450 Quadcopter Frame From PolyFlex Pressure Pipe

[PsyBorg]

Just goes to show.. no good deeds go unpunished hehe Maybe he thought you were just a crazy Tri guy and tried to get ya with brain freeze!

 

[kpixels]

PROGRESS!!!

Thanks PsyBorg! You were spot on about almost everything. Didn't get any results until I started trying combos below stock PID values. Tried KrazyFPVs technique just to find the right neighborhood for numbers. Will have another long session, fly some more and get used to it, then start looking at rates.

You are starting to get the hang of tuning now. Seems you are figuring out what it takes to tame one of these beasties. Flying skills are progressing as well. A lot smoother in the coordinated turns. the more you fly in acro the faster you will progress and the smoother you will get. Keep it up mate.

Yes, I need lots more practice! In my defense every time I change the numbers I have to relearn the controls somewhat. That video was first time flying with those numbers, other than in my living room, I could tell right away it was much better though. It was a bit windy too, LitterBug's snowstorm had just literally passed thru here...

 

[kpixels]

Glad you made it outside. It was sunny when I got home, so put a pack on to do some 6S testing on my F550. As soon as the charger beeped that it was ready, it was snowing hard... :-(

Gotta love OH this time of year. LOL!

When I got home yesterday it was dark and snowing big wet chunky stuff. Had given up the idea of flying but then the Sun poked thru. I saw a hole in the clouds and went for it. It started snowing again on my way home. Don't know how I got so lucky...

Well, actually.... Ken is west of me, and I firmly believe his flight was to seed the clouds and make it snow on me!

Sorry, I did wish it away and it had to go somewhere!

 

[LitterBug]

Oh goody goody I got a test in between squalls tonight and have my first 6S build/flight! (and it only has 3S motors!!!!) I really need to start a thread dedicated to my F550 to divulge all the details. The short: Higher voltage = better efficiency, breathing new life into old "stuff", E=IR, Higher Voltage = lower current at the same power, Thermal efficiency, and all that other good stuff too.....

Cheers!
LItterBug

 

[kpixels]

Oh goody goody I got a test in between squalls tonight and have my first 6S build/flight! (and it only has 3S motors!!!!) I really need to start a thread dedicated to my F550 to divulge all the details. The short: Higher voltage = better efficiency, breathing new life into old "stuff", E=IR, Higher Voltage = lower current at the same power, Thermal efficiency, and all that other good stuff too.....

Glad you got to fly! And the motors aren't toast? Let me know when you start the thread, I'm interested in details. I know you can double mAh by using two identical batteries in parallel. Wondering if you can get one 6S from two 3S in series?

 

[LitterBug]

Motors are NOT toast and not even warm. E=IR, Watts=Volts*Amps, etc...

To spin a prop and generate enough lift to hover, it takes X watts. So say you are running on 4S (16V) and that takes 5 amps. 16*5= 80 watts. If you increase volts to 6S (24V) that means it only takes 3.33 Amps for the same amount of watts. Less amps usually translates to less heat as well. To be safe, I am limiting the Max ESC output to 66% (4S/6S). So 66% of max throttle on 6S would be equivalent in performance to 4S on 100% throttle.

That's the quick and dirty explanation. I'll rig up telemetry, OSD, etc... to document it properly.

Cheers!
Lit

 

[kpixels]

A few weeks ago, using a 15-20 ft dead tree limb to dislodge version1 from a larger dead tree. Besides a broke FC power wire from recovering, there was no other damage since I caught it with my head.

 

[kpixels]

If At First You Don't Succeed, Tri, Tri, Tri Again



13.5" wide x 13.5 long, 160.5 grams (w/o electronics)

 

[LitterBug]

YES!

Cheers!
LitterBug

 

[PsyBorg]

MAD MAN.... MAD MAN....CONTACT!!! Anomaly detected two posts up bearing 0 degrees relative. Suggest high altitude recon to gather further information.

 

[kpixels]

YES!

Cheers!
LitterBug

Thanks LitterBug! and PsyBorg too! I got a lot done Friday night and Saturday since it was a crappy weather still. The wimpy folding tricrapter, I mean tricopter is gone forever. For this new T-ri (get it?), all of the wires are in place, motors and ESCs, tough-tilt, servo and the flight controller all installed @ 455 grams only. It feels very solid. It will probably be the weekend before I can spend any serious time finishing it.



