Looking to by a Quadcopter / Drone. Anyone have one?

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The_Dama

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Hi. I want to buy a Quadcopter or Drone with a build in camera. I've been looking online and some of them cost over $1000 while some are $100.

I want to spend around $100 or less for my first one. Anyone have one? How do they work? Are they easy to use? Any help is appreciated. I've seen some where you can view the camera with your iPhone.

I'm just looking to play around with it.
 
I ended up designing and building one this past year with a bunch of 3D printed parts after owning a couple of other quadcopters in the past couple of years. What I would recommend if you are a first time owner would be to buy a cheaper model (likely sans camera) so you can begin to get a feel for how they fly.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IZC6C8E/?tag=neogaf0e-20

That's one I use when teaching kids how to fly. It's a pretty decent model, has relatively good durability, and it also can take a bit of a beating. It also is a good option to give you the ins and outs of quadcopter control.
 
Buy a toy quad first! Dirt cheap, and you can learn to fly (even indoors) without worrying about breaking your expensive quad. Because you will crash. A lot.

First learn to fly line of sight, and then later upgrade to the better stuff with FPV and all.

Then learn to do this: http://youtu.be/1MBW8zoZUR4
 
Nozem said:
Buy a toy quad first! Dirt cheap, and you can learn to fly (even indoors) without worrying about breaking your expensive quad. Because you will crash. A lot.

First learn to fly line of sight, and then later upgrade to the better stuff with FPV and all.

Then learn to do this: http://youtu.be/1MBW8zoZUR4
Click to expand...

I dunno, with all the shit drone owners are doing nowadays, I feel like really heavy regulation will come down...I'm considering buying an el cheapo toy drone to practice on and at least a prosumer one at the same time...

Maybe a Parrot AR and a DJI Inspire 1. If the Blackmagic Design Micro Cinema or Studio have a compatible gimbal for the Phantom 2 or 3, maybe that instead of inspire.

Basically, want one without any worry of future licensing / background checks, flight impeding restrictions or anything like that so considering taking a gamble buying a pair soon...
 
$100 will get you a toy unit to practice on, but you're not going to get anything else on your first time investment simply because you're going to need to buy a charger, batteries, transmitter etc. even if you go the lowest of the low you'll probly nearly spend the $100 on that before a quad.

Hobbyking is a great place to look for buying cheap RC parts and kits. You'll be able to get everything you need to build a drone there.

I've got two drones myself, a Scarab Reconn V3 and a Hoverthings Flip 360. Awesome fun, but you need to decide what you want to do with it, is it going to be for acro flying (manual flight, enjoy the control of flying the quad) or full assissted (relying on the flight controller to keep the quad in the air)

Also as someone else said, get the Hubsan as a beat em up so you can get used to the controls. They are a lot tricker to learn to hover and move because of their size, but it just means as you go to bigger frames they'll seem much more easier to maintain.
 
I've got a couple of the small toy ones (2 Syma X12s, 1 JXD 392). They work well enough for fun but...

I have a 180mm (SOSx Blackbird) frame coming in tomorrow and a bunch of parts (motors, et al.) getting ordered as well. Oddly excited at the prospect of having to replace parts frequently.
 
I just bought a Hubsan X4. I thought my chopper sim skills would carry over (no, I didn't), but this is pretty hard due to the quick movements.
 
I bought this one for around $15:

http://www.gearbest.com/rc-quadcopters/pp_71999.html

video review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Awo4AviLQVg

Pretty small, beginner friendly, has a removable shell to protect against damage, and it does some flip tricks. The battery lasts around 5, maybe longer depending on how continuous your flight is and if you have the shell on, and charges in 20-30 minutes. You might be able to fit a higher capacity battery on it, but I haven't tried it. Someone successfully mounted a small camera on theirs:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZXdHILgWrs

I kinda still want to build my own though.
 
Another Hubsan X4 owner here and i'd definitely recommend starting small as i find these things were tricky to get used to and you will bounce it off stuff at first.

Great fun, i keep forgetting to charge mine up and get some practise in out the garden though.
 
RyanDG said:
I ended up designing and building one this past year with a bunch of 3D printed parts after owning a couple of other quadcopters in the past couple of years. What I would recommend if you are a first time owner would be to buy a cheaper model (likely sans camera) so you can begin to get a feel for how they fly.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IZC6C8E/?tag=neogaf0e-20

That's one I use when teaching kids how to fly. It's a pretty decent model, has relatively good durability, and it also can take a bit of a beating. It also is a good option to give you the ins and outs of quadcopter control.
Click to expand...

