Full News

Sorry for the sparsness of the recent posts.

I am going to try writing in a text editor first so I can really spend the time to say what I need to.  I mean... what kind of a useful blog can I have when all the entries have little content?  But I digress... On to the post.

Tiny Hawk Quadcopter

I finally reached the pinnacle of my newbiness a couple of days ago when I learned how to calibrate the gyros on the Hubsan X4 H107C.  I did this on my Tiny Hawk and guess what?  The bird flies like a dream now.  What was that... three months of complaining and lamenting how lame the Hubsan flight control board was... and all I needed to do was calibrate the board... just once.  Now I think the ability to fly it are only limited by my skills.  So I pratice.  When I can.

I say that because in the last couple of days I have had to replace the two port side motors.  They just basically stopped working.  I opened one of them up and saw that one of the contact brushes had worn and broken.  Other than that, the motor was pretty simple and generally robust.  It's a shame that better brushes can't be designed that would last as long as the rest of the motor.  Like a chains weakest link, the motor is only as reliable as its weakest part.

Anyway, I had motors that I was planning on using for another quadcopter, so I used those to replace the motors.  Luckily I have not seen any balance issues between the old motors and the new ones.  Who knows, I might end of replacing the right side soon enough.

FPV Rig

Another great discovery was that my EasyCap device came with a faulty/inadequate USB extension cable.  I was having so many issues capturing the FPV video that I almost dug out the VCR!  But like I said, once I got rid of the cable it worked like a charm.

Here is a short sample capture...

Walkera Devo 7E Transmitter with DeviationTX

Like someone had granted one of my wishes, I discovered this great combination of hardware and software hacking that makes the dream of the *One Transmitter To Control Them All* possible.  The DeviationTX community has an active membership with new models being looked at all the time.

More on this later... so check it out.

     http://www.deviationtx.com/

Second - The FPV Rig

The second part of my project includes the building of an FPV rig that I could attach to the quadcopter that I had built.

Here is that diagram again about how I wired it.

And in the end, here is what I had built...

I mounted it on some foamboard, but should have found something thinner.  Anyway, I power the FPV rig from a separate battery for now.  It adds significantly more weight but is convenient for testing.  I will have to research a compact and lite solution for filtering the motor noise when I choose to use one battery.

The total cost of the rig is about... $35.

• Camera $18
• Voltage Regulator $6
• AV Transmitter $11

Of course with a $19 AV Receiver the price goes up to $44, but is still inexpensive.

Camera

• 170 Degree Field of Vision
• Runs on as low as 3.3 volts (so can run directly from 1S)

Voltage Regulator

• Polulu Step-Up/Step-Down 3.3V Reglator
• Really just needed a 3.3V stepdown

Video Transmitter

• TX5823 Operating on the BOSCAM bands
• Runs off of 3.3V
• 200mw

Video Receiver

• RC805
• Runs off of 5-12V
• Two Video Outs (2.5mm 4-pole plugs)

FPV First Steps

Well the Boscam TX5823 Video Transmitter module arrived and I immediately put together the rest of the FPV Backpack Module I had been planning.  Here are some pictures of the results...

More details to come.

Micro FPV Update

In my penny-pinching quest to enter the world of quadcopters and FPV flying, I am slowly working into the hobby.

At this stage, I am attempting to build a micro FPV backpack for attaching to small quadcopters so that I can fly them via FPV.  Of course I don't own a pair of Fat Shark goggles yet... so I plan on using a temporary "base station" setup to use for my first flights.  Here is the basic wiring of the backpack (excluding the battery).

Including shipping, the parts cost are as follows:

• 600 TVL Wide Angle 3.3v CCTV Camera ($18)
• 3.3v Step-up/Step-Down Pololu Voltage Regulator ($9)
• Boscam 200mw TX5823 Video Transmitter ($11)

Which is about $40.  But you have to have a receiver... 

and that will be about another $20.  If I use my TV to display the video, then the total cost is under $60.

My next step is to actually finish the backpack.  For this, I am waiting for the TX5823 to arrive in my mailbox.  Anyway, until it arrives... I could attempt to build a circularly-polarized transmitting antenna.  I also need to figure out how to mount all of the pieces onto some sort of platform.  It needs to be light, strong, thin and stiff.  I am also not sure if the camera should be somehow separate.  I'm sure the battery can be off-platform... because I may at some point use the main battery.

Of course the biggest concern is weight.  Then there is the issue of weight distribution.

Things to think about and investigate.

Quick Update

Today's exercise will be the testing of the camera module I ordered from EBay.  I believe I can run the module off of the same 3.3V Pololu StepUp/StepDown regulator.
The problem it did not work before was because I was going through the 12V reduction cable. 

More to come...