BumbleDrone 3000

dezertdog

Senior Member
HS-85MG+ installed. This went pretty easily. The bracket ended up measuring about 1mm wider and 1mm shorter than this servo. I trimmed the bracket a bit at a time with a hobby knife till the servo popped in, then mounted it up with the grommets and screws it came with (making sure to drop some loctite on the mount screws).

The servo arm went pretty smoothly too. The pro tricopter kit comes with a well thought out assembly. One 2-56 threaded rod, two DuBro ball-links, a couple M2 socket cap screws with nuts and two spacers. It turns out that the two ball-links butted up against each other was the exact length I needed (44mm eye to eye). I trimmed the threaded rod by clipping it with with some pliers, dabbed some loctite on each end and threaded them on. I then took the screw, ran it through the ball link, through the spacer (rounded surface facing the ball) and then through the horns. Some more loctite for the nuts, a little torque and all done. The only thing I may re-do is get a beefier servo horn. The little on on there now seems undersized, although it seems to work well enough for now.

servo_resized.jpg

servo_installed_resized.jpg
 
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dezertdog

Senior Member
One last project for the day. BumbleDrone 3000 has been asking me if someday he will have stripes like a real bee. Here ya go little buddy!

cutting_stripes_resized.jpg

stripes_close_up_resized.jpg

new_stripes_resized.jpg
 

dezertdog

Senior Member
Had some time to bench wire up the motors and esc's today for balancing. I love hearing those beeps for the first time, it's like first words. :D I use a seismograph application for my Google phone to track the vibrations. I've used a few, and most will work fine, but the ones that sample X/Y/Z simultaneously seem to be the best. Many times I see a bad vibration in axis X from one motor, and from another axis Y etc. I prefer this one by Atrius:

seismograph.jpg

For the tricopter, I just lay the phone on each boom, spin up that booms motor alone to mid stick as a base line, and then through the entire rpm range. Just watch the axis peaks to see if there are any rpm's that show an imbalance. If you find one, add the standard little dab of tape and re-test till it's as good as you can get it. Some motors are fine from the box so also make sure you take a baseline test without any tape.

I'm really I surprised at those NX-4008-620's, they are pretty good when you get them at just about any rpm. I figured there had to be something I could do though, and after zooming the seismograph way in was able to get each motor just a little more balanced. Now they all have a great smooth sound and low vibration.

balancing.jpg
 
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dezertdog

Senior Member
HK has had my control board on backorder for weeks, so frustrating. I tried to cancel the order, and the site craps out... I was checking out getfpv.com tonight and to my surprise, the same board is now IN STOCK. Ships out tomorrow, can't wait! :applause:
 

colorex

Rotor Riot!
Mentor
HK has had my control board on backorder for weeks, so frustrating. I tried to cancel the order, and the site craps out... I was checking out getfpv.com tonight and to my surprise, the same board is now IN STOCK. Ships out tomorrow, can't wait! :applause:

Did you get the programmer too?
 

dezertdog

Senior Member
$6 more to get it here in two days, when I've had the HK order sitting there on backorder for a month? Easy math for me.

I had to take the HK canceled order in credit though. Just means I got to pick up some more toys for BumbleDrone (non-backordered of course this time). :cool:
 

dezertdog

Senior Member
Well, that's true...

I'm getting started with my own tricopter now. Wish me success!

I'm not sure how I missed the whole tricopter thing being so into helis, but I'm into it full force now. Good luck though man, I want everyone to build one of these now!

I just got my favorite HK email, "we have received your order and it has been sent to the warehouse print queue for dispatch."
 

colorex

Rotor Riot!
Mentor
I'm not sure how I missed the whole tricopter thing being so into helis, but I'm into it full force now. Good luck though man, I want everyone to build one of these now!

I just got my favorite HK email, "we have received your order and it has been sent to the warehouse print queue for dispatch."

My favorite is: "Your order has been shipped from the warehouse" :p
 

dezertdog

Senior Member
More parts in hand, so off we go!

