Tarot 680 Pro build

[wafflejock]

Courtesy of another forum member got my hands on some big motors on a great deal and some other parts to try and put to use. Two months later now and I finally decided to just start buying parts since I know myself and once it's here can't stop myself from building.

Not there yet but feel like a good start for my first day, frame instructions were sort of garbage to non existent but with help of YouTube and just going with it I've gotten a good part of it assembled.



Also little test board I'm working on for getting the efficiency of things and to run some things to limits.

 

[Dugdog47]

Dude that thing is gonna be a beast!

 

[wafflejock]

Yup it is pretty gigantic, had some trouble finding betaflight setup tutorial on it since so many regular quad ones out there but think I found the calc for setting up the mix correctly. Going to try using the GPS module and other things to get it to do waypoint flights, but props won't get here for like a month so there is going to be some waiting. Thinking I'll try 3D printing some big ones and see if it can possibly work with those on the test bench, also waiting on couple motors since one of the six I got from the other forum member had a bearing shot or something making noise at high RPM so I'll replace that one.

 

[Dugdog47]

Calc for setting up the mix correctly? Pardon my ignorance but what exactly does that mean?

 

[wafflejock]

Yah had never looked into this either but finding info on configuring betaflight for a hex has been pretty tough.

Multi-rotor Motor Mixing and why it's important - Quad Questions

How to setup a custom mix in baseflight and cleanflight for multi rotors.

quadquestions.com

If anyone here wants to point me in the right direction would appreciate it.

 

[Dugdog47]

The Inav firmware has a pre-set choice of mixers you can pick from based on the size of your drone. The 10 inch selection worked pretty good on my 450 however I had to quit using Inav because the pre-flight checklist kept tripping not allowing the kwad to arm.

 

[wafflejock]

Gotcha yah looks like ardupilot had a similar configuration chooser thing, will be a while till props get here, coming on the slow boat from Shenzhen but will let you know how it goes, got a kakute F7 I'm trying to make work with it, curious to try out iNav and some other things with this too since I've been basically 100% betaflight from the start (once CC3D Naze build.. ran some other firmware but aside from that)

 

[RENOV8R]

You just gotta put on the 680 Pro CF canopy for the cool factor! Here it is on my 650 Sport

 

[RENOV8R]

What sized props are you going to use?

 

[wafflejock]

I ordered some 1355 according to ecalc.ch and other things I've been able to pull together about the 680 Pro frame these should fit but I have to wait like a month to find out so I'm 3D printing some half props as stand ins for now. Figure it will be a fun way to test out my little rig for seeing how much thrust I can get given some input power too. About the canopy it does look much nicer with it for sure, I may pick one up eventually but opportunity to print another thing too

 

[wafflejock]

It's going to be a tight fit for sure I tried with my printed props nice thing about them being in halves I can put one half on one motor and one half on the other and check distance it has about an inch of clearance and these are about 12.5" long so 13" will be cutting it close but saw somewhere stated compatibility with 1355 so hoping that spec sheet was right.




Got signal wires hooked up still need to do GND wires somewhere thinking just bundle them then jumper wire to a pad on a pdb I put in there to supplement the built in wiring on the frame.

 

[wafflejock]

Update the FC is hooked up now I went into betaflight and found the correct option in the configuration tab of the configurator (getting it running on Mac OS Catalina took some doing). There is a Hex+ option in the top left of the configuration page that I had just overlooked being a drop down, or it turned into one at some point, but anyway that looks like my build and shows 6 motor outputs on motors tab now so going with that for now.

So yay FC and receiver hooked up and transmitter is bound so now just need to finish screwing frame parts together hook up the motors and give them a test spin ‍

The mmixer values from the calc linked earlier appeared to work as well in terms of motors showing enabled but it messed up the model previews whereas hex+ looks awesome.

 

[wafflejock]

Okay small update the receiver and FC seem to be all good but the signals to ESCs are wrong or something, I'm going to replace the ESCs since they were all used left overs from previous quad builds and not sure they all even speak the same protocol once I have some fresh ESCs in hand will replace those and check things out with blheli suite or worst case start probing around with a oscilloscope. As is seems like the ESCs are stuck in a "reboot loop" just playing startup tones over and over. I individually tested the motors and ESCs so know they are okay individually and no obvious shorts on signal lines or anything so will wait to replace and post again hopefully ready to fly then.




On the plus side it looks like it could fly

 

[wafflejock]

My best guess right now is I swapped a GND and signal connection on one of the ESCs or one of them might be shorted to GND but will post again if I figure out anything definitive for now back burner this project to finish some other things.

 

[ringolong]

Nice build coming along! I can't wait to see it up in the air.

I miss my old 680 sometimes.

 

[wafflejock]

Okay so minor update something is shorting between my ESCs so about to start taking them off and continuity check along the way. Just wanted to post quick update with short clip of test rig, good God this thing is frightening, sorry for the loud YouTube in the background but get some idea of how loud the prop gets

Reads out as about 4lbs of lift with 1355 props 3S battery and 620kv 4006 motors from Tarot... Scary and exciting!

 

[Dugdog47]

Outstanding work there my friend very cool thrust tester you have, I'm guessing you made it?

What makes you think something is shorting the escs?

 

[wafflejock]

Thanks yah it is a mash up of Arduino tutorials basically but uses basically a scale and the motor has center same distance as to center of scale so should be basically 1:1 it pushes on the printed part and that pushes down on the scale. It has some little glitches in the PWM signal so going to try some servo driver board to handle that. Turns out the short is something with the FC or something it is pushing into because I took all the ESCs off and still had a short, bit surprised nothing smoked and still have to pin it down but now have to rip this thing back apart and figure out what the FC is running into when it's all screwed down from the top. Hard working on this thing cause the top and bottom plate hold the arms in need 5 human arms

 

[wafflejock]

Oh also finding the short with continuity check between + and - that are supposed to go to the ESCs, after I took them all off was still beeping for continuity between the two then unmounted the FC screws and just shift it a bit with everything still plugged in and the continuity went away between +/- (screwed it back down and the short came back). Anyhow still need to rip it apart sometime this week and see exactly what's happening and had bought replacement ESCs since first ones I tried were all left overs.

 

[Dugdog47]

I did a 450 quad could never get it as smooth as I'd like but was okay I guess. Inav never did work on the airbot f4 but was smoother than betaflight which always works lol.

Keep us posted on your Tarot!!