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Newbie build

Yonzariq

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As someone completely new in drones/FPV I am in the process of slowly ordering the necessary parts while flying/crashing around my living room with some micro's :D

Not searching for the real high end stuff, but good enough to keep me busy and learning for some time without breaking the bank.
Most of these parts are recommended to me by other people, or chosen after reading into other people's builds.

I have got the following on order or received so far:
Frame: TransTEC Frog Lite 218mm Frame kit


ESC: Anniversary Special Edition Racerstar REV35 35A BLheli_S 3-6S 4 In 1 ESC
Motors: Racerstar Racing Edition 2205 BR2205 2300KV 2-4S
Propellers: Racerstar V2 5042 5x4.2x3 3 Blade Propeller 5.0mm Mounting Hole (ordered 30 sets :p)
Antenna: DYS FPV 5.8G Antenna 4dBi Mushroom Antenna RHCP

Transmitter: FrSky Taranis X9D Plus SE
Receiver: FrSky XSR 2.4GHz 16CH ACCST Receiver S-Bus


Also thinking about the following parts to complete the build:
Flight Controller: Matek BetaFlight F405-CTR Flight Controller Built-in PDB+Matek 5.8G Video Transmitter VTX-HV
FPV Camera: Foxeer Arrow Micro V2 2.1mm 600TVL 150 Degree 1/3 CCD IR Blocked FPV Camera w/ Upgraded OSD
Batteries: Turnigy Graphene 1300mAh 4S 65C Lipo Pack w/XT60
FPV Goggle: TopSky F7X V2

The biggest challenge for me would be to put it all together and get it flying...
Parts collection I can come a long way with the help of a lot of people, but the building I really need to do myself.
I already got a nice set of tools from my cars, will probably need a good soldering iron and some small stuff like cables, connectors, shrink wrap etc.
 
As someone completely new in drones/FPV I am in the process of slowly ordering the necessary parts while flying/crashing around my living room with some micro's :D

Not searching for the real high end stuff, but good enough to keep me busy and learning for some time without breaking the bank.
Most of these parts are recommended to me by other people, or chosen after reading into other people's builds.


I have got the following on order or received so far:
Frame: TransTEC Frog Lite 218mm Frame kit


ESC: Anniversary Special Edition Racerstar REV35 35A BLheli_S 3-6S 4 In 1 ESC
Motors: Racerstar Racing Edition 2205 BR2205 2300KV 2-4S
Propellers: Racerstar V2 5042 5x4.2x3 3 Blade Propeller 5.0mm Mounting Hole (ordered 30 sets :p)
Antenna: DYS FPV 5.8G Antenna 4dBi Mushroom Antenna RHCP

Transmitter: FrSky Taranis X9D Plus SE
Receiver: FrSky XSR 2.4GHz 16CH ACCST Receiver S-Bus


Also thinking about the following parts to complete the build:
Flight Controller: Matek BetaFlight F405-CTR Flight Controller Built-in PDB+Matek 5.8G Video Transmitter VTX-HV
FPV Camera: Foxeer Arrow Micro V2 2.1mm 600TVL 150 Degree 1/3 CCD IR Blocked FPV Camera w/ Upgraded OSD
Batteries: Turnigy Graphene 1300mAh 4S 65C Lipo Pack w/XT60
FPV Goggle: TopSky F7X V2

The biggest challenge for me would be to put it all together and get it flying...
Parts collection I can come a long way with the help of a lot of people, but the building I really need to do myself.
I already got a nice set of tools from my cars, will probably need a good soldering iron and some small stuff like cables, connectors, shrink wrap etc.
your list looks good. Deff some spots you could have saved a lot more money but hey it’s a list that consists of medium grade to high grade. I will say this though your props will be fine but you may get stutter or oscillations with a 4.2 pitch on your prop. For 2205 2300kv motors a 5x4.0x3 prop is the best tested prop At least for that exact size motors. I am running 4.0 on my 2306 2400kv motors and man I wish I had some 4.5 or 4.8. My jello footage and oscillations were coming from that alone As for the building it part. It’s not hard but it is. First time at least. You’ll have so many questions you’ll feel bad asking continually but don’t feel bad. I did the same. Literally 5 posts a day haha it’s what this place is for. Helping. Yes soldering iron that burns between 550 and 750 would be great and make sure you have a sponge or a top cleaner for it Also 60/40 solder or my favorite 63/37 rosin core. Also some helping hands work great Electrical tape, heat shrink, extra silicone wire the same quavers as your motor wires. I will say the frsky xsr is good but the xm+ or even the best one the r-xsr would fit better. Either way it really doesn’t matter for your first build. It’s got diversity and you don’t need rssi or the problem of setting it up right this min. The flight controller you want are basically the best. If you wanna save money go cheaper but otherwise Matek is goooood. But anyways feel free to ask and remember youtube is your best friend haha also Joshua Bardwell and uavfutures (on youtube) keep us updated friend and welcome to the jungle :)
 
