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Howdi from Florida

Andrei

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Hi
I am a racing drone newbie with some very basic tiny whoop experience (with my TinyHawk) which I found both exhilarating and frustrating. I love the way these tiny race drone fly, but I am deeply frustrated with the fact that most such drones require much more technical skills (or time to develop them). This is why I will stick to "ready to fly" race drone kits. I have a Taranis X-lite RC and DJI RE goggles, which I hope to use with my future drones. I am currently hesitating between the following models:
I am currently leaning towards the Walkera F210. Any suggestions?
Do you know which of these models are compatible with my DJI Racing Edition goggles?
Most of my drone flying is areal photography with my beloved DJI Spark and I can't wait until the Spark 2 comes out (I read that July is the target date).
This is an example of the kind of photography I like do do:

3235

In terms of race droning, this is what I am looking for:
  • a fast flying outdoors drone with good wind resistance (a must in Florida)
  • a halfway decent DVR capability (ideally on the drone, but if not on the RC or goggles)
  • a strong frame and built quality
  • acrobatics are not very important to me, but speed is
  • since I am a newbie, I need the drone to have a newbie-compatible "beginner/easy" mode to learn
  • a completely ready-to-fly kit (alas, Betaflight or SpeedBee are too advanced for me, I don't understand most of what they configure)
Bottom line, I am looking for *fun* and not hours of hardware/software hacking!
I hope that the folks here will be able to steer me in the correct direction.
Thanks for any pointers!
Andrei
PS: do experienced quad racers offer online lessons for newbies like me? if yes, I would be very interested! Please let me know, thank you!
 
Welcome! I'm in West Palm, and we've got some more Floridians around here as well.

Just to be blunt: I would not buy any of those drones for sure.
Bottom line is, you're going to have to learn at least a little bit of betaflight if you want to fly FPV.
It's pretty easy, it just looks intimidating at first.
You already have a tinyhawk, did you get the whole RTF kit?
 
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Just to be blunt: I would not buy any of those drones for sure.

why not?
could you recommend a better RTF kit for my needs?

Bottom line is, you're going to have to learn at least a little bit of betaflight if you want to fly FPV.
It's pretty easy, it just looks intimidating at first.

I did play around with it a little. I am totally willing to learn Betaflight to improve my drone's handling, but not as a prerequisite to fly it

You already have a tinyhawk, did you get the whole RTF kit?

I got the whole RTF kit and it was great until I eventually lost the TH. I bought a new one, but I was unable to bind it to the RC shipped with the TH kit. The lights go on, when I flip the arms they change, but the rotors never rotate.

I think that I will try to bind my new TH to my Taranis FrSky x-lite RC, but I am afraid that I lack the know-how to do that.

I also need to bind my Mobula7 to my Taranis FrSky x-lite RC but, again, I find the instructions totally inadequate and confusing.

This is my biggest frustration with race drones: they all seem to require me to study manuals and spend time fine tuning them. I have ZERO skills or interest in working on drones, what I want to do is *fly* them had have fun.

Is that really so unreasonable?
 
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I have ZERO skills or interest in working on drones, what I want to do is *fly* them had have fun.
Is that really so unreasonable?
?
I'm the same way brother. Binding is easy.
Create new profile in controller
Set the controller to bind (it will beep)
hold down bind button on receiver (on aircraft)
plug battery in craft
hit enter on controller to confirm bind
Done

Unplug craft, plug it back in and it should be bound.
It's going to be a B¡tch the first time, but it becomes second nature.

I bought a new one, but I was unable to bind it to the RC shipped with the TH kit. The lights go on, when I flip the arms they change, but the rotors never rotate.
To fix this, you need to go through the binding above, then plug the craft into betaflight, and set up an arm button in the modes tab.

Same with the mobula

why not?
could you recommend a better RTF kit for my needs?
Those are GARBAGE KITS. There's no nice way to say it.
Any RTF kit that comes with a controller and goggles will come with a CRAP set of controller and goggles.

You already have a controller, once you master binding you can fly any prebuilt craft you want, and they're MUCH MUCH better.

