First FPV flight of TBS Discovery

R

RTRyder

Merlin of Multirotors
Last Friday I finished swapping everything over from my F450 to the Discovery frame and Saturday morning I headed over to the field to get some test and tune flights on it. Flew quite well right off the bench but was seriously anemic in the power department with the stock 2215/905kv 3S motors and Graupner 10 x 5 props. Straight and level was no problem, climbing was slow and sometimes in hard banks it started to slide towards the ground as momentum slowed. Fixed that problem on Sunday by swapping the motors with my F330 which had the 2212/920kv 4S capable motors. That, a 4s 5000 battery and a set of Graupner 9 x 5 props was just what it needed although I've only flown it LOS in the street out front since it definietly has some speed to it now, can't wait to get back to the field and see what it can do now with some more horsepower to work with. As soon as the new motors arrive for the QAV500 I'll be able to do some comparison flying, right now the QAV has more power than it can use effectively and it only wants to go fast. Not necessarily a bad thing but it can be a handful in a field surrounded by thick stands of tall trees and not what you want for doing video recording.

Here's video of the maiden FPV flights of the TBS, still have some work to do on ridding the GoPro of jello but that wasn't even on the radar screen for the first flights, I was satsified with just having video, now I can work on making it better which the motor and prop swap has already made a difference, more to come...


The QAV and Discovery at the field on Saturday...

IMG_2238a.jpg


Ken
 
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T

Tahoe Ed

Active Member
Nice Ken. I got my Discovery in today. Now to find the time to build it up. I noticed the same thing as you did concerning the wiring from the camera to the core. The cable wires don't match the ones that connect to the BNC leads. Nothing that can't be fixed. I am planning to use the DJI 920's as well. I have 5 brand new 4S 3000 lipos that are ready to go along with 4 4000mAh. That should last me. I like the fact that the Immersion vTx will operate on up to 6S. It makes everything much simpler and cleaner.
 


R

RTRyder

Merlin of Multirotors
Macsgrafs said:
Ken, thats some smooth flying mate, may I ask what RC gear you are using?

Ross
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Naza with GPS, I've pretty much stanardized on this setup for all my FPV quads. I fly it exclusively in ATTI mode, with the right gain settings it flys much like a Mikrokopter which was my first "real" mutlitrotor so it feels right to me flying that way. The ATTI gains need to be turned way down, otherwise it will constantly be trying to level itself and from the pilot perspective it looks like its fighting you. In windy conditions I usually run the ATTI at the minimum gain of 40%, it's a bit loose that way but still very controllable. In calmer conditions I crank it up to around 80% and in dead calm I have the slider setup to go as high as 140% though it's rarely windless enough here to use that setting.

Right now the TBS is set to 140 on basic pitch and roll and I vary between 60 to 80% on ATTI pitch and roll using the Graupner 9 x 5. The flight in the video was with the old motors and Graupner 10 x 5, it's actually much smoother now with the 920kv motors and smaller props. I have to work an evening gig tomorrow so I'm going to try and get out in the morning for another round of test flights. If all does as well as I expect then it's time to go flying in more interesting places.

Ken
 



Droider

Droider

Drone Enthusiast
Aye Up Ken.. that looks like a elongated F450.. Is it? Oye u nicked my folding liftime table! ;-)
 

Macsgrafs

Macsgrafs

Active Member
Sorry Ken, Imeant what Radio Control system are you running....2.4GHz or 35MHz? It's because you went some distance away....don't know if I would trust my 2.4GHz stuff to go more than a few metres ;)

Ross
 

R

RTRyder

Merlin of Multirotors
mailman35 said:
what are you using for the vtx? 900? 1.3? 5.8?
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The VTX right now is a 1500mw 1.3, I'll be trying it out with 2.4 next time out.

Droider said:
Aye Up Ken.. that looks like a elongated F450.. Is it? Oye u nicked my folding liftime table! ;-)
Click to expand...

It's a set of 450 arms on a set of custom centerplates, aka the Team Black Sheep Discovery. The front arms are spread wider than normal so nothing gets in view of the camera and the plates extend rearward to hold the battery and provide a little more real estate for mounting things. I'm not completely sold on the battery location, I was able to get a better CG with the stock 450 center plates and the battery slung underneath lengthwise, the problem with the stock setup is there really isn't a good way to just stick a GoPro on and not have some part of the quad in view and the space to mount accessory gear is limited with the Naza and GPS, with a WKM it would be even tighter. I managed to get everything positioned so the CG is pretty close to where it needs to be on the TBS, the QAV I'm still working on it and moving things around. Life would be easier if I used smaller batteries but I like the 10 minute plus flight times of the single 4S 5000 setup even if they are heavy buggers.

