Derek's HK Dart 250 FPV Mini Quad

[Derek]

That's quite normal Derek, does not seem to have any effect on flight.
I assume this is with the board NOT powered up?

I was just testing the board with the USB cable to be sure that the board was working. It was advised to me to not solder any of the pins on yet and to simply get into the Cleanflight and calibrate the accelerometer. If I could get that far, then the board is probably a functional board. I did get to calibrate the accelerometer. When I couldn't calibrate the magnetometer, I got concerned and began to over-think things (again). However, since the Acro version has no magnetometer, I'll continue to move forward.

I scrolled down a bit on the calibration screen and I noticed that the quad on the screen was yawing, even though I was holding the board stationary. I just thought that was odd. I also noticed that the green arrow that was on the quad, in the programming, did not correspond with the arrow on my Naze32 board. I'm assuming this is something that will get setup later.

[Stambo]

Because the Acro has no compass, it does not know which way it is facing, only that it is moving so the arrow in the interface may not point in the direction of the arrow on the board.

You may want to rotate it on the quad so that the usb port points to the side.
Makes it much easier to plug in later.
This can be set up in the configurator.
Don't over think it , just throw it on the quad and make it go.

[Derek]

The phrase "Don't over think it" needs to be tattoo'd on my arm so that I would be constantly reminded, lol

I am working tonight and tomorrow, so I'll get back one the quad Wednesday and hopefully have some progress to report.

[Graham Lawrie]

Not sure about cleanflight, but on baseflight when it is showing the position of the quad with the arrow on it on the bottom right hand side of the screen on ther is an axis offset if you click on that it orientates the arrow to point forward when viewing:)

[Derek]

Thanks Graham! I do remember seeing an offset option. I'll check it out.

What's the best way to calibrate the throttle endpoints on the esc's?

[Graham Lawrie]

I think it depends on your TX mine being a DX6i, I have to set all to 125%. Then knock them back to get the correct movement on the Baseflight screen for monitoring the stick movements:)

[KevG]

When it's all plugged in,

Connect naze to pc, no battery connected or tx on
Go in to motor tab, check the little box that allows you to spool all motors together, then move master tab all the way to the top,
Connect battery, you will hear beeps, move master slider all the way to the bottom,
Board will initialise

Job done!

[Derek]

ok, now that's cool!!! Thanks Kev!

I have to work again tonight but I'll be working on the mini quad tomorrow. I'll get the esc's installed. I do have the motors mounted. I'll get a profile made in my DX8. From the sounds of it, the quad profile is just a basic Airplane profile. Is that right?

[KevG]

Yes mate, and I set my flight mode switch to ch5 and a n other switch for lost model alarm

[Derek]

I missed a few pics but here is my quad and it's beginning to look like a "quad." I have the esc's and motors mounted. The esc's are soldered. I have some small gauge wire soldered into the mix for the LED's and I have a set of wired soldered into the mix to power the vtx and camera.

IMG_20150318_213658.jpg (2.4 MiB) Viewed 2599 times

I was at the store today and I bought a new soldering iron with a very fine and very sharp pencil tip. Hopefully I can do a confident job of soldering the pins to the Naze board tomorrow.

[wolfman76]

The quad is coming along nicely bro. I need to run some wiring for less on mine also and also power wires for the video gear also for later.

[Derek]

I just got done soldering on a Deans plug, soldering the pins on the Naze board, installed the Naze board and i got the esc/motor wires prepped for soldering tomorrow. I setup a profile in my DX8 for the quad and I used another plane of mine to get the AR6210 and sat bound to the DX8. I'll sit down tomorrow with my laptop and see if I can make some progress with the programming in Cleanflight. If all goes well, I'll get that done and perhaps installed the FPV gear.

Now..I have to say.......soldering the pins onto the Naze board absolutely SUCKED!!! I know that I'm not the greatest at soldering and perhaps that contributed to the difficulties that I had but I believe that I got it done properly. Next time...I will either pay someone to solder the pins on for me or I'll order the board with the pins already soldered, lol. To the people that can and do solder these pins properly....I applaud you, lol. Damn that sucked!!! ha ha ha

[Tony]

Nice job D, soldering is simple mate, a man of your skills needs to learn this properly, you can't have a simple task of soldering get in the way....you need the proper gear though to do a good job... A decent iron and some 4 core solder 1mm in diam... Mind you I've been soldering components on pcbs since the 70's. I'll set my camera up and do a short video that may help you...

[Derek]

Thanks guys! It's a work in progress. I have a decent soldering iron with a very fine tip. I think the solder that I have is different from what you are talking about, Tony. I'd appreciate any soldering tips that you can offer.

[Derek]

do i want PPM or PWM rx input?

[Derek]

I think I'm going to need Lee's help here because he has a DX8, also. I've gotten to the point of setting the arming range and the flight modes. I've watched a few videos on Youtube on how to do this and obviously I'm missing something. The videos show something about a "range" and I see the range bar but the only switch that moves anything is my Gear switch.

I dont have a breakout cable. I didn't know that I needed one, so I didn't order it. Something like this should come with it. Anyway...I made one by following this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXH_RN5t-RM

I have my board going to my 6 channel rx just like the guy in that video.

I'd like to find out how to set the "Arming" and a couple of flight modes.

[Derek]

lol....well, it's official.....I'm confused, lol

I have the esc's calibrated. I have the end points set. Motors are turning the right ways. I haven't figured out how to ARM/DISARM the quad nor set the flight modes.

I think it's about time to put the quad on the shelf, for a while, until I can actually speak with someone for guidance.

[Stambo]

Arm is normally throttle low, yaw right.
Are you running cleanflight or baseflight?

[Derek]

Cleanflight.

I've tried low and right throttle and nothing happens.

[Stambo]

Derek turn on your Skype I sent you a request