Custom GIANT multirotor - 25lbs payload, 20 minutes flight

Raptortech

Foam Addict
I know it's been a while guys, but we did the maiden flight! I actually maidened on my last day working full time for the company (which was Friday Aug 14, so I've been sitting on this footage for while).

Later today I'm planning on using the Pixhawk's autotune function to tune the PIDs, which should be rather exciting!
 

RAM

Posted a thousand or more times
Autotune will be a nail biter but all videos I have seen of it worked.
 

cranialrectosis

Faster than a speeding face plant!
Mentor
Wow! Just WOW.

I notice the boss stating 'bring it away from us' and 'I'm a bit nervous' when he's flying. That's gotta be pretty impressive in person.

Are you planning to tune without a payload or payload weight?
 

Raptortech

Foam Addict
Are you planning to tune without a payload or payload weight?

The first tune will be with no payload. Then we will test several flight modes including RTL. Then an endurance test, which should hopefully be over 45 minutes.

Once we are happy with the performance, we will start flying with a dummy payload and repeat the tune with that payload.
 

jipp

Senior Member
impressive. even tho the first thing i thought of when your boss took control of the Science AP FH machine... get the man a nano qx 60.00 BNF.. and practice in acro mode ( red led )for a day or two, then he would not be nervous.. or maybe he would be that is a monster.. and it sounds like a small heli taking off. heh.

im thinking 1 case of beer, ill be waiting for it to arrive on my front door.
would you post the specs again.. just frame size, motor/prop/FC. nothing to detailed.. it looks like its using yard sticks for props :p im guessing they are 18" or something silly like that.

it would be impressive to see in person that is for sure.. if you gonna go big, go big or go home :p
chris.
 
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Raptortech

Foam Addict
would you post the specs again.. just frame size, motor/prop/FC. nothing to detailed.. it looks like its using yard sticks for props :p im guessing they are 18" or something silly like that.
chris.

ESC: 80A HV Opto (T-Motor FLAME)
Motor: T-Motor U10 100kv
Prop: 26x8.8 CF
Frame: AerialPixels FX8 Pro Elite
Battery: 12S 22000mAh 15C
FC: Pixhawk
 

jipp

Senior Member
ESC: 80A HV Opto (T-Motor FLAME)
Motor: T-Motor U10 100kv
Prop: 26x8.8 CF
Frame: AerialPixels FX8 Pro Elite
Battery: 12S 22000mAh 15C
FC: Pixhawk

thank you... nice build.. i hope it will do all the science you have planed. sounds like a exciting project to be in.. especially when its not your money building the quad. :D

rock on.
chris.
 

x0054

Senior Member
Out of curiosity, how are you going to mount the camera and the gimbal payload. It strikes me that no matter what, you are going to have those landing feet in the way of your shot.

It's a monster build though, I can imagine how scary it is to fly something like that!
 

jipp

Senior Member
Out of curiosity, how are you going to mount the camera and the gimbal payload. It strikes me that no matter what, you are going to have those landing feet in the way of your shot.

It's a monster build though, I can imagine how scary it is to fly something like that!

i just went through the build photos.. i had to take in how big this really is.. the video just does ot do it justice.. you need a old vw bug next to it for comparison. lol.

its gonna lift a big camera so i was thinking he would have retracting landing gear. but i did not see it.. so im not sure what he has planed for that..


such a cool project. i would love to take a test drive on some.

i wonder how it would handle with wood props.. at least with wood props no need to worry about breaking a prop.. but maybe carbon blades that size are bullet proof.

chris.
 

Raptortech

Foam Addict
Out of curiosity, how are you going to mount the camera and the gimbal payload. It strikes me that no matter what, you are going to have those landing feet in the way of your shot.

These are just temporary landing gear for testing. When we fly with a gimbal we will use landing gear that rotate with the yaw axis of the gimbal so that they are never in shot.

The gear are sold to be compatible with the Movi M15 gimbal:
MR15_OnlineFront_1024x1024.jpg

Here is a shot of somebody's octo equipped with said landing gear:
img_0065.jpg
 

joshuabardwell

Senior Member
Mentor
I can't believe you spun the props up the first time indoors, without the copter tethered in any way! Living on the edge! I've seen a mis-tuned PID loop take a copter to the moon the first time the throttle left zero. Not a big deal when it's a $300 mini quad weighing 550 grams, though.

Seriously, though, epic build.
 

makattack

Winter is coming
Moderator
Mentor
Nice build and log! I do echo @joshuabardwell's observation about spinning up untethered. Those are some impressive gonads! I was a little more concerned about the FOD potential especially with those scissors below the prop blast.
 

jipp

Senior Member
so what size do you guys recommend tethering a quad for starting up for the first time.. 600 series?

chris.
 

joshuabardwell

Senior Member
Mentor
so what size do you guys recommend tethering a quad for starting up for the first time.. 600 series?
chris.

Here's how I'd answer that. The worst-case scenario on a spinup is that something goes wonky on the PID controller and the motors all go to full. Or maybe the copter starts oscillating like crazy and shakes itself to pieces, while clattering all over the room in the process. So now ask yourself: if I throttle up and that happens, am I willing to accept the consequences? If the answer is no, then the copter should be restrained on first throttle up. If the copter is capable of seriously injuring you, seriously damaging something expensive in the room, or damaging itself to a point where you'd be upset to have to fix it, then it should be restrained on first throttle up.

With my mini quad, I always do a hand-held test after any configuration changes or after changing a prop where I throttle up and tip it forward, back, left, right, and feel that it pushes back correctly. I also feel for oscillations. I started doing this after once accidentally setting P gain to 25 (the max value) on Luxfloat, which resulted in the copter just taking off for the moon, oscillating wildly, the second the throttle left zero. I cut throttle and it fell from about 30 feet and landed on my Mobius and destroyed it. I mean, you think that if you just give it a little throttle, then you'll catch any bad tendencies and throttle back, but that's not what happened with my mini quad. There were two settings: to the moon, and off. And what if your brand new FC has a damaged gyro or something and does a flip of death?