Q450 Build Plans

J

Johny2x4

Member
A quick forewarning, I'm fairly new to the hobby but have dumped quite a few hours of research into building a quadcopter. Since I am new to the hobby, I have a tough time pulling the trigger and ordering the parts due to fear that they won't work and I'll have just wasted my money, which is why I am making this thread. I've got quite the parts list in my cart on Hobby King and thought I'd see if anyone was willing to take a look to see if I'm heading in the right direction. I am budget minded in some aspects due to this being my entry into building from scratch, but I am open to suggestions.

Below is my parts list. I'm going to add a bit of reasoning behind why I chose the parts as well in some cases.

TX/RX: Turnigy 9x After reading several threads on this forum, I dumped the HK 6ch and decided this one was worth the extra $30.
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/..._Module_8ch_Receiver_Mode_2_v2_Firmware_.html

Frame: Q450 Love the design, simple and functional. Not to mention Cheap.
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/...opter_Frame_450mm_Integrated_PCB_Version.html

FC: KK2.1.5 It was either this or the CC3d, after research I seem to have read that more people recommend this one.
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/...ntrol_Board_With_6050MPU_And_Atmel_644PA.html

ESC's: Afro 30a ESC's Again, after reading around these forums, I saw many recommendations for these. Probably only need 20A, but the 20A were not in stock.
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/..._Motor_Speed_Controller_SimonK_Firmware_.html

Motors: DT700 Good reviews, decent price, and found a youtube video where someone recommended them
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__6246__hexTronik_DT700_Brushless_Outrunner_700kv.html

Props: Slow Fly 11x4.7 Suggested by HK based on the motor.
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__22450__Slow_Fly_Electric_Prop_11X4_7SF_4_pc_.html
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/...Electric_Prop_11x4_7SF_RH_Rotation_4_pc_.html

I'm not going to link all the other small items, but I will list them below.
10x 10cm Servo Leads
Hook and Loop Battery Strap
20 pairs of 3.5mm bullet connectors
Male tx60 plug with 10cm wire
Prop Balancer
Status LED and Alarm for KK2.1.5

I think that pretty much take's care of it. Sorry for such a long read or a lot to take a look at. If I'm choosing parts for incorrect reasons let me know. I really appreciate any feedback.
 
Hi mate welcome to the forum, well list is good , no battery tho , the led that hobby king does i found gets so hot it melted it self , so i didnt use it it gets so hot no glue will hold it in place as it melts the glue, i removed all the bullet connectors from my quad due to them failing in flight , i soldered Esc to motors once i got them spinning the right way , also get a battery strap then there is no way battery will move , Now the FCB is good but the Hk firmware lets it down but flash it with steveis v1.18s1 pro and its then very stable and nice to fly , your need the flash tool
http://hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/uh_viewitem.asp?idproduct=27990&aff=13680
Now the motors are for a plane your better off with a multirotor motor this may be a better motor
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/...s_28_30S_900kv_270w_short_shaft_version_.html
i have had 2 of these 450 frames and are good in a big crash an arm normally snaps only once has the top plate snapped so buy a second frame and this will give you spares , mine had 2212 motors 1000kv turning a 10x4.5 prop 2200mah battery and over ten min flight time
So far you have done well with this list still use hook and loop and battery strap if you do crash you dont want battery to fly off it can damage its wires and catch on fire ( lipos burn big time )
 
Thanks, I'll take a look at the motors again. I've been changing them as I do more research. I left the battery out because I'm going to pick one up locally in the states. I added a strap and the flash tool as well. I really appreciate the suggestion. I'm excited to place my order. It's unfortunate that it's going to take a few weeks to get the parts, but in the mean time I'll have more time to play with my Hubsan X4. I asked for a Syma X6 for the holidays as well for just an easy and cheap step up to a larger quad. Once the parts come in, I'll do what I can to capture a build log/pictures. I feel there is never too many beginner first time builds for people to see the good and bad and learn from it.
 
Can someone offer some personal experience on shipping from Hobby King? As seen in the screenshot below, tracking shows it departed twice from New York on the 12th but hasn't been updated yet. The tracking number listed on the left doesn't register with any other postal/carrier company here in the states(I removed them from the screenshot). This is my first time shipping this many things from outside the country so I'm completely unsure of the process. Has anyone had a package say it departed from NY and then no other updates?

Tracking.JPG
 
Alright, I got it built and was able to get it up in the air. That being sad, there is still quite a bit of tweaking needed. I flashed the 1.19s Pro firmware since it was the latest from Steveis. I got the MultiStar 2212 920kv motors and ordered some 10x4.5 props. What I didn't realize was that they needed certain props to fit. I'm going to order some DJI Style props soon as backups. To get the ones I order to work I had to kinda file the inside so it would slide down the shaft further. I ended up with a 5500mah battery as well. It's quite heavy, but it flies okay with it. I need to do a lot of work on the gains, it is far too sensitive for me at the moment as I'm still pretty new for something this big. Here it is:
quad.jpg

Alright, some post build thoughts:
Flight controller position:
In my head, I was thinking that putting it on the bottom board would be better as it would protect it from damage, but in hindsight, it's kind of a pain to get to in order to make adjustments now.
Soldering:
Simply put, I'm pretty bad at soldering. Some really ugly joints in here.
Shipping:
Shipping was a roller coaster for me, It sat for a week with the only update was that it departed somewhere. Next I got a few updates of movement, but still it seemed kinda shady. All in all, they all got here safe.