Had 4 nice flights with version 2 today (Sunday) along with some hiking...
Ken

 

[PsyBorg]

Cool you got to fly as well. I got out today on an absolutely gorgeous bright sunny Sunday afternoon with low winds and slight breezes to fly in. Was over 50 degrees by the time I was done. Put 5 pack thru the Gremlin and just hung out at the table enjoying the afternoon watching geese flying back thru, seeing all the local birds back and active. Had some helicopters flying low and slow patterns like they were searching fro some one. That part was annoying as they were well below the 400 foot mark and not moving in a predictable pattern. Not that my Gremlin ever sees anything higher then about 50 feet anyways.

Lookin forward to seeing some flight vids for this project for sure.

 

[kpixels]

Cool you got to fly as well. I got out today on an absolutely gorgeous bright sunny Sunday afternoon with low winds and slight breezes to fly in. Was over 50 degrees by the time I was done. Put 5 pack thru the Gremlin and just hung out at the table enjoying the afternoon watching geese flying back thru, seeing all the local birds back and active.

Thanks, sounds just like it was here, such a nice break from the crappy weather.

Lookin forward to seeing some flight vids for this project for sure.

Thanks, I really appreciate that!

Long story, but you might want to know. When I cut the pieces for the new tricopter frame, I also cut a new rear motor boom for version2. One of the motors was tilted slightly relative to the others. It was one of the last things in the back of my mind that it could be contributing to that bounce, but hardest to fix or check.

Well I would of had the tricopter finished already if it weren't for the major surgery I performed on version2. The good news it was well worth the effort to get that right, it feels so much better. The only bad news is now I have to re-tune the PIDs again, probably start from scratch again. It should all iron out nicely now, with some time and more nice weather.
Ken

 

[kpixels]

Secret Places Explored With Poly Quadcopter

Highlights footage from Version2 of four flights that totaled 43+ minutes of HD 1080 @ 60 FPS. First flights after extensive repair to correct the angle of one motor that was slightly off. It needs further PID tuning, but it's good enough to get my fix.

 

[PsyBorg]

Oh yeah.. you can see a HUGE difference now. Get the tune dialed in and I think you have a viable quad ofr as long as you can keep it in one piece. Good find on that motor issue and solving that.

Did you by chance use the rates I posted as you are now nice and controlled at center sticks and not lurching out of hover?

 

[kpixels]

Wild Poly Quadcopter Tamed At Last?

Oh yeah.. you can see a HUGE difference now. Get the tune dialed in and I think you have a viable quad ofr as long as you can keep it in one piece. Good find on that motor issue and solving that.

Thanks PsyBorg, that's what I thought too! I was able to sneak out after work last night and spent almost an hour trying different combinations before capturing this footage. Figured it would be easier to show you than trying to explain where I was with this. In the footage I can see a slight high speed oscillation that I didn't notice while flying but I'm pretty sure I can get rid of. I think the bouncing coming into the dives is me cutting throttle too much.

Did you by chance use the rates I posted as you are now nice and controlled at center sticks and not lurching out of hover?

No, haven't got to the RC rates yet. I'm ready to mess with them at the next opportunity. To me it felt really great except for the yaw seemed to drift, especially if I was trying to punch out a long straight run, it squirrels all over.

YouTube Description;
Version 2 poly quadcopter after first PID tuning session since repair that corrected a misaligned motor. Krazy's technique wouldn't work this time. Instead, slowly cranked up P from last best number while keeping the D half of P and she finally stopped bucking around so much. After watching this footage and my flying notes, I'm sure it will be even better with more tuning and now on to RC rates with advice by PsyBorg from the FliteTest forum.

__ p___i___d
R- 60--30--30
P- 66--30--30
Y- 70--30--__

 

[PsyBorg]

Yeah the wobbles when you go into a dive is more you falling straight into your own wake. This is a feel thing you will learn over time. Like just before you start your dive make sure you are moving a bit forward to be heading away from dirty air and not falling straight back down thru it.