Purchased thanks for the link will give it a try.
 
I'm doing a PhD about using UAVs (probably quads) in agriculture (I'm still in the early stages where I'm deciding exactly what to do though).

I still don't own one though and I should probably rectify that asap. Like others have mentioned, I'm probably going to go for a $30 toy quad to learn how to fly first, and then I might go for something bigger.

My lab's got a couple of bigger quadrotors (400+mm). A couple with home-made frames, 3 with those R450 frames from RC timer:

790fbc01c7fe1c51.jpg


The frames are super cheap. I assembled one of them and it was very easy (you need to have a soldering iron though, but a cheap one should work fine — you don't need to be very precise). The frame does feel a bit wobbly (it's not completely rigid) but I don't really know how that'd affect the flight performance.

All the quads in our lab do use Pixhawks as their flight controllers and those are pretty expensive though. However, according to some students I know that fly a lot it's easier to learn how to fly with a Pixhawk because it's a very good controller. So it's worth getting one according to them.

I'm also part of a team in this competition. We're going to have to design, build and test an octocopter worth close to $10k, which is pretty exciting actually.
 
I went with this

81luK-IfDtL._SL1500_.jpg


I bought it at Frys and I love but it keeps flying to the left when I just go up for some reason. Is that normal? Do I need to adjust it on the remote?
 
"are the batteries suppose to last 10 min or less? The battery on this thing is bad. Are all drones like this?"


Yep, battery life is not long. Buy multiples, charge them all up, and swap as needed.
 
Getting a quadcopter that has a camera on board that you can view on your phone isn't going to be under $100.


I can get you quadcopters in the $150 range that have cameras for FPV, but you still need a headset/monitor and a controller.
http://www.horizonhobby.com/nano-qx-fpv-bnf-with-safe-technology-without-headset-blh7280

The whole kit with a headset and controller is $420
http://www.horizonhobby.com/nano-qx-fpv-rtf-with-safe-technology-blh7200

DJI's Phantom line is around a grand....
http://store.dji.com/phantom/phantom-3


Horizon is releasing a Quadcopter with a 4K camera and a live video downlink to a screen built into the controller for about $1200.
http://www.horizonhobby.com/product...fly-15086--1/chroma-w-st-10-and-c-go3-blh8675
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ygy-YLDX3Ys

Horizon makes good products with great support, but they cost more than the cheapest Chinese built stuff, or the DIY kits. However, they're "Bind-N-Fly" or "Ready-to-Fly". Super simple, warranty if something doesn't work and you didn't break it.

I love Horizon, but it's all up you you.

If you've never flown anything, start with this:
http://www.horizonhobby.com/nano-qx-3d-rtf-blh7100
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IorvPyiunpU


Edit:
So I looked at the model you bought, and frankly, it's a toy, not hobby grade. Parts are going to be hard to come by, and you're going to need them.
Charge time on that is 120 minutes for 7 minutes of flying? Awful. You can charge hobby-grade batteries at 5c, and they're pretty cheap to have multiples.
 
The_Dama said:
I went with this

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/81luK-IfDtL._SL1500_.jpg[IMG]

I bought it at Frys and I love but it keeps flying to the left when I just go up for some reason. Is that normal? Do I need to adjust it on the remote?[/QUOTE]
My brother gave me one of those. Fun little toy. As for the listing, there are trim controls on the remote. The manual is sometimes hard to decipher, but they're the little switches below and to the sides of the sticks, they beep when pushed, and the digital display shows how far from 'center' you're pushing it.
Click to expand...
 
I've had my Phantom 2 for a year now and love it. I get just under 20 minutes of flying with it before I change out the battery. Crashed it a few times-- the body itself is pretty durable but the gimbal (h3-3d) is not.

I've had no problem flying, and crashes only happened when I was being senselessly careless. I learned by flying "blind" for a few months before getting a transmitter and monitor. Took a minute to get used to looking into the monitor and then looking up to find the quad, but I feel pretty good with it now. Still not super comfortable flying in tight-ish places, though.

I have no problem recommending the Phantom 2 as a beginner quad.
 
Teknopathetic said:
"are the batteries suppose to last 10 min or less? The battery on this thing is bad. Are all drones like this?"


Yep, battery life is not long. Buy multiples, charge them all up, and swap as needed.
Click to expand...

It's also worth noting that you need to be careful with your batteries. If you discharge them too much you'll notice they will start to swell. If you don't stop using them you can completely ruin them and you'll need to replace them.

