So I've had this old tri-copter for probably close to five years now. Aside from the day I traded an old camera for it, I've never flown the thing, but a recent foray into nano-drones has brought my attention back to this old thing and I want to get it back up and running.
Well, part of the reason I never got into using it after first acquiring it was that I dropped and broke the remote, a HobbyKing HK-T6A V2, which I never got around to replacing until just this week. So I thought, despite the copter having sat powerless for the better part of five years, that just getting a new remote, binding it to the receiver, and having at it was all I needed to do to get this thing up and running, but I appear to have been wrong.
I've been at it for a couple days now, trying to get everything figured out, and while I've made some headway, I've still not had a takeoff, let alone gotten the motors to spin up (except for once during an ESC calibration, but haven't been able to replicate that since).
So I'm looking for some help and guidance. The copter is a custom built tri-copter, and I'll attempt to describe the components as best I can.
ESC's are Turnigy Plush 18A
I think the motor's are turnigy as well, but I'm not sure, maybe someone can tell based on the picture?
The flight controller is I believe an APM1.0 with the IMU on top of it
The radio receiver is the one that came with the HK-T6A remote
And beyond that, I'm not totally sure, but here are some hopefully helpful pictures:
So I tried going without connecting to a PC or anything, tried arming the ESC's using the default throttle down rutter right and got nothing. I've since gotten the copter hooked up to my PC and updated the firmware using the latest edition of the Mission Planner (was that a mistake?) and did all of the calibrations, the compass, the accelerometer, and radio, then went to calibrate the ESC's. Now, the first time I tried calibrating the ESC's, it seemed to work! Everything took and happened like I expected, while still in calibration mode I was able to blip the throttle and get the motors to spin, I thought I was golden. Then, I disconnected the battery, went to go into normal mode, and again, the ESC's wouldn't arm, so now I'm essentially back to square one.
Any help would be tremendously appreciated. I'd like to get this thing up in the air and flying soon!
Thanks,
Eric
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