something that caused several cracking noises in the past. Not any more :highly_amused: This u/c rocks.
The mount is diy with 360 mod'd servos on roll and pitch with Trex-450 main gear on the roll with the PH Skyline rsgs. A quick test last night on the old u/c shows that my new mount works very well. No more testing until later in the week but this looks very promising.
As for the new u/c. It weighs in 10g heavier than the stock VM u/c. I have rolled-back to HFP firmware 4.3.802 and it is flying very well. New u/c or not - it's still a Droidworx
Pete
A quick rebuild of the VM and some further testing of the firmware resulted in 4 heavy landings. I split several u/c tubes (where the bolts tap in) and the front u/c leg cracked. I considered building a new u/c and this was decided on after I rebuilt the gimbal and it was too close to the groud...
I have built a few multi u/c systems and I had some 8mm carbon shaft in the corner... time to built an entirely new u/c that was taller with little weight gain.
I like building with wood - it absorbs vibes better than ali or carbon, it is cheap and light and easy to work with. I have used 18mm sq pine with great success before so it becomes the standard building block for the new u/c.
The 260mm legs push through 8mm holes in the pine. They were epoxied in position - as were the 10mm ali skids.
The mount connects via 3mm bolts through the 4 holes in the u/c frame. To assist in vibration reduction, the holes were oversized to 5.5mm and silicon fuel tubing put through the holes in the frame. There was an overlap at each side which compresses within the bolt/nut.
All finished. Not a bad day's work...
Test flying was minimal due to the 60kph gusts at the moment... BUT I did a few hops in the yard and (intentionally) touched down while flying slowly forward, causing it to tip on its nose... something that caused several cracking noises in the past. Not any more :highly_amused: This u/c rocks.
The mount is diy with 360 mod'd servos on roll and pitch with Trex-450 main gear on the roll with the PH Skyline rsgs. A quick test last night on the old u/c shows that my new mount works very well. No more testing until later in the week but this looks very promising.
As for the new u/c. It weighs in 10g heavier than the stock VM u/c. I have rolled-back to HFP firmware 4.3.802 and it is flying very well. New u/c or not - it's still a Droidworx
Pete