Airhawk's Nighthawk 250

[airhawk]

so far those of you awesome people who have followed my quad threads you would know i wanted to buy a fpv 250 quad
after 11 pages of questions i have decided to go with this quad the night hawk 250 http://www.besthobbymall.com/night-...-fiber-quadcopter-aircraft-frame-combo-1.html
with this fpv set http://www.getfpv.com/fpv/video-goggles/fatshark-teleporter-v3-video-goggles.html
this Rx http://www.lemon-rx.com/shop/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=132
a dx6i as a radio
maybe this pbd http://www.gothelirc.com/shopexd.asp?id=2016
xt60 connectors
naze 32 https://store.flitetest.com/naze32-acro-flight-controller-board/
the fpv set and the quad arrived in the last couple of days im still awating the rx,naze and pbd also need to get some wire
i have to wait to get everything soldered but i thought i would start this thread in advanced

 

[jhitesma]

Should be a good setup, I love my nighthawk (mine is the emax version but as far as I can tell identical) I have the hybrid G10/CF version and have yet to break anything despite some good hard high speed crashes and at least one "fall from the sky" when my antenna came loose:

Other than knocking the camera off there was no real damage.

I have the 1806 emax motors and have been quite happy with them...2204's are more fun but there's nothing wrong with 1806 when you're starting or not looking for ultimate top speed. The emax 1806's are way nicer than the DYS IMHO.

I'm not as big on the simon series emax ESC's. I plan on replacing mine at some point, probably with the DYS SN20's with blheli.

If you're getting the combo with the CC3D (I see you're also ordering a Naze but the link you shared to the quad has the CC3D clicked) I'd suggest trying Tau on it - the newest release (just came out this week) brings back autotune on the CC3D platform. The Naze32 is nice as well and very popular but the wonky serial setup drives me crazy on them and while I can get them tuned pretty well I have to admit the autotune on Tau makes it so much quicker and easier that I get frustrated fast when I go back to my Naze board. (I've also run Tau on the Naze and got it tuned really quick manually as autotune doesn't work on the Naze with Tau.) But that's just me, you'll find a lot bigger community around the Naze and Cleanflight but I find for me Tau just flies better and the community while smaller is second only to FT when it comes to friendliness and the feeling of being part of a family.

If surveilzone would actually deliver the "indestructible" props I ordered almost 2 months ago I'd fly it a lot more often too

I would suggest buying extra dampers for the camera mount, or running some zip ties or string through them to keep them from getting lost in crashes. I knock that thing off all the time with my mobius on there and keep forgetting to add retainers of some sort

More nighthawks in the desert...I love it!

 

[airhawk]

im not using the cc3d i favor the naze for community support .including me i know two people that have a night hawk (in az).also i don't plan on using the mobius mount because im using the camera that came with the fpv set and that needs to be guarded off .
its great to see the 250 master commenting on my thread
thanks
Airhawk

 

[jhitesma]

I'm no master, just some guy who likes to bash around and type a lot

Now that I think about it fitting the teleporter camera may be a bit tricky. I haven't seen one in person to see how big it is but it mounts a bit differently than a board camera. It will probably fit in there but you may have to get a bit creative since I don't see any way to mount it other than sticky tape which may put it a little low - so you may need a bit of a spacer. Will just have to experiment when you get it.

That RX will work...but honestly I'd rather use a sat RX because it's simpler to wire up (just three wires - signal/power/ground) it's a bit more complex to setup in cleanflight...but not much just a few settings to change. It's also cheaper and lighter which is nice For FPV proximity flying you don't really need the dual antenna diversity - though it is nice to have. You'll just have a bit more wiring to deal with all those PWM signals on that RX.

Looking forward to seeing your build progress! I don't get to the Gilbert area very often but my wife's cousin in Mesa and we're overdue for a visit. And on our way back from Flite Fest we just found a great little Moroccan restaurant on McDowel by the airport that we're dying to go back to. So we'll probably be up that way sometime in the next year...just have to replace our car first which should hopefully be happening soon And since 250's are easy to travel with maybe sometime we can get a chance to fly them together once yours is built

 

[airhawk]

i was thinking to move the camera back and run zip ties through the provided spaces or i may just go with sticky tape

 

[Basscor]

@jhitesma

Is there a link with a good setup for Tau with the CC3D? I have an emax combo i'm building this weekend and really like the idea of an autotune!

 

[jhitesma]

@jhitesma

Is there a link with a good setup for Tau with the CC3D? I have an emax combo i'm building this weekend and really like the idea of an autotune!

