Anyone else fly radio controlled quadcopters/multirotors?

[johnny.t.]

I got a quadcopter on a whim about 18 months ago after a mate showed me a video of one on youtube, I soon got tired of buying replacement parts and took to building my own from 3mm ply and 12mm pse pine. Then more recently I discovered the world of mini racing quads, made from carbon fibre, cheap as can be(£20 for a frame) and near indestructible. Flown FPV(first person view) via a tiny camera and video transmitter coupled with some fancy video goggles with a built in video receiver, they are crazy things to fly, and it's resharpening my 40 year old reactions! The best thing to me is that all this is the stuff of childhood science fiction and now you can just go do it
Does anyone else here fly these or anything else when not knee deep in shavings/sawdust?

A little video taken in the woods with mine(following my mate with his at the start)
http://youtu.be/0FJZ5Aha56Q

 

[Harbo]

Impressive and fast!
What camera etc do you use - it produces a quality video?

Rod

 

[finneyb]

Impressive.

There was a piece on the Today prog this morning - about 1hr 20min in http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04mb2r7.

Brian

 

[StevieB]

Cool - now make a skin to look like a Star Wars speeder bike from Return of the Jedi and you are good to go

Steve

 

[johnny.t.]

Impressive and fast!
What camera etc do you use - it produces a quality video?

Rod

On this little one I'm using a Mobius action cam, they're pretty good and can be had for about £40, on the larger ones I use a gopro hero3.

 

[DiscoStu]

Not flown myself but I know a few people into them. One of my mates has got a massive tracking system and he can fly his from about 20km away. It will even return to base when it gets low on fuel / batteries etc and it can even stay geostationary either at a fixed point or it can stay fixed over a moving object - like a car. It's impressive stuff. I do fancy having a go.

 

[HeliGav]

I fly quads, I have a "DJI phantom vision plus" which is the latest toy in the hangar! check the videos out on youtube. Used to fly helicopters, but quads much more stable as a camera platform.

 

[johnny.t.]

Stu, your mates sounds very impressive!

Gav, they do look nice, I like the fiddling around making my own approach rather than the out of the box jobs(It's cheaper that way :lol: ). I'm currently building a pixhawk controlled one to carry my gopro and gimbal, it does all the fancy GPS stuff and also can be programmed to fly fully autonomous missions!

 

[DiscoStu]

The DJI Phantom seems to have a good reputation. I might see what a good learner copter is.

My mates set up was very impressive. He bought it second hand and it wasn't cheap. He actually bought it from someone close to me so he popped in for a coffee after he collected it. It came in three Peli cases and is a mass of screens and controls etc.

Ever seen a 5 year old on Christmas morning? He looked the same!

I assume he's using it.

He goes to a lot of the events. I just fancy something I can learn on and the maybe something I can whack a go pro on.

 

[RogerS]

Not flown myself but I know a few people into them. One of my mates has got a massive tracking system and he can fly his from about 20km away. It will even return to base when it gets low on fuel / batteries etc and it can even stay geostationary either at a fixed point or it can stay fixed over a moving object - like a car. It's impressive stuff. I do fancy having a go.

Interesting. I wonder what the feelings are of anyone innocently sunbathing in their garden it as it flies overhead. Invasion of privacy?

 

[Mark A]

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/84329404/

 

[johnny.t.]

The DJI Phantom seems to have a good reputation. I might see what a good learner copter is.

My mates set up was very impressive. He bought it second hand and it wasn't cheap. He actually bought it from someone close to me so he popped in for a coffee after he collected it. It came in three Peli cases and is a mass of screens and controls etc.

Ever seen a 5 year old on Christmas morning? He looked the same!

I assume he's using it.

He goes to a lot of the events. I just fancy something I can learn on and the maybe something I can whack a go pro on.

TBH Stu, as cool as the phantoms are, building one from parts will be much cheaper and is pretty straight forward, providing you can weild a soldering iron 8)

 

[Gerry]

Yes I have a few, I've been flying radio control for nearly 40 years now and Multicopters for the last 5 years. I've just completed the maiden flight of my Y6 before the winter sets in. It flew beautifully straight of the board.
A short mobile clip below.

Gerry

First flight