Here's a short clip, somewhat adulterated by YouTube, of a test of this inexpensive gimbal and controller that I bought from goodluckbuy.com. The Goodluckbuy SKU is 98952, you can look at it by entering that in their search engine. It's made to mount on a Phantom but it's not hard to work up a mount for most any copter.
Here I'm flying it on my DJI 550 Hex "The Witch." I didn't use the provided vibration mounts but rather some stiffer "lord" type mounts I had lying around. Also there are rubber grommets involved.
This gimbal comes without a shred of documentation and I haven't yet figured out how to find the appropriate software. However, it works "out of the box". The only problem is a slight off-level lean on the roll axis, which I've fixed for the moment by simply shimming one end of the GoPro. Build quality is very high. It's all aluminum so not super light.
In this video I've intentionally left bits of the airframe visible to show how hard and well the gimbal is working.
The entire 8 minute flight is as smooth as the 29 seconds seen here.
Slightly off-topic: This clip starts with the hex under manual control in "stabilize" mode, approaching a Geofence that starts at the weed line. When the hex hits the fence it goes into RTL and heads home. It overshoots home (the red landing pad) and neatly turns back to it and ends up right where it should be, at which point I take back control and the clip ends. The slow flight home is my setting, and I think the overshoot might be a result of settings I've made as well, as I'm looking for smoothness, not speed, when I'm tuning.
I'm excited by this gimbal. The YouTube video doesn't really do it justice. If anyone else is using one of these I'd like to hear from you.
Comments
Did you happen to weigh the gimbal before mounting it? It looks heavier than its $120 cousin.
Darn, almost forgot...how are you mounting to the bottom of your hex? Are you simply going thru the bottom plate and adding holes if and where necessary?
Thank you again.
r
This is strange. I have been looking for weeks at this same gimbal and holding off on pulling the trigger. Today I stumbled across this post. Perfect.
I'm currently flying a DJI 550 Naza M with an Alware 2-axis servo activated gimbal. The servos plug directly into the Naza ports for gimbal control.
My question(s) is/are do the two leads from this gimbal plug into the same ports of the Naza? I'm assuming they would, but would like to know for certain before I make the purchase.
My other query is what landing skids are y'all using with this gimbal?
Thank you one and all for any information.
r
I just had to get one, Hope to see one for Sony NEX line for under $200 soon.
Is there any reason for using these gimbal other than building your own using h/k servos and similar pan/tilt kits ? is the vibration problem with the later really that different ?
Hi Richard, It is my understanding that PID's differ gratly between versions. Below are my settings for Roll and Pitch. Please note hat both motos are reversed. Hope this is of help to you.
@Richard,
It comes all assembled with a board which I think is a Martinez clone - mine worked out of the box and I have yet to get software up and running for it (see Eric's post, above) so have no idea what values are.
looks good, it is great that this tech has come down in price so much
i have bought a similar one waiting for mine, waiting .... waiting ... be here soon i'm sure(its only been ten days ) ,. it has same issue in that u need to remove the protective case for your GPH 3. i saw this http://www.fpvmanuals.com/layerlens/ and at first thought it was overkill, and not sure if cam will still fit in gimbal but maybe would be good idea ( NOTE * not affiliated in any way)
i cannot wait for my gimbal
One more small possible advantage of this Gimbal versus the several others that Goodluck Buy has listed.
It sticks down less in the vertical dimension than the others.
This keeps you in closer alignment with your copters roll / pitch axis meaning that it imparts less up and down motion to the camera when the frame rolls and pitches around it, also you can use a shorter / lighter landing gear.
Are you using the Martinez board? Can you share your PIDs you are using? I'm having a hell of time trying to tune my gimbal.
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