So yeah, check the battery voltage often. You might be able to check it on your transmitter (it might not be that accurate). Otherwise you can get a small voltage metre (my supervisor's got a small PCB with a screen on it that tells you the battery voltage when you hook it up to the battery for example)
 
The_Dama said:
Do all the drones you the same battery plug? Amazon has them cheap but I dont want to buy them if they dont.
Click to expand...

Some ready to fly (RTF = comes with quad, radio, batteries etc) use proprietory batteries so no.

Otherwise the majority should just use a standard lipo battery. Some you can order with the connector type you want, otherwise you usually just remove whatever connector is on the battery and concert them over to whatever connector type you want.

Most people with quads are using EC6 connectors.

Also dont buy batteries off ebay, and especially dont buy second hand. The quality of lipo batteries varies horribly. Hobbyking's Turnigy batteries have always been regarded as a good battery that doesnt break the bank but it usually very reliable. I use a lot of the Turnigy Nano-Spec stuff in both my quads as well as Heli's, Planes and racing vehicles.
 
The_Dama said:
I went with this

81luK-IfDtL._SL1500_.jpg


I bought it at Frys and I love but it keeps flying to the left when I just go up for some reason. Is that normal? Do I need to adjust it on the remote?
Click to expand...

I'm not familiar with this quad or what flight controller it uses. It's unlikely it's trim in the radio (it uses a proper radio and no a wifi from a phone device right?)

You may need to recalibrate the gyro and accelerometer. It could also be the ESC's aren't calibrated correctly and are sending more power to one side than the other.

Hard to say without knowing what gear is in it. If you can recalibrate gyro, acc and ESC's I would start there and see if it continues to be a problem.

I could start a new thread on the in's and out's of quads, what to buy, how to get into it if people are interested.
 
Mohonky said:
I'm not familiar with this quad or what flight controller it uses. It's unlikely it's trim in the radio (it uses a proper radio and no a wifi from a phone device right?)

You may need to recalibrate the gyro and accelerometer. It could also be the ESC's aren't calibrated correctly and are sending more power to one side than the other.

Hard to say without knowing what gear is in it. If you can recalibrate gyro, acc and ESC's I would start there and see if it continues to be a problem.

I could start a new thread on the in's and out's of quads, what to buy, how to get into it if people are interested.
Click to expand...

That would be great. I think we could discuss many topics, including hobby and professional use, and transitioning from the more simple toys to RTF or home built FPV and action-oriented Gopro drones.
 
Mohonky said:
I'm not familiar with this quad or what flight controller it uses. It's unlikely it's trim in the radio (it uses a proper radio and no a wifi from a phone device right?)

You may need to recalibrate the gyro and accelerometer. It could also be the ESC's aren't calibrated correctly and are sending more power to one side than the other.

Hard to say without knowing what gear is in it. If you can recalibrate gyro, acc and ESC's I would start there and see if it continues to be a problem.

I could start a new thread on the in's and out's of quads, what to buy, how to get into it if people are interested.
Click to expand...

I'd be actually pretty awesome if you could start an OT of hobby grade RC cars/trucks in which to discuss drones, planes, and what not.
Provide feedback, recommendations, and most definitely share your vast RC knowledge.
 
I'm shit with imaging, so I can't do banners and stuff but I'll put the info in. Will get onto tomorrow, its 4am right now :/
 
We do need an R/C OT.

I have quite a few quads, DJI F450

VCKwiVw.jpg
Click to expand...

Good cheap platform to start with, can use whatever flight controllers but the DJI ones are easy to setup and tweak, a lot of the arduino open pilot stuff is poorly documented and a pain unless you really like tinkering.

Bro has a s900, tarot 650, tbs discovery, ect.

tPj0E9o.jpg
Click to expand...
 
Flo_Evans said:
We do need an R/C OT.

I have quite a few quads, DJI F450



Good cheap platform to start with, can use whatever flight controllers but the DJI ones are easy to setup and tweak, a lot of the arduino open pilot stuff is poorly documented and a pain unless you really like tinkering.

Bro has a s900, tarot 650, tbs discovery, ect.
Click to expand...

That's some pretty nice/serious hardcore hardware right there ...
I have the phantom as well as some other more amateurish "syma" ones
And a friend of mine bought the phantom 3 about a week or so ago but he just like i do, have a bunch of questions
in regards to calibration and what not so it'd be great to have an RC OT,... specially one created by Mohonky

He gave me some advice on a Losi Ten (SCT truck) and wow,.... his knowledge is seriously jaw dropping.

