Many of you may remember the 290mm FPV quad that I scratch built, last year. It was a heavy sucker but it did fly and then it did crash. I really have no explanation why it crashed. I was flying around my usual field, with my Dad on deck. I was about 60-75 feet in the air and the quad just began to tumble uncontrollably and then met terra firma very firmly, lol. The damage was really not that bad but I put the quad on the shelf and stepped away for a few month. I decided to build another quad, trying to make sure that I was building it as light as possible. Unfortunately, I think I was going so "light weight" that I began to lose structural integrity and the quad arms could easily be torqued. I did try to fly the quad and it was just impossible. No matter what I adjusted in the Naze, I could actually see the front and rear arms torqueing while in flight. I was less than impressed. I began to give my original ECHO 290 another look and decided to strip it down and remove the landing gear and the upper deck. I wanted to try to squeeze as much as I could into the main frame of the quad (rx, Naze, esc's, and a bit of wiring). I knew that the vtx would not be able to go inside the main frame. it's going to sit on the outside, rearwards of the battery. Here are some pics of what's going on....
- 1 Old Quad.jpg (163.82 KiB) Viewed 3439 times
The above pic is of my "light weight" 250 quad. I used 10mm x 10mm carbon fiber square tubing for the arms. Unfortunately, no matter how tight the hardware was, I could grab the front and rear arms and I could twist them with relative ease. Disappointing.
- 2 Crashed ECHO 290.jpg (135.72 KiB) Viewed 3439 times
The above pic is of my original ECHO 290 quad with the broken bits still on board. I spent about 3 hours deciding how to proceed but I think I'm on to something special now.
- 3 Stripped Down ECHO.jpg (115.78 KiB) Viewed 3439 times
The above pic is of the new ECHO 290 quad. I removed the landing gear (although cool looking, just dead weight). I removed the upper deck as well. Now, this quad kinda looks like that ImmersionRC Vortex 285 quad. Pretty cool, actually!
- 4 Weight of Stripped Frame.jpg (167.76 KiB) Viewed 3439 times
The new frame idea is minus the landing gear and upperdeck, as well as any hardware. Weighing 183.8grams.
- 5 Naze, ESCs, Motors.jpg (210.41 KiB) Viewed 3439 times
The Naze32, 20amp Afro ESC's (flashed with BLheli), motors, FPV cam, and a bit of wiring.
- 6 Action Cam on Front.jpg (123.63 KiB) Viewed 3439 times
I soon realized that my HobbyPartz ActionCam just wasn't going to work being mounted on the top. I decided to move the ActionCam to the nose. I bent a bit of 3/4" x 3/4" aluminum angle to act as a tilted cradle. Now, the ActionCam does have a small viewing screen on the backside. To protect that screen from getting scratched on the aluminum, I wrapped the aluminum with black packing tape and then adhered a small piece of black foamboard (also wrapped in black packing tape) to the aluminum. The viewing screen then rests against the softer black foamboard. I just have 1 ziptie holding the cam in place but I will probably use two (one that wraps over the top and bottom and then another that wraps around from side to side.
- 7 FPV Cam Mounted.jpg (147.14 KiB) Viewed 3439 times
With the ActionCam mounted on the nose, there is no way that the FPV cam would be able to see over ActionCam if the FPV cam were mounted on the top deck. Solution: A small pine block, with a taper on the rear, is secured to the top deck via two 3/4" coarse thread sheet metal screws. This block was also wrapped with black packing tape. The FPV cam was then secured to the block via another 3/4" coarse thread sheet metal screw.
Thus far, my resurrected ECHO 290 quad is looking quite promising and I'm happy with it. I'm anxious to get it to the finished step so that I can weigh it and compare it's weight to the original ECHO 290 quad's bulbous weight. I'm sure that my quad isn't going to be as light as anything that Dan, Lee, Stambo, and Graham fly, but it should be lighter than my original ECHO 290....and that will be an accomplishment.
....more to come.
