Well today after some challenges I got the maiden flight in and all in one piece. It was a little on the windy side but I couldn't wait another day to fly it. First impression was it was running very smooth. It hovered great after getting out of the ground effect. I have a few things I would like to discuss. First the Mag interference and running compassmot. In the picture below you can see that my accessory plate is up pretty high. In the build instructions it is half that height on only a single standoff. When I ran compassmot I got readings of 30 and 31 which are ok but I wanted better so I tried adding a second tier of standoffs and doubled the height. I ran compassmot again and was pleased to see 8 and 9 on my two tests.
My next thing I ran into was I was testing the correct flight direction when I moved the sticks on the radio. Throttle worked fine, left and right worked fine but the elevator seemed reversed. When I pushed the stick forward the copter wanted to backup towards me. I verified in radio calibration and the scales moved in the directions I expected. I had to reverse the channel on my TX and it now works fine but to me it is backwards in the radio calibration screen now compared to all the other channels. Anyone seen this behavior??
My average throttle for hover seemed a little high somewhere between 575 and 600. Is this an issue other than it shows I am heavy? After I get everything sorted out I think I will be removing all the bullet connectors from the ESC's and soldering them up and shortening the wires where I can.
Here are a few more pictures of my setup for now. Let me know what you think.
Greg
Replies
Well I did my first Auto flight today. I ran the same one three times and changed the last one to an auto land at the end. It worked perfect. I am trilled how well this thing flies. Sorry for the video as I couldn't even see the copter on my screen out in the sun so I guess it turned out ok.
Video of flight
If your transmitter is ratcheted, then you're using the an airplane transmitter. Helicopter transmitters don't have the ratchet. Your option is either buy a new transmitter or remove the ratchet mechanism. I had a Specktrum DX5 that was ratcheted and I went to a DX8 helicopter transmitter. Really like the DX8 and all the features it has, plus the support has been really good from the company.
What ESCs are you using?
One thing I did want to add to this is I used no padding or shock mounting for the APM. It is mounted flat with three strips of 3M double sided tape (no foam) right to the carbon fiber plate. I have read the forums recently about it and so far so good I have to log another flight to get the interference graphs and will find out how they look.
Gred
My elevator was also reversed. I also changed it on my TX side. My average hover is around 550, though I can't get mine to hover perfectly- sometimes it climbs quite a bit then I adjust one ratchet click of the thottle down and it descends. Not sure how to fix that yet, but congrats on your maiden.