Thanks for all of the info!
I was actually guided to those props for this setup by a few other people, but will order a few of 5x4.0x3 props also.
Ordered a load of shrink wrap and tape.
Still need a few more parts and wiring before I can start building.

Also I am new to the whole FrSky scene, it was a bit unclear to me on which rx would be best suited for me, saw this one recommended a lot, so ordered one.
As I am in EU, 99% of the Rx on banggood etc. don't work with an EU spec FrSky :(

Read only good stuff for Matek, so that was a no-brainer to choose, maybe more expensive, but imho still not that expensive at €60.

Don't really expect to have it flying within a few hours after receiving all parts, build first, and then dive into setting the flight controller up etc.
I also have a few RC cars and crawlers, and when FPV vs a nice crawler, FPV is sooo cheap :D
 
Took some time but got all of the parts.
Time to build :)
Totally overlooked the fact that I ordered a micro camera, so I need to come up with some kind of spacers to mount the camera in my frame.
 
As I ordered a wrong one myself I need to pay shipping when returning, this is almost half the cost of the camera, so I'll just keep it for future use.
And order the correct size for the quad.

Hmm... keep it and throw it on a car.
Sounds like a great plan :cool:

So for now I started soldering the motors to the ESC and am going to look into a different camera.
 
Started to look into soldering the ESC to the FC, but have a few questions...
ESC has a 7 wire output, 8 in drawing, but I guess NC is not connected :)
RacerStar REV35 4-in-1 anniversary edition:
51obWEGMQZL.jpg


But FC, Mateksys0 F405-CTR manual only states where to connect
- GND
- IN1
- IN2
- IN3
- IN4
When using 4-in-1 esc
F405-CTR_BF.jpg


I also see a Vbt solder pad on the FC, but that is used to connect the VTX, Mateksys VTX-HV to the FC

The FC comes with a big capacitor, is that necessary to use?

Same goes for SBUS Rx connection, my FrSky XSR has 5 wires, Matek states only 4 in their manual.
No info on where to connect CPPM wire.
XSR-1.png

F405-CTR_RX.jpg
 
Last edited:
CPPM is the older analog signal protocol whereas sBus is the newer digital signal. XSR is just giving the option to use either, you can just ignore the CPPM output.
 
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runcam swift 2. great camera, tough!! great features, good view with the right vtx. i have three..
your kit looks good. is there going to be a build video? at least some pictures are called for. ( :
 
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Ah great, I will ignore the CPPM output.

Will upload some photo's when I am home from work :)
 
Some photo's :)
First mounted the motors and test fitted the ESC to measure the motor wire length:

Extended the motor wires and mounted the ESC:

Wired the VTX:

Soldered the Rx plug on the FC:


Next up is soldering the ESC plug to the FC, but I am still unsure on where to connect VBAT and CRNT from the ESC.
 
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Got it all built and wired last weekend, but I am running into a few issues.
1. From Betaflight everything responds as expected, but motors are in the wrong order and rotation, so I should use BLheli32 for this.
But I can connect with BLheli32 as in, it sees that an ESC is connected, but I cannot program or update the ESC, I get errors about incorrect firmware when I try to do anything after connecting with BLheli32.

2. When I disconnect from Betaflight, connect a lipo and arm the quad, the motors start spinning uncontrollable, causing the quad to bounce over my entire workbench...
Applying a bit of throttle and it is gone, motors are then rotating slowly as I would expect with that amount of throttle

Video of what happens after arming:
 
It only happens after arming, and stops when I apply a bit of throttle
When controlling the motors through betaflight it doesn't happen, not even with all 4 on full power.

Orientation looks good, quad image in Betaflight turns in the right directions when moving the sticks
 

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