I have a bunch of other RC vehicles, and would be great to share a common interest with fellow RC hobbyists.

Mohonky said:
I'm shit with imaging, so I can't do banners and stuff but I'll put the info in. Will get onto tomorrow, its 4am right now :/
Click to expand...

Please let me know if you'd like some assistance creating banners or graphics for the OT, ... (i work for a major advertizing company, so I can definitely do graphics with no issues) LOL
 
I've got an X4 as well. You can get great beginner quads for less than $40. I'd recommend that as quads are hard to fly, they definitely take practice. Get something cheap, load up on batteries and have a blast. You'll quickly learn whether you like it or not, without spending a ton of cash. Plus you will crash, a lot.

Check this out
http://www.banggood.com/buy/Quadcopter.html
 
When I was a kid, I used to fantasize about buying a dozen remote control helicopters, tuning them all to the same frequency, and using one controller to pilot the whole swarm. Then I wanted to play Flight Of The Valkyries real loud as I chased people with them. Slowly, the universe has made this dream a possibility.
 
Echoing the "buy a cheap toy one to learn" advice. Dont spend 800 bucks on a Phantom and crash it into a tree within the first 15 seconds of its first flight.
thats the mistake i made!
 
I just brought a Hubsan X4 h107c and the controller left stick does not snap back to center when moving it north/south. The right stick does. Is that normal or is my controller broken? I have not used it I case I need to return it to Amazon.
 
ParityBit said:
I just brought a Hubsan X4 h107c and the controller left stick does not snap back to center when moving it north/south. The right stick does. Is that normal or is my controller broken? I have not used it I case I need to return it to Amazon.
Click to expand...

I think thats normal for the left stick. If you press left or right the stick goes back to the center , up or down it doesn't ( I dont have a quacopter but have an mini heli )
 
So, it's agreed, we need an Aerial |OT|. I just finished calibrating my Phantom 2, looking forward to getting her out and about again.
 
"I just brought a Hubsan X4 h107c and the controller left stick does not snap back to center when moving it north/south. The right stick does. Is that normal or is my controller broken? I have not used it I case I need to return it to Amazon."


Yes, that's normal. The left stick doesn't return to center so you can more easily control throttle. There are transmitters that allow you to swap, but I believe left stick throttle is most common for quadcopters.
 
Baka Sempai said:
Please let me know if you'd like some assistance creating banners or graphics for the OT, ... (i work for a major advertizing company, so I can definitely do graphics with no issues) LOL
Click to expand...

I will, but I'll do up the writing for the post and you can send me some graphics to pretty it up when its done.

I wanted to do it tonight but I just finished installing Win 10 and have bit of a headache so I've put it off, I always want to be fairly comprehensive in covering multiple aspects of different frames, flight controllers etc. its sort of all in my head and I need to also give myself something of a refresher between some boards as they are a constantly evolving thing. I will also go into other stuff about accessories, batteries etc so I will try and make sure it covers a fairly large scope of the hobby but it will be impossible to go fully in depth on each particularly flight controller as it gets way complicated and there are people out there with better documentation for specific boards, mine will be a basic intro into each. But I think it'll be enough for people to get a good idea.


ParityBit said:
I just brought a Hubsan X4 h107c and the controller left stick does not snap back to center when moving it north/south. The right stick does. Is that normal or is my controller broken? I have not used it I case I need to return it to Amazon.
Click to expand...

This is normal, you have a Mode 2 radio. The left stick controls Throttle up and down and yaw left and right while right is cyclic (pitch forward and back, roll left and right). Your cyclic should always centralise itself on release.

If the left stick did this, would default to half throttle, not good in a quad as if you werent actively oushing it down, it would constantly want to spring to half throttle. The left stick should naturally centralise after movement left or right, but up and down it should hold its position where you leave it.

Mode 1 is the reverse, left stick is cyclic, right stick is throttle and yaw. Mode 1 is becoming obsolete and is largely only used by people who have flown for many years starting out on mode 1 years ago, Mode 2 is largely the defacto now and anyone getting a radio who have not used one before should be default goto Mode 2 as that is what most others will be using so you can hand off a controller and someone can use it no problems if you get stuck.
 
Good luck, OP. I just saw this post from a redneck I went to high school with in my Facebook news feed. Lots of his redneck friends were agreeing with him. I believe these types think Obama is spying on them or something.

tzJQmhz.png
Click to expand...
 