It's just going to take me some time to get used to flying this and the fact that it's big and heavy. It's a serious step up from my hubsan x4. Anyways, I'm hoping to get some more flight time in tomorrow. When I get brave enough, I'll throw my gopro on it and start taking some video.
 
Hi mate glad to see as a quad not parts lol, steveis1.9 is really for the evo board its still ok to use if you want but may be more aggressive , so i would put it on 1.8s1 pro ,then adjust stick scaling to claim it down leave all setting as is on 1.8s1 now if you pop it into stable mode your find its not a handful and will fly nice , carbon props will make a more stable flight due to plastic blades flex alot when flying
What i did was put kk on top set it up and then pop it inside
 
Happy Holidays folks!

I was able to fly quite a bit over the last two days. I hit a tree branch, knocked off a propeller and lost the dome hex nut that holds the prop on. The nut came off due to me having to alter the props to get them to work. I ordered the correct props from HK already and just waiting on them to be shipped. I was able to find just a normal nut to work in it's place though. It was a pretty bad wreck, but all it did was scrape up the remaining dome hex nuts. and a few scrapes here and there. I was out at a family farm today for the holidays and brought my quad with me to get some flight time. I didn't time it so I can't say an exact time, but it was well over 10 minutes. I went ahead and mounted my GoPro on it and flew it for about 5 minutes, but it was already dark here and the footage is nothing but Christmas lights and street/traffic lights off in the distance. Hopefully tomorrow morning in the daylight I can get it back up in the air to catch some decent footage.
 
Well done mate glad your getting the , if you lost the cone and put a nut on change the other 3 to keep the weight right
 
I got it up in the air pretty far today. Had no problems. The propellers need replaced for the correct ones to correct the vibrations, but those should be here early next week. I also ordered a 2650mah battery. I'm hoping the less weight will help it fly easier. Take a look, let me know what you think.
 
HI mate well done , the new props will sort out the jello in the camera, i would not fly it ,it will knock a motor out due to the prop being wrong way up , once your really happy with it get some carbon props unless thats what you have coming ,but it does fly well , see you had a dusting of snow
 
Thanks. I have some plastic props coming, the new ones just have the slot to fit properly around the motor shaft. I'll have to search around for some carbon props. The props are currently the right way up, just they are out of balance because they had to be modified to fit on the shaft which makes it incredibly hard to balance. Right now only double sided foam tape is holding the camera. I'd like to look into a different set of landing struts so i can mount the camera under it to keep the props out of the shot and to better balance it.
 
Hi mate if you have a spare channel on the radio you can get retracts not cheap buy look good ,your find them on ebay ( they are like the ones on the new align quads ) may be look at a 2 servo gimbal
 
Hello all, I'm bringing this thread back from the dead. So it's been over a month since I reported in, and I thought I'd do a quick write up about the last month to offer some more insight for newcomers.

In the last month I've learned a few very important things:
MORE PROPS
I was over confident when I put this one together seeing how I never break props on my Syma X6 or Hubsan X4. Boy was I wrong. I just got an order of 8 cw and 8 ccw as well as a set of self tightening CF props. When testing your limits, you'll often break things. Speaking of limits...
KNOW YOUR LIMITS
I have wrecked several times by trying to show off or just generally being reckless. I broke the top plate of my frame once after a 50+ ft fall into a corn field because it got too far away from me. Good thing it was just over a field...
DONT FLY OVER PROPERTY
Don't fly a big drone over cars or people/their property. I did this a lot when I first started, after several random failures and wrecks, I wont dare risk flying over someone or their property just in case of an accident.
PRE FLIGHT CHECKS
I busted about 5 props in one day just trying to get the quad off the ground. The root cause was my transmitter was faulty and would erratically lose calibration of the elevator. Now I do pre flight checks every time. I also had to order a Turnigy 9xR due to my 9x being faulty. Shout out to Hobby King, their RMA process was fantastic. I didnt have to ship it back to have it verified, they offered a replacement, refund, or bonus points. I used the bonus points towards upgrading to that 9XR.

Well, that's the majority of my first month with a scratch build. I've put a ton of time into flying. I have a lot of parts on order to build a 250. Here's a shot I just took today of my Q450 so you can see that it's changed a little since last post:

quad.jpg
Thanks to you guys for the help getting started. Once I get all the parts in for my 250, I'll be opening a thread for that build.
 
Well done my friend she looks good , glad your having fun flying ( crashing) dont worry about the crashing we all still do from time to time, wait till you get the 250 built there will be a lot more crashing with that as they are very fast
 
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