Canners 130/180 quad build

Thanks Mucky, couldn't have done it without your assistance.

I changed a setting on my ESC's and solved the bouncing problem, landing now smooth. Unless I cut the throttle too early...  

I did not like the pointy standard controlsticks on the Taranis.

Was looking on the web for custom replacement sticks, turns out they hardly exist, could find a few but not much.
Then I remembered I had an old Hubsan controller, and looked if I could modify those controlsticks to fit my Taranis.
Didn't have to do anything, just screwed them on, they fitted perfectly.

Made some good pics of my finished build. After final check up and finishing touches the quad is ready to fly now.
Still need to setup some switches on the Taranis and do some tweaking of the throttle though, been too busy with the building itself.
I've hovered a full battery, and all seems well so far, no excessive heat. But not tested yet how it will hold with a bit more throttle.

Nice pics m8....and yup looks ready to fly and crash into a tree now

 

If it crashes and breaks at least I can fix it myself 

Did the first real testflights outside today.  Also first time actually using the Taranis to fly.  

It was awesome, the 180 flies beautiful, better then the Eachine. Though I still need to tweak the stickhandling and stuff, I was amazed how stable and 'locked in' the quad feels. Also the power is great, it's much faster then my Eachine250.

Very happy with the performance, and despite the summerheat, the quad stays relatively cool.

Will try post a video tonight, otherwise tomorrow.

I think it`s the same as building your own computer,you get much better quality and far better performance.

What also could make a big difference is the flightcontroller firmware. The Eachine runs on Openpilot, while the 180 uses Betaflight.

Maybe I'm going to try flash the Eachine with Betaflight.

Had a bit of a scare today, almost lost my 180. Small accident, but everything turned out alright.

Yesterday I had changed my ARM switch.    I'm used to having it at low throttle left/right, but decided maybe it would be useful to assign ARM/DISARM to its own switch. Wouldn't accidentaly want to disarm the quad while flying, so it seemed logical.

So.. switch changed, and I went flying today. I remembered before taking off, that at landing I had to use the new ARM switch to disarm, instead of the usual low throttle left. This is important because after I changed the ARM setting, the motors spin up to yaw at low throttle when the quad is armed. (this normally does not happen when that stickmovement is used to ARM/DISARM) 

Needless to say, ofcourse I forgot the ARM switch at landing the quad, and at touchdown I did low throttle full left to disarm. This gave the motors max power to yaw and the quad spun straight up into the air like a crazy rocket. I was wearing the goggles and heard the motors scream past me and saw nothing but blur in the goggles. It lasted only a second, but after I regained control and visual, I found myself high above the trees.

After this happened I was almost to scared to land each time the battery was empty.
Changed the ARM setting back to how it was, as soon as I got home.

The climbing speed was amazing though. 

Besides that little accident the quad flies really sweet. Did my first double barrelrolls and powerloops today.

I was finished building much too quick...

Experienced something nasty today. I landed my quad in wet grass, not totally wet, just a few droplets. As often happens with landing, a little bit grass was mowed by the blades. A small chopped off piece of wet grass had landed on the PDB and connected a plus and minus solderingpoint of one of the ESC's. This caused a shorting throughout the whole PDB. No smoke though, instead the motors started to spin up randomly. Not fullspeed fortunately that would have been disastrous. Even with the quad unarmed, as soon as I connected the battery the motors where becoming active, and slowly started spinning faster and faster.

I had not waterproofed anything, getting the quad to fly at all was challenging enough. but I think I better get some siliconspray or nailpolish and at least waterproof the ESC connections to the PDB.

After blowing air through the quad to get rid of the grass and letting the quad dry, i found the problem persisted.
Had to partly disassemble the quad to see if I could find the problem. Wasn't too hard to find the cause.

