Windestal's V3 Tricopter!

Techno

Sunny Day Park Flyer
I was just on rcexplorer.se, when I noticed that there is a V3 Tricopter coming out in a few weeks. I wanted to see if there was a discussion about this already on the forum and there WASN'T. I was so shocked that I typed this up.
It's pretty typical of David's tri frame (AKA AMAZING), but he gave it a new tilt mechanism (3D Printed) and made it CRAZY LIGHT. I strongly recommend and tricopter-maniacs (like myself) go check out the post on David's http://rcexplorer.se/blog/2014/08/the-tricopter-v3-coming-soon/
In the comments David said it would be using 900KV motors, 20 amp SimonK ESCs, a KK2or openpilot, 4S setup (3000-4000mAh),etc.

As usual, feel free to:
Comment, Speculate, Consider, Compare, and Brainstorm!
 
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jhitesma

Some guy in the desert
Mentor
Saw that a few days ago. I really like the arms he's sourced, seem much better engineered than the pultruded stuff most people go with.

I'm still not big on 3d printing for production parts, though it is nice that it allows people to print their own replacements...just not enough people have printers.

I'd love to see him do what polakium has done with their frames and start casting the parts instead of 3d printing them. If the frames prove popular I suspect he'll almost have to start casting them to keep up with demand. 3D printing is great for prototyping and home building, but really isn't very efficient or effective for production work.

And living where I do I just can't bring myself to buy 3D printed parts since the're highly likely to deform or melt on the way to the field in the summer :D
 

Techno

Sunny Day Park Flyer
Saw that a few days ago. I really like the arms he's sourced, seem much better engineered than the pultruded stuff most people go with.

I'm still not big on 3d printing for production parts, though it is nice that it allows people to print their own replacements...just not enough people have printers.

I'd love to see him do what polakium has done with their frames and start casting the parts instead of 3d printing them. If the frames prove popular I suspect he'll almost have to start casting them to keep up with demand. 3D printing is great for prototyping and home building, but really isn't very efficient or effective for production work.

And living where I do I just can't bring myself to buy 3D printed parts since the're highly likely to deform or melt on the way to the field in the summer :D
While yes, the 3D printed parts are more prone to melting in hot weather and they don't exactly have a ton of strength to them, they're light as ever and easy to replicate, given the resources.
 

nishaad

Member
I am loving the fact that he has managed to source woven carbon arms rather than the pulltruded variety. The latter lost a fair bit of strength due to the holes required for the front arms. I will be buying a set of the new arms as soon as they go online.

I'm already using a woven 3K carbon central body based on his design, with a brushless gimbal made from the material. It will be nice to have the arms to match too!

At $6 per arm, that's way cheaper than what I can source in my part of the world
 

Balu

Lurker
Staff member
Admin
Moderator
As far as I understood him he didn't just "source" them, he specifically worked with the manufacturer to make them as he requested...
 

Cyberdactyl

Misfit Multirotor Monkey
As far as I understood him he didn't just "source" them, he specifically worked with the manufacturer to make them as he requested...

Could be. Dragonplate.com has it in 3/4". But from a cursory search, I can't find it any smaller that has a gloss finish and/or isn't ridiculous in price.
 

Cyberdactyl

Misfit Multirotor Monkey
I think David's 'Deluxe' will go down as a classic in DYI tricopter builds.

I built mine about 2 years ago and still love it. Fly it a few times a week. Yet for me, time has moved on in one aspect of the design that he appears to still use. The semi-circular wire isolation platform. It works. . . and works pretty darn good for GoPro size cams, but micro cams like the keyfobs or the Foxtech V3, or card cams and probably (don't have one so I can't say for certain) Mobius, can still be effected by vibration. And it's kind of large and cumbersome. Several months ago I finally found a mod that was able to tweak out the higher mechanical frequencies for my V3, but it was a pain.

But I found something very cheap, compact and works as well for the GoPro and a bit better for ultra small (<20g) cams. All you need are a couple of simple small plates of thin plywood or G10 or carbon fiber, etc., a velcro strap and some $4 silicone/rubber bearings and you're good to go.
 

baddox

Senior Member
Looks pretty good. I like everything but the landing gear (looks cheesy) and the tilt mechanism (3d printing is awesome, but I can do it myself, and I'd rather have something more durable). If those booms are as good as he says, I could use those for lots of things.
 

ztoon

Gone with the Mistral
Bought one kit just when it came online thinking I was ready to upgrade to "full fiber" from my actual David W. frame + wood booms. Just crashed twice in 2 days... maybe I'll wait a bit before switching.

EDIT: I guess I'm one of the 200 to have ordered in the first 48 hours, because guess what...
 
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Niall762

English weather sucks
I was fortunate enough to have a go with the new tricopter when he came to the hobbyking uk fly in and I have to say it had a lot of power. He flew it acro mode los which I had a go at but I was kind of scared of crashing so went to stabilise! It was very fast and agile, and so light! We flew for around 20 minutes without gopro on the 3000mah 4S a spec hobbyking kindly 'gave' him.