My quad copter build

[RSendout]

After watching the vids posted by Jab1a on here and having flown RC heli's for a few years now, I have decided to build myself a quadcopter with the view of going FPV at some point in the future
I will be building this from parts NOT from a kit so the learning curve will be pretty steep for me but hopefully I will get her in the air fairly quickly.

My first box of bits arrived today and already I have problems, hopefully this is not a sign of things to come.

2014-04-01_18-42-34_748 (Small).jpg

First off the they have sent the wrong motors, I wanted ones without shafts.
One of the motors had a stray ball bearing inside it which took me about an hour remove.
They have sent the wrong battery connector.

Legend has it that problems happen in threes so hopefully that's my lot for the entire build over and done with in one fell swoop

I will post pictures as I go with a bit of info as to what Ive done with each

[Hosky]

Going to be interesting!!! Ill be keeping an eye on this

[Robbhp]

Cool glad you are doing the thread it will be interesting to see it come together :-)

[skyshack]

I'm watching.

[Yakko]

I've been watching the FPV forums for a while, and am flying a little ready built FPV quad around my house - wasn't brave enough to build from scratch. Best of luck, watching with interest.

[RSendout]

Spent a couple of hours getting bits to fit properly and sit where I want them to today.
Had to sand the arms to get them into the mounts on the main body. Also had to file out the holes in the power board and control board to get them to line up properly.
Made up some spacers for the boards and threw it all together to get an overall view of how it will look. Nothing is aligned or tightened up yet as its all got to come apart again for the joy the wiring will bring.
I also need to find space for the ESCs and reciever.......
And decide on what props to go for.......

So here she is so far

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[MEL]

Fast progress. Watched quite a few of jabs videos and then find myself browsing for kits

[RSendout]

Bit quicker than I expected too. I have this week off to get the 200 ready for MOT but it was raining today so I thought I would do a test build of the quad

[jizzle]

Very cool mate!, whats the estimated time to completion and flight?

[RSendout]

I originally thought about a month or so but have had a good head start today so maybe a bit sooner

[jab1a]

This is looking very promising indeed! a great read and I like the two photo's.

I think you have taken the right path to get into FPV, building from stratch will allow you to fine tune your frame and settings as you will know what effects what as you progress. This is exactly how I learned from scratch and build my first Quad from scratch and research on the internet... I wish I had the flight controllers and information we now have when I started back at the start of 2012, its amazing how fast things have progressed. The flight controller I learned on did not even support 'auto-level' and didn't have a baro so the learning curve was like hitting a brick wall on my first flight.

I will be checking back here from time to time to keep updated, please PM me if you get to have your maiden flight remember its rude not to go down in glory on your first maiden lol

[RSendout]

Just got back from my local model shop with a bag of goodies

2014-04-03_16-02-37_184 (Small).jpg

So much for my plan of working on the 200 this week, I cant leave the quad alone long enough to make it to the garage
Now, where is my soldering iron.......

[Robbhp]

Don't forget with the corally connectors females on anything that holds power I.e. batteries. The amount of times we see this the wrong way around is untrue, I am shocked half of Bolton is not a massive lipo inferno lol

[RSendout]

Spent a bit of time tinning wires and filling solder buckets today
Hopefully I will get a chance to fit the ESCs and motors this weekend. It's going to be a squeeze

Also ordered the ESC programmer board and USB to flight control board intrface

[Hosky]

Quick question, how much is this costig if you don't mind me asking?

[RSendout]

I don't mind at all

I haven't kept an exact record of what Ive spent. You also have to keep in mind that I already have the radio.
The bits Ive pictured above and the programing boards Ive just ordered add up to approx £200.

I am trying to do a reasonable build as cheap as I possibly can. I really want to go FPV at some point so that's going to be another couple hundred on top.

[Yakko]

What flight system are you going for? Naza?

[RSendout]

Naza is far to posh for this build
As this is my first build, I have tried to keep it as cheap as possible as I have no doubt it will probably end up hanging from a tree or something

I am using the KK flight control board, not as advanced as Naza but has some great features for the price

In the first pic you can see it packed in black foam, in the second it is sat on top of quad.

[RSendout]

Made a bit of progress today whilst waiting for the window fitter that didn't turn up

Extended the motor wires so I now have four of these:
2014-04-05_11-07-17_835 (Small).jpg

Also fitted the plugs and sockets to the ESCs so have four of these too:
2014-04-05_11-52-55_791 (Small).jpg

[RSendout]

Weather wise its been horrible here today so guess what Ive been doing

Managed to squeeze the ESCs inside the main body which I'm very pleased about as this keeps things nice and tidy. It was very tight so I will have to keep an eye on temperature. I'm not running particularly large batteries though so flight times will be quite short and swapping batteries should give things a chance to cool down a bit.
Ive also spent a fair bit of time reading up on the control board so as soon as the programming lead gets here I will be ready to get that sorted.
Another quick pic showing the ESCs in place, not that you can really see them as they are inside the body. You can see the wires connecting them to the power board though and the temporary wiring to the flight control board

2014-04-05_17-38-34_38 (Small).jpg

Things left to do:
Set up ESCs.
Set up the flight control board.
Mount the receiver.
Tidy up wiring for ESCs to flight control board.
Wiring for receiver to flight control board.
Set up transmitter.
Fit props.
Fly!

I reckon she could be seeing her maiden flight next weekend