Posted on 12/29/2014 9:06:03 PM PST by djf
Anybody else have a drone?
I'm asking because I decided to get myself a cheapo Christmas present, and got a Hubsan. The small one.
It's quite a challenge to fly... so far, I think I've taken off and landed a total of twice. All the other events have been crashes.
The first time I tried it, I hooked it up on my coffee table, powered up the controller, and pushed the RPM's up. It VERY promptly took off, crashed into my roof but keep going, and landed at the top of a bookcase about 15 feet away...
Wow!
Since that time I have tried mostly low-level flights, trying to get the feel of the controller and the feel of the drone.
No camera, so no pictures. That will wait for another day.
And it has a somewhat short flight time - measured in minutes, MAYBE ten minutes if I can run it that long without crashing.
Is there a drone ping list? I might be interested!
A friend of mine got a DJI Phantom. Pretty sweet.
I got one of the helicopters a few years ago and never did learn to fly it.
The better ones have stabilizing gyroscopes or something and are pretty easy to fly.
I have yet to take this one outside. But the weather is supposed to be nice for a few days, probably tomorrow.
Also, I ordered the crash kit - some extra propellers, and additional stuff.
This is a very small unit indeed. I think it weighs less than an ounce total.
But I can tell you from the speed that it has and it’s unpredictablity, I WOULD NOT fly a bigger unit inside!
None of the quadcopters would be remotely controllable without a three or six-axis gyro/accelerometer set up and code to utitize them.
Can't justify the cost for a toy though.
Do have a bunch of sugarcane farmland and woods/swamp that it would be a kick to view from it.
Trying to rationalize buying one if the prices come down :)
Wow! That’s pretty sophisticated!
Mine has nothing like that!
I figured from the start I would like to learn the bare-bones flying first. That way, any self-stabilizing is extra!
The small indoor ones have limited stability and are hard to fly.
The DJI phantom has GPS so it will stay in the same location, regardless of wind, without having to touch the controls. I’ve flown one in very windy conditions.
If it loses radio connection it goes to an altitude of 60 feet and returns to its original take-off location by itself.
Many other features and different flight modes, depending on how much you wish to control yourself.
It’s very easy to fly if you take your time and learn in small steps. Very stable.
For real fun google “quadcopter FPV.”
I would never admit anything to you G-man...
Total cost for mine from Amazon (without the crash kit) was like 55 bucks.
It’s not big enough to take up a camera (or anything else!)
But it seemed like a good price to find out if I liked them and wanted to invest any more.
later reading
bump
You goof… you shouldn’t be flying this one inside either! I have a Rotor Concept HP-Q1 Quadcoptor and like you, I started indoors because I thought it would be easy to lift off, move it over and set it back down. What I did was promptly do some drastic and unplanned pruning on one of our long standing tall house plants. Then I recalled the words of the fellow I bought it from at the tradeshow in Vegas… “When you try this for the first time, only do it outside in a windless day in a place that has lots of wide open spaces.” “Well”, said I, “there is a football field down the road so I’ll use that.” “Not enough space, you need much more room” said the sales guy…. and he was right. I ended up trying it outdoors for the first time in a park that has two back to back baseball fields and within minutes, the drone was caught up in a tree about 200 yards away. How did it get there so fast? Easy when you don’t yet have a good handle on how deceivingly sensitive the controls are. And so at 8 am on a Saturday morning in a public park while people were out walking their dogs, I was hauling along a 20 foot long extension ladder (that pulls out to another 20’) to climb up and pull the drone down. Fortunately, it was undamaged but it frankly was amazing that I even found it.
Something that light will be extremely difficult to fly outdoors unless you have ZERO wind. Until you get the hang of it, these microcopters are best flown indoors in large spaces like gymnasiums or warehouses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30HDdocMyAk This is what I aspire to having for my winter place in the sun... not just the drone but the boats, the water, some good and relaxing times...but seriously, there is some gorgeous footage here.
Kewel...
http://www.hubsan.com/productinfo_11.html Is this you opening up your present?
We got a helicopter this year. It flies into the tree, the ceiling, the hanging lights...and then crashes. Finally got it to hover but flying it around seems like it will be impossible.
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