You'll need a brain to mix all the tx inputs for your tri. To get started I'll be using the "HK v3 KK Board Flight Controller". It comes programmed for a quad, so it needs to be flashed with new firmware, to do this you will need a USB loader for KK boards.

NOTE: I'm using Windows 7 and the HK board mentioned above, this guide may not work for other boards or a different OS!

KK_USB_rs.jpg


Windows 7 didn't recognize my USB loader (which it calls USBasp) so I had to go find drivers. The "recommended" driver as far as I can tell comes from this site: http://www.fischl.de/usbasp/usbasp-windriver.2011-05-28.zip

I pointed the device manager at the root folder (libusb_1.2.4.0) and it installed without any issues.

USBasp.jpg

KK_plugged_in_rs.jpg


I then grabbed the flash tool from here: http://lazyzero.de/_media/modellbau/kkmulticopterflashtool/kkmulticopterflashtool_0.62.zip

When I ran the tool the first time, the Windows path to Javaw.exe was not set right for some reason and I had to edit the .cmd file to say "C:\Program Files (x86)\Java\jre6\bin\javaw.exe" -jar kkMulticopterFlashTool.jar -p instead of just javaw -jar kkMulticopterFlashTool.jar -p. Once I made the edit, the UI loaded up.

KK_flash1.jpg


Set the options as follows and click Flash. Once that's done you will see a Thank You and you're all set!

KK_flash1.jpg
 
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dezertdog

Senior Member
I've never liked that orange Turnigy uses for their ESCs.

plush_18a_rs.jpg


I decided to make them over to match my color scheme a little better...

plush_18a_working_rs.jpg


Ahh, much better!

plush_18a_black_rs.jpg
 
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dezertdog

Senior Member
I'll be using Turnigy 3300mAh 4S 30C Lipo Packs. The connector they come with isn't good for much so I swapped them out with XT60's. If I'm going to drink the HK kool-aid I might as well have a full glass right? :p

XT60_rs.jpg

I won't get too deep into soldering...actually I have a lot of soldering left to do, so maybe I should just get this out of the way now!

- Buy a quality iron.
- Keep the tip super clean and shiny using a wet sponge in between use.
- Use flux on and then tin everything to be soldered.
- Don't forget to put the heat shrink on first.
 

dezertdog

Senior Member
So as I sit down now to start electrical work and mock up my props, I've had a change of heart about mounting the front two motors on the bottom. It does look cool, and arguably does make things smoother, but till I'm rock solid piloting this tri I've decided to go with the safe bet to save props and have reversed the front two motors so all are on top now.

Props_Mocked_Up_rs.jpg
 

dezertdog

Senior Member
With how close to being done I was, I really had a hard time sleeping last night and just got up and powered through the 14.8v wiring and ESC extensions till about 3am. :eek:

After a lot of reading I decided that it was best to extend the signal wires, and not the ESC power. I did read though that it's said if you add some caps to the ESC power extensions and then it's fine. When I was recovering the ESC's I noticed that they have a cap on the input and I probably would not have had any issues. That being said I decided partly for aesthetic reasons and partly for protection I wanted the ESCs closer to the hub.

Wiring up the tail ESC extensions. Here I'm finishing up the third signal wire to the tail motor.

soldering_tail_rs.jpg


Once I had each wire soldered up and shrink wrapped, I covered all three with one more shrink wrap and routed it around the boom, attachting it with some small zip ties. Of course on the back boom they all had to be yellow. ;) For the front two I only had white laying around, once I can get back to Harbor Freight I'll be swapping all those out with black.

tail_done_rs.jpg


Rinse and repeat for all three booms. On the front boom the ESC is on the bottom, and on the front two booms they are on the backs.


Here I'm wrapping up boom #3. All three signal wires are done and I'm just about to shrink wrap the set and tie it up.

almost_done_boom_3_rs.jpg


A shot down the right boom, nice and clean.

