I have my FT Knuckles H-Quad since 6 months now. I flew a lot with it, had couple of crashes, nothing really bad though but now I want to it take to the next level. I always wanted to try FPV so I decided to tear down my Knuckles H-Quad and transform it to a FPV quad. Why tear it down you might ask? Because I already tried to attached a GoPro on it. Videos are not too bad but more importantly, it felt heavy on the sticks and not really responsive. I know I can shave the weight down, it's just a matter of choosing the right wires / components, avoid connectors when possible and be smart sometimes As I had to change the layout of components to make room for the FPV gear, it was a good occasion to review everything.
Here is from where I start:
The AUW is 785gr with the GoPro and a 2200 mAh LiPo. The blueWonder motors can support that but as I said, too heavy and not responsive. This little beast should be faster and agile. So I aim for a target AUW of 650gr. I know that a lot of weight to save but I think I can do it
So, To achieve my goal, I went on HobbyKing and bought some stuff: Boscam vTx and vRx, clover leaf antennas, board camera, multimeter and other stuff form ebay like LCD screen, Pololu voltage regulator (those things work very well and so small, less than 1gr! I really recommend them) and foam boards because yes, I will build my own FPV googles and it will be the subject of another thread Good thing about it is that If I don't succeed it, I still have a classic LCD screen For those who wonder how much I spent, the shopping list amount is about 100$.
First, I tried to connect the FPV gear all together. At first I didn't get an image from the camera. I checked, double checked all connectors, FPV channel, the wiring and it turned out that HobbyKing sold me a camera with a reversed connector so the polarity was wrong... Spent 2h on that but hopefully, I didn't fried my camera. Then, I removed all electronic components to leave only the frame and the motors.
I mocked the new places for the ESCs
I cut out all connectors leaving only what I needed
I soldered the motors directly to the ESCs with 18awg wires and started my own power distribution with 16awg wires. Before soldering everything, I also need to add another extension to power up my vTx but this will be for another day!
Finally, here is what I managed to shave so far: 80gr!. It really surprises me how heavy these little things are.
Here is from where I start:
The AUW is 785gr with the GoPro and a 2200 mAh LiPo. The blueWonder motors can support that but as I said, too heavy and not responsive. This little beast should be faster and agile. So I aim for a target AUW of 650gr. I know that a lot of weight to save but I think I can do it
So, To achieve my goal, I went on HobbyKing and bought some stuff: Boscam vTx and vRx, clover leaf antennas, board camera, multimeter and other stuff form ebay like LCD screen, Pololu voltage regulator (those things work very well and so small, less than 1gr! I really recommend them) and foam boards because yes, I will build my own FPV googles and it will be the subject of another thread Good thing about it is that If I don't succeed it, I still have a classic LCD screen For those who wonder how much I spent, the shopping list amount is about 100$.
First, I tried to connect the FPV gear all together. At first I didn't get an image from the camera. I checked, double checked all connectors, FPV channel, the wiring and it turned out that HobbyKing sold me a camera with a reversed connector so the polarity was wrong... Spent 2h on that but hopefully, I didn't fried my camera. Then, I removed all electronic components to leave only the frame and the motors.
I mocked the new places for the ESCs
I cut out all connectors leaving only what I needed
I soldered the motors directly to the ESCs with 18awg wires and started my own power distribution with 16awg wires. Before soldering everything, I also need to add another extension to power up my vTx but this will be for another day!
Finally, here is what I managed to shave so far: 80gr!. It really surprises me how heavy these little things are.
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