My tri-copter :o)

[Shadow74]

Hey Eric!

Nice of you that you keep active on the forum! Your tricopter looks very nice, and your tail as well helps with orientation. I hope you can keep Woodstock from getting shock induced brain damage...

Hey colorex! thanks man! I am working really hard on the whole multi-rotor side of the hobby....i am truly fascinated by them.


I am doing the best I can to keep Woodstock safe up there. hehehe he def gets to have all the fun....I wish I could ride my tri-copter

talk to ya soon!


Eric

 

[John Campbell]

Looks great and Snoopy would be proud. Somewhere, I think I saw an RC flying Dog House with snoopy. Would be cool video to see them flying in formation with each other

 

[Shadow74]

In the words of Major Benson Winifred Payne....."I had a minor set-back" :black_eyed:


When filming Flitetest this past weekend, I took off with the tri-copter following the plane that Josh B. was flying, to get some air-to-air shots. We took off, everything was great, then at the halfway point of our first lap around the field my tri-copter just decided to go from straight and level flight, into a right aileron roll into the ground from around 100' up.

As you can see from the pics, the damage is quite minimal. It broke my center section, an arm, one prop, and stripped the gears out of my Hi-tech tail servo. Oh well, I haven't had a crash in over a year......guess I was due for one. LOL! (the crash was pretty epic.....it sounded WAY worse than it was. Go big or go home right. LOL)

I am going to start a new "top-secret" project with my KK board. Soon as I get it underway....I will post pics.






Cheers,


Eric

 

[FlyingMonkey]

Eric the important question is did you get it on film?

 

[Shadow74]

Eric the important question is did you get it on film?

Unfortunately no We flew some last minute footage at the end of the day, so we already had the camera rigs in the house. Wish we would have though.....was a "good" crash....if there is such a thing. LOL

 

[bicyclemonkey]

So what plane was Bixler flying that you were getting footage of?

 

[ananas1301]

Ouuuch.

Looking painful but as you´re saying: You were overdue for a crash A year without a crash!? Inredible. I can´t keep up with that but I just started flying multicopters

The frame looks so nice. Too bad it broke.... It seems that you managed to make the frame out of wood quite well especially with the curves.

 

[colorex]

Hi guys, do you think it would be a good idea to use 10x10x600 mm balsa sticks for tricopter arms? I have plenty of those available, and they are lightweight and vibration absorbent (at least more than pinewood)

 

[ananas1301]

Hi guys, do you think it would be a good idea to use 10x10x600 mm balsa sticks for tricopter arms? I have plenty of those available, and they are lightweight and vibration absorbent (at least more than pinewood)

I doubt that balsa is itself is stable enough... I only have balse sheets and I know how light weight they are but balsa in comparison to Pinewood breaks sooo much more easily because it doesn´t have the density pinewood has.

however, what you could do is getting some CF flat rods and glue them onto the balsa.

 

[ananas1301]

Hi guys, do you think it would be a good idea to use 10x10x600 mm balsa sticks for tricopter arms? I have plenty of those available, and they are lightweight and vibration absorbent (at least more than pinewood)

I doubt that balsa is itself is stable enough... I only have balse sheets and I know how light weight they are but balsa in comparison to Pinewood breaks sooo much more easily because it doesn´t have the density pinewood has.

however, what you could do is getting some CF flat rods and glue them onto the balsa.

 

[bbmagic]

@Shadow74, sorry to hear of your accident. From the looks of it it must have come down on the front right and rear boom with the ground almost perpendicular to the frame perhaps even a bit upside down. The plywood shearing on edge must have made quite a pop! I'm really impressed with your "cage" around your KK board, it seemed to have worked wonderfully. The tape even pulled off a layer of wood from it. I assume that you didn't video the aerial scenes from the recent scimitar episode, your camera mount being put on a boom looks like it will keep the props out of the frame. It must be David flying his tricopter for that video. Hope your GoPro is alright! Keep up the great work. I love the aerial cuts in FliteTest videos... Sort of a trademark now!

 

[colorex]

I doubt that balsa is itself is stable enough... I only have balse sheets and I know how light weight they are but balsa in comparison to Pinewood breaks sooo much more easily because it doesn´t have the density pinewood has.

however, what you could do is getting some CF flat rods and glue them onto the balsa.

Really, a balsa 1x1 cm stick is so much stronger than a sheet. You have to feel them. Oh, and CF is not available here, and HK is shipping-expensive.

