Testing Arducopter using a bench power supply

I'm starting to build my Arducopter and immediately after having gone through the tests I could do with Mission Planner and a USB only I started looking for a solution on how to avoid recharging LiPo batteries every 10 minutes of testing, a especially how to avoid spending money on replacing AA stilo batteries just for testing the radio.

So I came with the idea of using my bench power supply for powering both the Arducopter and the radio. I basically created 2 power cables, one that goes into the battery socket and one that goes into the radio power plug: on one side the respective plugs and sockets (a JST connector for the radio and a XT60 connector for the battery) and on the other side two banana plugs that go into the power supply.

I doubt I'm the first using this approach for testing, but I don't recall seeing it anywhere, so I thought it was worth posting it.

Here more pictures of the setup.

A closeup of the TX power cable

A close up of longer cable plugged into the TX

A close up of the other cable, plugged into the battery socket

I'm documenting my build process on my Drone and ROV related blog, so if you are interested you can also have a look at it to see how I am progressing.

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Comments

Andrew McKinstry January 4, 2013 at 1:54pm

how many amps and volts are you setting bench power supply at?
Simone Chiaretta December 16, 2012 at 11:45pm

Ibrahim, the best solution is to buy a ready made kit, like jDrones or the 3DR kits. It cost less and it's less time consuming than buying all the pieces separately. The links to buy them are in the menu of the site.
Simone Chiaretta December 16, 2012 at 2:58pm

Yeah, I know, have to find some first :)

Thank you

Simone
Developer

Bill Bonney December 16, 2012 at 2:56pm

I would recommend using a 2 cell balancer JST plug as it has the correct number of connections (3) meaning you are less likely to plug it in wrong into the radio the. With two connections you can plug it in reverse on the connector and destroy the radio.
Ibrahim A. Hameed December 15, 2012 at 8:33am

Dear Simone, would you please give me a list of components to build a quad-copter...I need a recommended list of components since it is my first time to build it. I am so appreciated... Ibrahim (ibrahimabdelhameed@yahoo.com)
Norman Sanchez December 14, 2012 at 3:59pm
Norman Sanchez December 14, 2012 at 3:41pm

I use a power source for security cameras 20 amp 275 watt, this method to calibrate and test the quad is a source of economic and 6 amp 12 volt for the radio is very good. with a 12 gauge wire two pairs of 2.30 meters long I can last for 24 hours at half throttle and 16amp with 8 engines.

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