Hi Ken,
Thanks for keeping us all up to date with the WKM, mine arrives tomorrow, but I can't get it flying for another couple of weeks, I'm still waiting for a few other bits to arrive.
If you get a chance, are you going to test the failsafe RTH function? I'm dying to know how that works, if it is actually as good as the DJI videos shows...let us know!
Thanks,
Gunter.
I have tested it actually although I'm using the hover mode rather than RTH at the moment. If I flip the switch to failsafe it just stays where it is, when I click back to manual it releases and I get control back. I think if I waited long enough it would also autoland in hover mode, don't know for sure, maybe I'll give that a try tomorrow. I'd love to test RTH but there's no way I can do it in the the neighborhood, way too many trees and quite a few that look higher than 20 meters!
ken would you say that although you probably brought down the Attitude gain under 100 % to get a good result in the wind gust etc. That the WKM is still less work to fly as a bird with MK. Do you think its only the constant altitude hold that eases the flight or does the simple controlling also seem more advanced although low with the attitude mode ?
Boris
I'm way under 100% on ATTI mode, depending on the degree of wind it's somewhere between 50 and 70%, seems to work really well there, I can float it on the wind and get acceptable video. I've got a video from testing in the wind this afternoon loading up now, a bit over 3 minutes of raw 1080P 60FPS from the Nex 5N that Youtube is having a hard time digesting, says about 45 minutes to upload 700 meg! Normally I'd crunch it down into Windows format first which not only reduces size but uploads very fast, this time I wanted to see how Y/T would deal with it raw, answer is, not very well. I'll add the link when it's done but it's going to take a while...
So the things I like about the WKM vs the MK. First ATTI mode and the varo altitude hold, what every manufacturer dreams about but none have managed to achieve prior to DJI and the WKM, it makes anything you put it on easy to fly. Easy enough that you don't have to wonder or worry about what the multi might do, you KNOW what its going to do, so you can focus on aiming the camera where you want it and be as smooth as you possibly can with the sticks, definitely takes the pressure off the pilot.
Second, the balance between tuning ability and plug and play, they got it right, just enough parameters to dial in the setup and everything just plugs together. Hoverfly claims plug and play as its biggest strength but its also its biggest weakness, the lack of tuning ability leaves you with few options other than what it can do out of the box and one size definitely does not fit all from my experience with a Hoverfly Pro board. On the other hand you have MK that is fiendishly complex to tune properly but can be made to fly quite nicely on just about anything if you have enough patience and time to play with the settings until you get it right.
Support, DJI so far is doing a great job listening to users and responding as quickly as possible to reasonable requests, try emailing Holger and asking him to change the software and see what you get for a response!
Camera gimbal setup and tuning, by far the easiest and best I've encountered in the world of multirotors, and if the teaser videos I've seen are any indication things are going to get a LOT better very soon. If DJI comes through with what they're hinting at there will not be any question about which is the best flight controller and camera mount for APV, now lets see if they can make it affordable too...
Ken
OK, video is finally ready...