I've yet to actually try it myself as I don't have a CC3D board - I do run Tau on my FlyingF4, BrainFPV and ran it on a Naze32 for awhile (though I'm back to experimenting with CF on that board just to keep up with the developments on CF...I honestly preferred the way it flew with Tau.)

I think I may have been slightly mistaken as well, it's not the latest release that brought autotune back it's a recent build. So you would have to use one of the nightly next builds from here to get autotune on the CC3D: http://jenkins.taulabs.org/artifacts/ Then again I see in the forums that the pre-release just before the latest release did have autotune on CC3D working so you may want to try the latest official release first. I've been really busy with work and flying out to Ohio for FF so I've been a little out of the loop lately

With that out of the way....It's my understanding that the bootloader on the CC3D is compatible with Tau. So you basically just have to install the Tau GCS (Ground Control Software) and then use the flashing tools in there to install Tau on the board. If you want to go back to OP on it you should be able to just use the OP GCS to reflash OP. There's a possibility it may be slightly more complex...I believe the latest release of Tau has moved to ChiBios as the underlaying RTOS on the CC3D platform (which is how they got autotune working again since ChiBios uses less system resources than the old RTOS) and I think that may require a different bootloader. So you may have to reflash the bootloader as well. Though again it's my understanding this is all done through the GCS.

I really need to pick up a CC3D to play with just for fun...but even at <$20 I have a hard time justifying picking one up just to experiment with since newer better boards are available now

Once you have Tau on it the GCS has a simple wizard for initial setup that walks you through setting up your initial settings for flight. Then it's just a matter of configuring an aux switch to change your mode to autotune and running autotune to get your PID's dialed in

 

[Basscor]

Ok, I'll give it a shot then and let you know how it goes

 

[airhawk]

cc3d is a interesting board ill try it out on another quad. You know i ordered a pdb form best hobby mall(where i got the quad) and i got a fc instead its a kk multirotor board configured to x and cannot be changed with out a usb programmer http://www.besthobbymall.com/kk-compatible-multi-rotor-control-board-v5-5-ver-2-9-firmware.html well i already have another on order

 

[airhawk]

would it be okay to keep the vtx on the top plate where the mobius would be and the battery supply keep the battery on the middle plate?

 

[jhitesma]

Should be possible. I like to fly with my battery on top and have my VTX inside the frame for protection. Though when I first built my my VTX cost more than my batteries...now it's the other way around

If you build carefully you might be able to fit it all inside...but it would be tricky and you'd have to stick with a fairly small battery. I like using a pigtail off the VTX between it and the antenna since I tend to smash antennas in crashes fairly often - that way I only break the antenna and don't damage the VTX.

 

[airhawk]

im using a 1500 3s

 

[airhawk]

alright i got the lemon rx yesterday. i think im going to mount the vtx and the power supply underneath the top plate.

 

[airhawk]

Alright, some progress is being made i spent today getting familiar with the build of the night hawk. on Sunday im going to most likely get the electronics soldered. so hopefully can start the build on Monday or Tuesday.

 

[cranialrectosis]

Got any pics of the build?

 

[airhawk]

i havent built it in truth i cant build it without getting something soldered but ill try to post pics of my lay out build

 

[airhawk]

im confused what is the difference between what i bought and thisl http://www.emaxmodel.com/nighthawk-pro-280-size-carbon-fiber-and-glass-fiber-mixed-quadcopter-frame-rtf.htmlthat looks pretty cool i know its a 280 and mine is a 250.

 

[jhitesma]

That's their new RTF. They seem to have changed the arm shape, added motor angle wedges, reshaped the top plate, made a few more cosmetic changes and...they use an all in one integrated board for the very bottom plate that includes the FC, ESC's and BEC.

 

[airhawk]

is it that drastic of a difference other than the pdb that cleans up the build immensely?

 

[jhitesma]

Doesn't look like it. I don't like the look of it as much, though I do like that they finally added an antenna mounting hole on the top plate. But then went and mounted the VTX on the middle plate with the antenna right on the TX where it can damage the TX in a crash.

And while the all in one board does clean up the build...I'm really not a fan since then you're stuck with it. Burn out an ESC, yeah you can add an external but it won't be quite the same as the other three and you've still got dead weight from the unused components. Want to try a different FC - you're stuck with the dead weight of the built in...and probably have to cut traces and patch in wires to connect to the ESC's. For experimenting it's horrible. For a RTF where you just replace instead of repair I can see it, and I will admit that I've toyed with making my own all in one...but it would be done the way I want and that's why I'd do it, it's doubtful many other people would like it done the way I want