Girlfriend got me a Hubsan X4 with a camera.

Hubsan X4 H107c

Less than £30 and it's great. Can fly it indoors, outdoors and it does stunts like loops.

Only downside is the battery lasts about 10 minutes but takes about half an hour to charge. You can replace all the parts with spares including the motors and LED lights. got myself a replacement kit for less than £20 that comes with extra battery and loads of other stuff.

When I get to grips on hot to fly it properly, I'll promote myself to a bigger one.
 
snacknuts said:
Good luck, OP. I just saw this post from a redneck I went to high school with in my Facebook news feed. Lots of his redneck friends were agreeing with him. I believe these types think Obama is spying on them or something.
Click to expand...

for once, I actually agree with them. Don't fly that shit on people's property. The law is totally on their side and so is human decency.

otherwise, drones are cool and I want to try that FPV shit above^^^
 
Mohonky said:
This is normal, you have a Mode 2 radio. The left stick controls Throttle up and down and yaw left and right while right is cyclic (pitch forward and back, roll left and right). Your cyclic should always centralise itself on release.

If the left stick did this, would default to half throttle, not good in a quad as if you werent actively oushing it down, it would constantly want to spring to half throttle. The left stick should naturally centralise after movement left or right, but up and down it should hold its position where you leave it.

Mode 1 is the reverse, left stick is cyclic, right stick is throttle and yaw. Mode 1 is becoming obsolete and is largely only used by people who have flown for many years starting out on mode 1 years ago, Mode 2 is largely the defacto now and anyone getting a radio who have not used one before should be default goto Mode 2 as that is what most others will be using so you can hand off a controller and someone can use it no problems if you get stuck.
Click to expand...

Thanks a ton for this explanation! I figured a $45 investment was well worth knowing if I enjoy it or not. I just hope I do not drop it on my roof/trees! Probably will .... oh well. Lets see if it survives the weekend.
 
PrivateWHudson said:
Peeping Tom's stepping up their game?
Click to expand...

I'd say probably not, but for me as a pleb on the street looking up at this thing that isn't that far away from people's windows, not knowing if it has a camera or not, there's no way of knowing. i felt very disconcerted by it. what do i do, call the cops? throw rocks at it? or just be like, "welp we live in drone world now, better get used to drones flying all close to what used to be considered my private living space" ?

edit: i was out at snoqualmie falls, WA the other day (place of fine natural beauty, big waterfalls, etc) and there were signs everywhere that said "No drones, sensitive bird habitat" (or something like that) everywhere. is this really that big of a problem? how common are these damn things?
 
GeordieMark said:
I know a guy who has done this. Flys it around the grounds at work sometimes.
Click to expand...

FPV isnt as hard or expensive as you would imagine. Its actually easier to fly FPV than it is line of sight, especially if you play video games because its a view you are accustomed too.

ParityBit said:
Thanks a ton for this explanation! I figured a $45 investment was well worth knowing if I enjoy it or not. I just hope I do not drop it on my roof/trees! Probably will .... oh well. Lets see if it survives the weekend.
Click to expand...

The great thing about these toys is that they weight next to nothing, so if you have an accident, you're actually less likely to break them than a larger quad.

As for getting stuck in a tree or on a roof, well yeh that could be a problem. Though they are mostly meant for indoors, a good fart can send them wayward let alone any breeze.

lawnchairliartraitor said:
I'd say probably not, but for me as a pleb on the street looking up at this thing that isn't that far away from people's windows, not knowing if it has a camera or not, there's no way of knowing. i felt very disconcerted by it. what do i do, call the cops? throw rocks at it? or just be like, "welp we live in drone world now, better get used to drones flying all close to what used to be considered my private living space" ?

edit: i was out at snoqualmie falls, WA the other day (place of fine natural beauty, big waterfalls, etc) and there were signs everywhere that said "No drones, sensitive bird habitat" (or something like that) everywhere. is this really that big of a problem? how common are these damn things?
Click to expand...


Reaonably common, so could make one from popsicle sticks if you really want.

Though someone in the past has probably hit a bird hence they've maybe jumped on the situation quickly. The main problem with drones is people who get them and think they can fly around anywhere and fly them wrecklessly. You see some real dickheads on youtube posting their videos and there usually ends up being a shitfight in the comments from people who are telling them off for flying dangerously while others argue nah you can fly anywhere.
 
Man I love this thing. I take it to the park and people gather around. I iwsh the battery would last longer. I purchased more from Amazon.

It's time for a Drone OT for questions and videos
 
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