Building a Quadcopter

[jimustanguitar]

I took the plunge and ordered some parts to build a quad. Has anybody done this before, or does everybody own a ready to fly / off the shelf model? I remember Glenn had a frame at Man Up. Was that the Hobby King 450?

Anyway... I ordered the new KK2.1.5 flight controller because it seems rather beginner friendly. Got a 4 in 1 speed controller called a QBrain and some motors too. I have yet to pick up a radio Tx/Rx set, and I haven't decided on battery capacity or props yet.

My plan is to make my own frame too, so that should be fun to design and build. I'm thinking about doing a 250mm frame (prop center to prop center diagonally).


Stay tuned for a build log and design updates. Pictures too.

Jim

[BeeAmaker]

Your links don't work.

I got my frame from DX.com, $18.00 or something. I need to get speed controllers, flight controller, batteries, I have This radio for it. The firmware is hackable as well.

[jimustanguitar]

Links should be fixed. I've noticed that the link tool is flakey from time to time.

[BeeAmaker]

Looks like this guy is using the same controller,
www.instructables.com/id/A-SK450-Dead-Cat-Quadcopter-to-Call-Your-Own/

[jimustanguitar]

I saw that write-up too. Looks very similar to what I'll be doing, with some of the same parts too.

I'm not sure how soon my parts will arrive, but I hope to start designing the frame as soon as they do. Should be fun!

[jimustanguitar]

Well, I've started making parts to get this thing in the air...





I'm going to use CF arrow shafts as the arms for the copter. The little grooves that you can see in the print are so that I can vibration isolate the motors by having the mounts float on o-rings around the arrow shafts. I'll do the same thing at the center where the arms cross so that I can kill as much vibration as possible before it gets to the flight controller.




It's all just proof of concept right now, but hopefully I can get the dimensions just right, shave some weight off of the parts, and have some slick motor mounts soon!

[ZionPhil]

Hope that's ABS and not PLA

[jimustanguitar]

It's PLA, but this is just a fitment test. Not the actual/final part, yet.

[jimustanguitar]

Things are coming along... I'm liking DesignSpark Mechanical! It is actually easy enough to learn just by poking around for fun.




The motor mount design is evolving nicely.

[jimustanguitar]

Hey Brian, what's the best way to remove the fletchings from an arrow? I was hoping that I could either heat gun them off, or slice them with a blade and clean up the glue with a solvent. 

Is there a solvent that's best for removing the painted on manufacturer's label too?

[navkram]

Fletching use a stanley knife and be careful, heat does not work. Acetone removed the ones i cleaned.

[bvandiepenbos]

yep, carefully skin off the fletching with a sharp stanley knife.
Acetone works best to remove printed label. wear gloves ! ...acetone is nasty on the skin.
work quickly and use as little as possible, the acetone can start to attack the CF resin.
use a rag soaked with acetone and "stroke it" firm and fast

[bvandiepenbos]

Nice design work there Jim.
yep, I am really liking Design Saprk also.

[jimustanguitar]

Found a cool idea for an anti-vibration mount.

www.thingiverse.com/thing:313175

Never thought of using earplugs!

[jimustanguitar]

Still making progress. This weekend I drew up a mold (coming soon to Repables) to make vibration isolators for the flight controller mount. I bought some SmoothOn Dragon Skin (which is pretty cool feeling stuff) and injected it with a large syringe, and it worked!