I had used a bit too much flux while soldering, this had left a thin layer on the board. Not a big problem as long as it stays dry and in place.
Now a bit of wet grass got stuck to the flux, the wetness had made the flux fluid, making the grass permanently conductive, this was causing the short.

http://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/170941/why-do-we-need-to-remove-flux-from-circuit-boards

Thought I had solved the problem yesterday. The random spin ups had disappeared. So I went flying again, but after 2 batteries the problem came back. But this time it was only 1 motor acting up, before this all motors acted weird.


Today I've been at it whole morning:

Started with measuring the current on the soldering joints from the PDB to the ESC, which was good.
Read the ESC in BLHeli to see if anything changed, all was the same.
Replaced the motor, problem stayed.
Reflashed the ESC firmware, did not help.
Reflashed the flightcontroller firmware, and soldered the original motor back.

Finally a bit lost what could be the cause, upon reconnecting the battery a last time, it started smelling suspicious.


RESULT!





Now I'm still not sure if the ESC was the actual cause, but will find out as soon as I get a replacement.
Otherwise if the problem stays it could be the flightcontroller, or the radioreceiver. Though both seem to be working fine.

It could also be that the ESC was just bad from the start. Anyway, if I can get the problem fixed I certainly need to look into waterproofing the electronics cause I don't want to risk frying something each landing in moist grass.

The only thing that really sucks is the long wait for replacement parts to arrive.

Considering to get some 30A ESC's to go with those Emax redbottom 2600kv motors I'm waiting on.

Already wasn't sure the 20Amp ones could handle it. Though I'm assuming the trouble started with a short from wet grass, in that case the ESC should have smoked at the moment the short happened. This could be just 1 bad ESC that died quickly, but even the good ones are probably performing at max capacity.

2litre wrote:

Catcopter  Thats funny and disgusting at the same time.

Ordered a new 20A ESC to replace the damaged one, but only to test and see if it solves the problem.
Once the 180 is up and flying again, I'm gonna put the 20amp ones and KingKong motors on my Eachine250.

For the Emax 2600kv redbottoms, which I just received, I will get 30A ESC's.  
But before I put the new stuff on the quad, I must find the cause of the problem.

Hopefully just a bad ESC,which is annoying but easy to fix.

I would definitely go up to 30 amp ESC`s for the Emax rs motors just to be safe like I did,they
can start pulling a lot of amps at full thrust especialy if your using 6inch props or those tri blades.

Good luck m8.

Hoping for a bad ESC too, read or saw on youtube that this brand nowadays isn't as reliable as it used to be.

I use 4inch tri blades, and though they are smaller, I suspect they also pull a lot of amps because the motors need to spin faster to produce the same lift as larger props. That's why I think the 20A is barely enough, but the good ESCs do stay relatively cool.

If replacing the ESC doesn't solve the problem, I can try switching the flightcontoller with the one I already ordered for my other quad.
When still not solved after that, it can only be the radioreceiver or the PDB. 

Worst case scenario I just start over from scratch.

One thing is certain, I must look into waterproofing the parts before landing on wet grass ever again. I kinda feel lucky these random spin ups did not turn into a fly away or worse. Never had these problems with my Eachine, though I did short out the videotransmitter couple of times in the wet grass. Only let it dry and it still works fine.

This video shows the amount of Amps used during flight:

All I see is picture in picture ..

Did not think I'd have to explain.

The surrounding part is recorded in HD with a GoPro, the small video in the center is what's seen through the goggles. This was probably recorded with the Fatshark Dominator onboard recorder. It also shows the OSD which displays the Voltage, Amps and Mah. Sometimes the Amps spike up to 75.

Here's another video that shows the Amps stay much lower during level flight:

Still waiting for that 1 ESC to be delivered. The 130 stuff will probably arrive tomorow.  


Here's a video of the last flight before the ESC finally broke down.

Received the 130 stuff today.

Certainly going to be small enough to fly inside the house and garden, if I can get it to fly that is.  
Even though I got the 180 to fly, this new build is still a bit of a challenge because the radio receiver is different.
But there are youtube videos about it, so it will probably work out well.