Sub $200

Top of the line (mostly)

My next buy:

His big brother

Very fast

Classic Race Drone

I bought this, awesome craft


Any of those have better internals than the kits you found
I can throw some videos down about the controller for you, new profile, binding, that kind of stuff.
These are advanced craft, there's no way around it. I did 6 months of research before I bought anything at all.
You're at the hump, stick with it!
Trust me, you wont regret it

 
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Hey rtkDarling
Thanks so much for the excellent info!!!
I will pm RENOV8R to ask him what he might be willing to sell to me.
I will also look at all the models you recommended.
So, THANK YOU! :)
 
As @rtkDarling has so eloquently and comprehensively put, there are some great rtf quads out there and as he mentioned, don’t buy the good to go kits (unless they are a premium setup) as you will quickly lose interest.

As an example, I bought an eachine x220 rtf kit and it was a waste of money given that the goggles never worked for my eyes and the controller ran out of options given the finite switches that I wanted to set up. I now have a set of fatsharks, a Taranis Q7S controller and up to quad number 9, the latest being an Armattan Chameleon Ti which is a medium range missile that scares me occasionally.

My experience was that the best investment in the addiction hung around your neck and sat on your head, the experience of whatever quad you decide on depends on the former. By the way, I have a DJI Phantom and Mavic Pro that I drag out occasionally when I want to have a beer in my yard and send either on a Litchi mission around the lake where I live. Trust me when I say that once you get a good package together, your DJI stuff will end up on eBay....
 
By the way, I have a DJI Phantom and Mavic Pro that I drag out occasionally when I want to have a beer in my yard and send either on a Litchi mission around the lake where I live. Trust me when I say that once you get a good package together, your DJI stuff will end up on eBay....
I just got my Mavic back out and updated because I'm taking it to the Grand Caymans with me next weekend. The only problem with the miniquads is they're so hard to travel with. Controller and goggles are huge, batteries and aircraft scare the daylights out of the security. Everyone's seen a little folding DJI, they don't care.
 
Hi Andrei, welcome to the forum! Just got back in from taking my Sparky for a couple trips around the lake and saw your message. There's not much I can add to the excellent advice in this thread and yes I do have a nice quad that would love a new home in Florida. I posted it a few days ago, it's fast, it's tough, just bind it to your radio, plug a battery in and it's good to go.
 
I will send you a private message, okay?
 
I just got my Mavic back out and updated because I'm taking it to the Grand Caymans with me next weekend. The only problem with the miniquads is they're so hard to travel with. Controller and goggles are huge, batteries and aircraft scare the daylights out of the security. Everyone's seen a little folding DJI, they don't care.
Agreed, right tool for the right job I guess. I took my phantom overseas when I was working and customs in both Singapore and Manila couldn’t care less. When I travelled to Sydney, security made me strip my racing quad case as they hadn’t seen one before. What’s worse is they confiscated my mini side cutters as they were deemed a threat but let me keep my 5” long 2.5mm torx head driver. Go figure...
 
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Best recommendation is download a good Simulator program (I use FPV Air2) and start developing real stick time. By that I mean flying in acro mode or horizon mode. Flying a quadcopter that hangs in the air by gps and a barometer or ground sensing is not "flying" its guiding. Freestyle takes a lot of practice and racing takes 50 times more.
When you feel like you've got it all together and head to the field make sure you have a spotter or you'll loss it. Don't get to attached to your first couple of quads because they're going to come home in pieces (or was that just me) If you don't learn BetaFlight you cant even setup a BNF quad to fly.
 
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Agreed, right tool for the right job I guess. I took my phantom overseas when I was working and customs in both Singapore and Manila couldn’t care less. When I travelled to Sydney, security made me strip my racing quad case as they hadn’t seen one before. What’s worse is they confiscated my mini side cutters as they were deemed a threat but let me keep my 5” long 2.5mm torx head driver. Go figure...
LOL reminds me of something that happened the other day. I work beside a detention centre (aka jail) and guys who are released sometimes stop and ask if we have a cigarette. This guy was complaining that the jail confiscated his lighter, but gave him back his 18" bolt cutters!
 
When I started flying tiny whoops in the house it was great fun and practice. until I got board and moved up to the Lizard 105s (I have the prop guards on) and within a few days I took out 2 picture frames and a flower vase. I have bee exiled to the fields by a higher authority.
 
Does anyone know if I can just copy the Amber sound file on my X-Lite SD card to my new X10 SD card and replace the existing X10 sounds file with the Amber file?
I've already copied all of my model files.
 

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