 

[bmsweb]

Man I have no idea how I missed this thread. But I must say that I love where you have the GoPro Mounted looks perfect. I assume no Props in the picture at all. Nice work

 

[ananas1301]

Yeah that is a quite important thing I´d be looking for too and also the reason why I built the Tricopter like he did and David and many others, I guess, and not a Quadcopter.

The other advantage is that he will have it easier now adjusting the CG with the battery and not having to push it too far to the back.

Also with a GoPro 2 and 170° wide angle vids you´ll still have the props on the video

 

[Shadow74]

So what plane was Bixler flying that you were getting footage of?

Hey Bicyclemonkey,

As much as I would love to tell you, that would definitely be a blatant disregard for the terms of my agreement with Flitetest.

As soon as the episode releases, I will post it in this thread.


Eric

 

[Shadow74]

Ouuuch.

Looking painful but as you´re saying: You were overdue for a crash A year without a crash!? Inredible. I can´t keep up with that but I just started flying multicopters

The frame looks so nice. Too bad it broke.... It seems that you managed to make the frame out of wood quite well especially with the curves.

Hey Ananas,

The frame def took me a little extra time, the curves on the frame's center section I actually shaped and sanded by hand. Took a while....but worth it.


Eric

 

[Shadow74]

@Shadow74, sorry to hear of your accident. From the looks of it it must have come down on the front right and rear boom with the ground almost perpendicular to the frame perhaps even a bit upside down. The plywood shearing on edge must have made quite a pop! I'm really impressed with your "cage" around your KK board, it seemed to have worked wonderfully. The tape even pulled off a layer of wood from it. I assume that you didn't video the aerial scenes from the recent scimitar episode, your camera mount being put on a boom looks like it will keep the props out of the frame. It must be David flying his tricopter for that video. Hope your GoPro is alright! Keep up the great work. I love the aerial cuts in FliteTest videos... Sort of a trademark now!

Hey bbmagic,

Thanks man, that is almost exactly how it came in.....are you a forensics/ballistics guy or a detective? I must say that is pretty impressive that you knew the angle the it crashed. Nice!

The cage around my KK board was an idea that I got from my first multi-rotor (Miniature Aircraft Rotor X 404 quad) the KK on their little quad has a plastic box around it. It protects the board from light rain, snow etc.....and also as I found out with my tri-copter, protects it well in a crash.

I did not film the aerials for the scimitar episode, that was David with his tri-copter. And you are correct to say that you cannot see the props in my frame with the camera out on the end of the boom. Even at the widest 170 degree FOV the props are not visible.

My GoPro was totally fine (Thank the Lord) I attach it with a plastic (nylon) bolt so that in the event of a crash it would snap off.....and that is exactly what happened. I also NEVER EVER fly my camera outside of its protective case. being out on the front of that boom like it is, it will surely be the first thing to hit the ground.

As of right now, I am not planning on putting my tri-copter back in the air right away. I am gonna prolly fix the frame, shelf it for a while, and steal the board off of it for another project. (top-secret) LOL So until then, I will start another thread here shortly about "My Quad-copter" which I have actually been flying and working with alot longer then my tri.

Here is a screen shot from my tricopter:



Cheers!


Eric

 

[Shadow74]

Man I have no idea how I missed this thread. But I must say that I love where you have the GoPro Mounted looks perfect. I assume no Props in the picture at all. Nice work

Yep, no props visible in any of my aerial shots. My wife and I own/run a small production company, so I use my Quad to film aerials for the videos that we produce. I made the tri-copter to see how it flew in comparison to my quad.

 

[Shadow74]

Yeah that is a quite important thing I´d be looking for too and also the reason why I built the Tricopter like he did and David and many others, I guess, and not a Quadcopter.

The other advantage is that he will have it easier now adjusting the CG with the battery and not having to push it too far to the back.

Also with a GoPro 2 and 170° wide angle vids you´ll still have the props on the video

Hey Ananas,

I actually built my Quad first, and I made a boom for the GoPro to be out in the front, far enough that the props are not visible. When I put the tri-copter together, I just made a boom for it the same as my Quad.

I really do LOVE my Quad-copter. I have somewhere around 500+ flights on it now. For filming, it is rock stable.

Here is a video (the post below) that I shot a few months back using my Quad. No props in the shot, and no post-stabilization software.

(I have some other, newer stuff that I have filmed recently, but I don't have it uploaded yet, this video was shot a few months ago in October.)


Cheers,


Eric

 

[Shadow74]