I would probably bump up your I gains at this point as the twisting action on punch outs is a direct indication of low I I would put roll I to 40, Pitch I to 45 maybe even 50 with the camera way out front like that as well as bump Pitch P more and put yaw at least to 50 on I gains. the way to test it is when you are down at eye level blip the throttle to punch it up to about 20 or so feet if it twists going up or down I should be raised. Just be very aware that you are not slightly yawing when you punch out its an easy thing to do. I had to relearn more stable throttle stick after I changed over to hall effect gimbals as they pick up the slightest changes on the sticks.

Take a look at these two videos for tuning. Skitzo's is what made tuning click in my head. Stingy has a slightly different method and likes working D gains harder then what Skitzo does. I prefer Skitzos for mine as its a tighter feel and does not seem to fight what I do with slightly higher P gains and less D.

 

[kpixels]

I would probably bump up your I gains at this point as the twisting action on punch outs is a direct indication of low I I would put roll I to 40, Pitch I to 45 maybe even 50 with the camera way out front like that as well as bump Pitch P more and put yaw at least to 50 on I gains. the way to test it is when you are down at eye level blip the throttle to punch it up to about 20 or so feet if it twists going up or down I should be raised. Just be very aware that you are not slightly yawing when you punch out its an easy thing to do. I had to relearn more stable throttle stick after I changed over to hall effect gimbals as they pick up the slightest changes on the sticks.

Thanks, will try your advice next chance I get.

Take a look at these two videos for tuning. Skitzo's is what made tuning click in my head. Stingy has a slightly different method and likes working D gains harder then what Skitzo does. I prefer Skitzos for mine as its a tighter feel and does not seem to fight what I do with slightly higher P gains and less D.

Have watched these plus a dozen others. Since your pointing them out I'll definitely give them more weight now. I did end up going down with my I gain, like Skitzo's. Maybe some more tuning before changing RC rates yet?

 

[PsyBorg]

Being newer you probably don't have "your" rates figured out just yet. The ones I use allow me to fly any size quad and be able to move it a millimeter at a time with about a quarter inch deflection or to do near three full flips at full deflection. When tuning you should always set your rates first so you are tuning to your feel. You seem smooth enough with the rates you have in your last two vids I would leave them and tune with those. Once you get "tuning to click" you can always change the rates and retune as needed.

I know what my quads do and about where they are happy for our winds and such. I know 40 for pitch and roll I gains and 50 for yaw is where mine seem most stable and hold their lines properly. I just set that at the start. I lower D gains to 10 on KISS and 20 on BF and start Tweaking P gains til I get a nice crisp flips and rolls. You can hear when you are close as they start getting that ZZZT sound as you do a full deflection flip or roll. Once at that point I start twitching the sticks and listen for bounce back. Once I get that as tight as I can then I raise D gains to finish the tune. If at any point my d's go over 10 or 30 I reset them and go back to P gains and tighten them a bit more.

I just started refining my tune for my Alien after I reconstructed it and no longer have an action camera for it. Messed around for three packs this afternoon and found the board inside my FPV camera was rattling around so any thing I did today was pretty much useless. Was just chasing the camera shake.

 

[kpixels]

I know what my quads do and about where they are happy for our winds and such. I know 40 for pitch and roll I gains and 50 for yaw is where mine seem most stable and hold their lines properly. I just set that at the start. I lower D gains to 10 on KISS and 20 on BF and start Tweaking P gains til I get a nice crisp flips and rolls. You can hear when you are close as they start getting that ZZZT sound as you do a full deflection flip or roll. Once at that point I start twitching the sticks and listen for bounce back. Once I get that as tight as I can then I raise D gains to finish the tune...

Will try fishing around in that area.

If at any point my d's go over 10 or 30 I reset them and go back to P gains and tighten them a bit more.

?
I think I know what you meant, but not sure.

I just started refining my tune for my Alien after I reconstructed it and no longer have an action camera for it. Messed around for three packs this afternoon and found the board inside my FPV camera was rattling around so any thing I did today was pretty much useless. Was just chasing the camera shake.

That sucks! Do you have a new FPV cam lined up? If not is there any way I could chip in for a new one?