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Under the rear boom.

bottom_rear_boom_rs.jpg


Under the hub, 14.8v volt wiring complete. Battery mounted up and main XT60 connection easy to get to. I guess I didn't get a picture of the 14.8v distribution under the hood. I just took a length of wire, cut it in the center and pulled the insulation to the sides to expose some bare wire. So you've got a bare tip, insulation, then a bare center, insulation, and finally the other bare tip. Then I fluxed and tinned the center and both ends, soldered each front boom ESC negative to the ends, and soldered the rear boom ESC and main battery negative power to the center. This way you have even power distribution to all three ESCs. Repeat for the positive wiring. Then I used some shrink wrap to insulate it, dabbed some hot glue on the delrin and pressed the junction into place. I then put some hot glue on top of the insulated junction and pressed the next junction on top of it. When that was set up, I filled all the gaps with more hot glue so both are totally insulated and anchored. Make sure when you lay out the wires and locations to glue it down you consider that the booms have to fold. There needs to be enough play in the set up to allow both booms to extended/fold without straining the wires or pinching any other wire nearby. Next time I have it apart I'll try to get a pic of the belly.

Bottom_3_booms_rs.jpg


Top of the hub. GoPro temp mounted for pics, I'll need to figure out some sort of vibration mount once I get an idea of what the video quality is like.

ESCs_rs.jpg
 
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dezertdog

Senior Member
Continuing, only 8 pics allowed per post... I went with the rotation spec that the kkmulticopter site recommends. You need to have at least one of the front props counter rotating or you will end up with a tri that due to gryoscopic procession wants to roll, and a tail yaw mech that will constantly be fighting it to keep it level. What you end up with is a tri that flies with a slight roll all the time with the whole thing fighting itself, negative beuno. Here is the rotation I used.

spaint.jpg


So here we are, major build complete with only wiring up the controller board, and ESC/Tx programming to do. I've already spun up each prop 1x1 to make sure I had the proper rotation etc, It's killing me I'm this close and have to stop! I'm missing three short servo extensions to connect the Rx to the controller board... Have to wait till I can get to the LHS.

FR_rs.jpg

major_build_done_rs.jpg
 
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dezertdog

Senior Member
Finally got to the LHS to pick up some servo patch cables and realized they actually don't sell them! I guess with servos all having a built in cable, it's an odd item to stock. I picked up three 6" extensions, cut them down to size and crimped/soldered a new BLS connector on each and now have my patch cables.

servo_patch_cables_rs.jpg


Next I mounted up the receiver and controller board. As a base to reduce vibrations from the frame into the gyros I cut up the lid and bottom of the little foam box the KK board came in, glued each together with hot glue, and then dabbed some hot glue on the delrin platform and pressed it down. It's easier to put the glue on the delrin directly here, putting the glue on the foam in the right spots is a guessing game with the odd shape of the platform. Make sure when you do this that the board isn't up against the nylon risers or touching anything but the foam and that the two little white arrows are pointing in forward flight direction. I also dabbed the Rx with hot glue and mounted it at this point.

KK_Rx_mounted_rs.jpg


Wiring up the cables is pretty straight forward. The pins on the board are not labeled though, so I had to take a multimeter on continuity check mode and find the side with a dead short between all pins, this is negative. The center is always positive, and that leaves the other side as signal. For now I have the rudder servo connected directly to the Rx as I'm short a patch cable. This will preclude use of the Yaw gyro for now, but I'm a pretty competent heli pilot so keeping the tail inline till I get another patch cable shouldn't be an issue. Ail/Ele/Thr are patched as marked from the Rx to the KK board. As for the ESC connections, M1 = FL, M2 = FR, M3 = Rear.

KK_top_rs.jpg


Also mounted up the antenna extension at this point with the aerials perpendicular to the main antenna and the signal wires on the top of the boom away from the ESC wires.

antenna_extension_rs.jpg


Wow, is it really done? :applause:
 
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