Comments

• Joel December 6, 2015 at 8:39am

  Does anyone know of 3D print camera mount designs for the X8?
  
  I was looking at this one for the IRIS. Does anyone have any thoughts on how difficult it would be to adapt it to the X8? Would it mainly be a matter of switching the IRIS adapter plate for a X8 adapter plate?
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  David Pulvermacher May 20, 2015 at 7:00am

  Hi Doug. I'm still toying with the idea of transforming my assymetric X into an X8. Have you made any comparisons yet related to weight, flight times and battery capacity on your X8 compared to when it was an X4?

  By the way I saw your post about the 3DR radio. Have you thought of using a Bluetooth bridge instead? Much less cumberso me and you can sick the thing in your back pocket....

  
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  Doug Walmsley March 23, 2015 at 9:03am

  Each Quattro has a 5v Output which I ran to the power rail on the Pixhawk.  Since I have two Quattro's both are plugged into the rail providing power.  I have no PDB or separate UBEC's on my frame other than a 9v Step-Down voltage regulator (D24V6F9) from Pololu to run my Tarot 2D gimbal.  This regulator is soldiered directly off of the APM power module.
• DG March 22, 2015 at 8:32pm

  Doug,

    How did you handle the HobbyWing UBEC power to PIxhawk?
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  David Pulvermacher February 28, 2015 at 12:22am

  Doug, I'm very much looking forward to hearing what sort of flight times you will be getting with the X8 configuration, by comparison with the X4. I assume you will be using 4S batteries...?

  As for the MinimOSD, I wonder whether the original 3DR offering suffers from the same problems. The one I've got is a Goodluckbuy clone, so at a third of the price of the original I guess I can't complain. $50 is a bit rich with my pathetic currency.

  I find it odd that the thing displays fine at standstill (the whole board being powered by a UBEC at 5V), but as soon as I take off the overlay flickers intermittently. I'm going to try an RCTimer edition, and if that doesn't work I'll stick with the Skylark. Not as verstile, baybe but it has all the essentials.!
• DG February 27, 2015 at 4:18pm

  There's just nowhere to put the Quattro's aside from adding a plate, which is not in the plans. The good news is the slim tube ZTW Spyders will fit sideways in the frame, one on either side of the arm tube. It will be tedious, but should work. Then the power distribution will need to be worked out; may go the copper washer route since finding a small PDB with high enough current is proving difficult.
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  Doug Walmsley February 27, 2015 at 11:48am

  @David,  My Quattro's are not having any heating issues where I have them mounted.  I ensured the metal heat sink plate was facing out and away from anything that could create insulation mitigating heat buildup.  Funny part of this build is that I used Hot Glue to hold them in place and the ESC's haven't come loose since I attached them to the CF frame.  Real test will be this summer when I plan to fly my X8 as had as possible since swapping out my old 880kv motors for 600kv motors.  With summer heat and pushing ESC to max performance, I will certainly know how well they hold up to the glue and where they are placed.
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  Doug Walmsley February 27, 2015 at 11:44am

  I'm chatting up Bjoern on his post about MinimOSD issues as well.  Seems my two new purchases from RCTimer is showing the same issue I had with 3DR and HobbyKing's OSD modules.  They are temperamental and all these companies are developing the same boards based on chip sets.  So the problem is not getting better.  With that being said, I know there are folks out there doing their best to work their magic software work around to the problem.  Just wish someone would engineer a better board.
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  Flying Buddha February 27, 2015 at 8:46am

  Nice rigs! @david when i purchased my first Y6 from 3DR I was worried about the cooling of esc's too. It seemed rediculous to sandwich the esc's in a tight spot, but I haven't had any issues in the last year. As for th3 minimosd, ove had nothing but problems too. I just recently, after a year solved the issue. The 5v side was only getting 4.6 volts from my APM. This was enough to break the overlay. I used a seperate BEC to feed the 5v (actual was 5.1) side of the minimosd.
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  David Pulvermacher February 27, 2015 at 8:24am

  Very interested Doug to see that you have mounted your Quatro Esc's under the frame. I've been rather pre-occupied with the notion of keeping Esc's within the propwash for cooling purposes. Hence mine are mounted on the arms. I'd really like to get some of the Xaircraft motor mounts in due course, to be able to get rid of them, and take the leads through the tubes. Dont want to spend any more money now!!

  

  Haven't got the other four motors on yet,having had OSD problems with the minim. Pain in the arse. Have gone back to Skylark Tiny OSD for the time being!