I had a shorter non-folding table before that fit perfectly in the CRV that got totaled back in March. The new one is a little different in the cargo area and the short table wouldn't lay flat so everything kept sliding to the rear and piling up against the rear door, folding table to the rescue... ;)

I have the loading down to a science now, I know exactly which items go where and in what order, I can be setup and ready to fly within 5 minutes of arriving at the field and it breaks down and goes back in almost as quickly. I even have a small portable generator I bring along to run the battery charger so I can fly as long as I want to and not have to carry a couple dozen fully charged batteries for the three quads :)

Macsgrafs said:
Sorry Ken, Imeant what Radio Control system are you running....2.4GHz or 35MHz? It's because you went some distance away....don't know if I would trust my 2.4GHz stuff to go more than a few metres ;)

Ross
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The control system is an Immersion EZUHF on 433 mHz. The farthest point I went out to in that video was about 1600 feet and behind some 20 to 30 foot high piles of dirt, hard to get right down on the deck out there and keep video, I have yet to have a problem with the control radio though and that includes my JR 11X on 2.4. The farthest I've pushed the limit is to right at 2000 feet with my MK quad using a pair of Spektrum satellites on a diversity board with an Immersion 600mw VTX on 5.8. For that I had to be up around 300 feet in altitude to keep the needed LOS for the video, the Spektrums never even blinked, still had solid lights on landing which means neither one ever dropped signal. With the Immersion EZUHF I have no worry about losing signal with a quad, I don't have enough flight time in the battery to outrun the range of the UHF, video on the other hand can be tricky with all the trees and hills we have around here. When I go into the trees with either the 5.8 or 1.3 I start getting fuzzy static the further in I get which isn't all that far, the 1.3 will go deeper than the 5.8 but not by much. The big difference is behind the dirt piles, the 5.8 goes dark below LOS, the 1.3 just gets fuzzy occasionally.

As soon as I get the remaining items on the checklists taken care of on both quads I'll be heading off to some places I haven't flown before for a differenet view from the pilot camera.

Ken
 


R

RTRyder

Merlin of Multirotors
kloner said:
any problems with the naza gps?
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None, of the three I have this one is by far the best and most accurate. Initial lock is under a minute, near instant after the first battery, and the first time I tried RTH it landed less than 3 feet from the spot it took off from. I've used the RTH several times now mainly because I get a kick out of watching it turn towards home and fly back while I sit back and relax, still manages to land within a few feet of the takeoff point regardless of whether I have the 800mw VTX or the 1500 installed.

The setup on my stock F450 is another matter, crankiest one of the bunch, locks when it feels like it, sometimes holds rock solid, sometimes not. It's also the first one I got, the good one is the last, bought only a week or two ago so maybe they've gotten better at building them since the first batch...

Ken
 

Macsgrafs

Macsgrafs

Active Member
Thanks for the info Ken, it was because I saw you fly behind that small hill that I wondered what RC system you were running. What ever you're doing...it's working very well.

Ross
 

R

RTRyder

Merlin of Multirotors
Macsgrafs said:
Thanks for the info Ken, it was because I saw you fly behind that small hill that I wondered what RC system you were running. What ever you're doing...it's working very well.

Ross
Click to expand...

I just setup the Discovery with some new gear, should be even better for long range down on the deck now, I'll find out this weekend. I also got some pricey antivibration mat to put under the GoPro, in the couple test flights I've done with it I've been amazed at the difference, no jello in the video at all!

Still working on refining the setup, it's really close now and just about time to start taking it places I've never been before, at least not while flying a quad ;)

Ken
 

Macsgrafs

Macsgrafs

Active Member
RTRyder said:
I just setup the Discovery with some new gear, should be even better for long range down on the deck now, I'll find out this weekend. I also got some pricey antivibration mat to put under the GoPro, in the couple test flights I've done with it I've been amazed at the difference, no jello in the video at all!

Still working on refining the setup, it's really close now and just about time to start taking it places I've never been before, at least not while flying a quad ;)

Ken
Click to expand...

Where did you get the anti vibration mat...sounds wicked to me. Looking forward to more FPV videos from you Ken, keep at it.

Ross
 




R

RTRyder

Merlin of Multirotors
Tahoe Ed said:
You got that right. At least you have enough to do two machines or you can make it a two person buy.
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I don't know where you're getting the $120 pricing from, I didn't pay anything close to that for the green one I bought and I got it from Vibrationmounts.com...

Ken
 

T

Tahoe Ed

Active Member
Ken, I paid $99 including shipping and handling. If you are shipping to the EU I would imagine the cost would be higher.
 

kloner

kloner

Aerial DP
Did you setup some kind of account? there $95 plus ship plus the infamous sdi "handling", mine was $105 3 weeks ago
 

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