Building your own quadcopter.

Ok just to start off this thread here is a short video showing the basic components needed to build a quad
and how it fits together.

Will add some other vids later.

 these one`s seem to be the easiest to understand...for me anyway.

Watching Charpu build that racequad makes it hard not to buy parts and try build one myself.
Need to get more then just the parts though: soldering iron, wiring, doublesided tape, pliers and maybe some other tools.

I decided to wait a few months with building a miniquad. I recently bought the Eachine and hardly flown with it. I better have some fun with that first and do some good crashing. When I'm better at flying, I'll start thinking about building my own.

Just ordered the first spareparts for my Eachine, camera-unit and 2 ESC's. I already damaged the camera, though I'm not sure how it happened. It may have been like that from the start, and I only noticed recently, or it happened during a crash. Anyhow.. the camera's sensor has a burnout, which shows up as a black dot on screen. I'm not going to whine about warranty at Banggood, I just replace the camera. The ESC's are for later, if ever needed. They are often out of stock, so best to have a few. Will order more spareparts another time.

That vid about the ESC's was very helpful. He also refers to this video, which explains how to calibrate the ESC's.

Check out this channel. Lot of tips, tricks, testing and analysis: https://www.youtube.com/user/loraan/videos

Good tips. Must get myself a lost model alarm. Already had trouble finding my quad back after it landed in high grass. Also I am grounded for the moment, since the cheapo lipo charger that came with the Eachine is starting to fail. Doesn't really matter cause I was already looking for a better charger that can charge more batteries at the same time anyway. Charging 6 batteries by hand is quite a hassle.

Something like this:


And to stick with the batteries:

CANNER wrote:

Also I am grounded for the moment, since the cheapo lipo charger that came with the Eachine is starting to fail.

I opened up the charger to see why it was failing.



I learned one of the solder joints had burned. This must have happened a while back when i used some pliers to remove the plug from the charger. It's one of those tiny plugs that's hard to remove with fingers. I had not seen the loose wires then and got sparks. All seemed fine for a time, but then the charger started to show problems.

Instead of buying a new charger, I bought a soldering iron to try and fix it. If it works I don't have to buy a charger locally, and can wait a month till a new one arrives from China for half the price.



btw Already fixed the loose wires on the battery.

I want to build one of these, only then the 4" version. It's the same model, but has shorter arms.





Here's a pic that shows how small the 4" version is.

muckyman wrote:

Regulary checking for loose screws was a good tip. I found several on my quad. They were not yet that loose so they would fall out, but certainly not tightened.

CANNER wrote:

CANNER wrote:

Also I am grounded for the moment, since the cheapo lipo charger that came with the Eachine is starting to fail.

I opened up the charger to see why it was failing.



I learned one of the solder joints had burned. This must have happened a while back when i used some pliers to remove the plug from the charger. It's one of those tiny plugs that's hard to remove with fingers. I had not seen the loose wires then and got sparks. All seemed fine for a time, but then the charger started to show problems.

Just received the soldering iron. Fired it up immediately and resoldered the burned joint. The charger is fixed and charging batteries again.


Also learned that I should get a solder that when heated goes more fluid then the one that came with the soldering iron.
Or perhaps I just didn't wait long enough for the iron to get hot.

Thanks

Should get me some solder flux for the next soldering job.
But for soldering on a circuitboard I'd need solder that has the flux mixed in.

In theory you get longer flighttime with bigger props because they produce more lift, but that only goes for hovering.
I think once you start flying around full throttle it doesn't make much difference what propsize you use, the batteries will be empty just as quick.

Love that guy,he`s really funny but explains things very well.

some great information On this site here

Aww, I'm not very nice to my batteries. I keep them stored charged, but what can you do if it takes a whole day to charge 5 batteries one at a time. Impossible to plan 2 days ahead, and then have shitweather anyway. Well its not a very big problem cause they are cheap shitbatteries, but still would be better to look after them.

Good video

Not sure if this applies to quadcopters. And no idea if my Eachine250 has been treated and waterproofed. But I have been worried about landing in the wet grass, which went fine so far, just wouldn't want to short out the electronics with a wet landing. So I think I will look into this, when I start building my quad.