New budget fpv racing quad suggestions?

bigred29067 said:
Do you have a preferred website where you order your quads and parts?
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Amazon Prime- almost no risk, fast shipping, will likely pay a little more.

Hobbyking- Had great luck with them. Choose shipping carefully. If it comes from China is can take a month in a cargo container.

Occasionally some stuff from Banggood. Some guys have had no trouble, but they screwed me on a monitor that had a messed up screen so I use them as little as possible. Again, many people have had no problems with them though. You know how it is. I personally choose to do very little business with them.

Ebay- some really good deals, some scams and some junk. Use a paypall account.

There's others out there. These are the ones I use the most.
 
I run the Walkera F210 3D & the Rodeo 150, the Rodeo 150 is nice for flying obstacles, small, lightweight and fast enough.
Pros: Has a nice FPV field, batteries are cheap enough 2S 850mah, $189.00 RTF
Cons: Pain in the ass to close battery compartment, I suggest buying an extended battery cover replacement, lot better for tucking the balance & power plugs into the body.

The F210 is tough as nails, easy fix's parts are cheap, all component replacement (Plug & Play) no soldering required.
 
Altsickeness said:
Whoever would list the Eachine Racer 250 in a top 5 racing quad list is suspect. I had 3 and they where nothing but heavy, breakable garbage. Design was kind of unique but that was it. Eachine Falcon is pretty good but it follows a traditional design which makes it more durable. Forcing a person into troubleshooting and repair... Racer 250 will also do that, since it's owner will be spending lots of time replacing arms, ESCs, motors, cameras and VTXs and figuring out how to bypass the proprietary circuit board that eventually shorts out. :)
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Currently on my second 250 racer. If you are a good pilot, get a light weight frame, they are faster. If not, the eachine 250 racer cannot be beat for the price and i have slammed mine into trees, my house, my car, the ground, the street, dropped it out of the sky fifty feet up when the battery died and....it still flies. Granted, i have replaced 2 arms, a dozen sets of props, a reciever and other things, but the parts are dirt cheap. A complete set of arms is like 9 bucks. the entire power distribution board is 24 bucks if you need one. ANY racing quad is going to require repairs. Either that or you are just not flying it hard enough. Pansy. Get a phantom and take pictures of yourself.

Want more speed? after you wear out or otherwise destroy a motor, upgrade it with a set of emax motors and 20amp esc with one shot and a 4s battery. I promise you it will keep up with just about anything but a pro built racer.

Top five? it should be number one for value for breaking into fpv racing.

The Falcon is a traditional quad, nothing special about it but the price. Can buy a frame kit on ebay that looks just like it for 20 bucks. There are lighter frames on the market if you have to have the most speed. GT2 is the way to go for speed. No top plate, small shell to protect innards, it does not get any lighter. Will go through a lot of batteries though until you master soft landings.

If you go with the racer, order it with one of the cleanflight controllers. worth the wait. openpilot is no longer supported and i can see why. Probably why the cc3d version of the 250 racer is selling for the cost of the parts, labor and shipping.
 
I'm looking to get into racers as well, but I'm starting with a micro. There are a ton of them out there, but the Eachine QX90C has great reviews and comes with Cleanflight installed but can be flashed to Betaflight. Got mine for $47, so I can practice flying fully manual and learn how to tinker around with PIDs to get tuning down. So far I've had good success ordering from Banggood, it just takes forever it seems.
 
Gadget Inspector said:
I'm looking to get into racers as well, but I'm starting with a micro. There are a ton of them out there, but the Eachine QX90C has great reviews and comes with Cleanflight installed but can be flashed to Betaflight. Got mine for $47, so I can practice flying fully manual and learn how to tinker around with PIDs to get tuning down. So far I've had good success ordering from Banggood, it just takes forever it seems.
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A word about Micros. I had the jjpro-t1. Carbon fiber is heavier than plastic. 90 percent of the RTF, like the Hubsan 107d, will fly circles around it and not break apart like the mini kit copters bolted together with carbon fiber parts instead of a one piece molded shell will. Only downside is having to use a module to get it to work with your own transmitter and the settings are proprietary. Not adjustable.
 
Jackson said:
The Racer is yesterday's news and tech... period. To be avoided.
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I beg to differ. Right now, quads are the DOS of the first window computers. Line editing, each piece having to be configured, separate boards for each function, etc. For the people who have been doing it the longest, they are not going to want to see things change.

But the future will be modular and plug and play. A single board with built in FC, ESC, video TX, and receiver. It will be able to be programmed with whatever you want and will auto recognize what motors you have, the frame, and will automatically set the PIDs. No tuning, or auto tunning the first time you fly it without any input from the pilot.

That single board will snap in to a modular base that already has a printed circuit board and power distribution system. No wiring components individually. Micro connectors to plug in legs with motors already attached. Or legs with printed circuits like the base so the motors just need to be snapped in, not wired in.

The Eachine Racer already has a pre-printed base with power distribution system along with micro connectors to make attaching a FC a single cable operation as opposed to a soldering adventure. Before long, it will have pins to just plug in a FC. No cable.

It is the most forward looking quad on the market right now.

For you code writing Neanderthals and weekend soldering smiths, i know, it makes you feel like your time is coming to an end. As it should. Pick up another hobby. Build a radio from scratch or something. Computers did not really take off until they became intuitive and easy to use. Remember when you had to load firmware just to add a drive? A lot of people making a living working on computers probably hated plug and play tech. Millions of normal people loved it though.

There are going to be advances in individual components and programming in the near future, but plug and play will mark the true start of mainstream popularity. Same with transmitters. Right now they are very crude in operation and programming. Wont be long before you see one with a touch screen wifi and downloadable formats for different FC firmware and receivers.

The Eachine racer is on the right track. Nothing else out right now is looking forward. Most of it is all minor advances in individual components, nothing tying it all together. Just individual companies trying to make s dime on a product with a very short shelf life. In the last 60 days i have seen the Emax 2305 motors fall from 100 bucks a set to 39 dollars a set.

When modular comes out and the jockeying for format starts to die down, ie windows, mac, you will see some incredible advances in function over the tit for tat bantering over the most popular components like we have now. The focus will shift from "who's motor do you have" to "what are you flying, driving to work."

it may have started with an andrino board and a roll of solder, but so did phones, computers, radios etc.

Modular. Eachine. No one else is going there yet. The cube will be gone before the year is out, replaced by a single board that will be able to do it all instead of three boards bolted together. We already have 4 in 1 esc boards. Will not be long before it is included on a FC.
 
rosco11 said:
A word about Micros. I had the jjpro-t1. Carbon fiber is heavier than plastic. 90 percent of the RTF, like the Hubsan 107d, will fly circles around it and not break apart like the mini kit copters bolted together with carbon fiber parts instead of a one piece molded shell will. Only downside is having to use a module to get it to work with your own transmitter and the settings are proprietary. Not adjustable.
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Also bought a replacement shell/body. This one is going to be great. Lots of vids to come. Thanks!
4ca3ed02-ae93-445a-9f7f-1f412edcd949.jpg
 
rosco11 said:
I beg to differ. Right now, quads are the DOS of the first window computers. Line editing, each piece having to be configured, separate boards for each function, etc. For the people who have been doing it the longest, they are not going to want to see things change.

But the future will be modular and plug and play. A single board with built in FC, ESC, video TX, and receiver. It will be able to be programmed with whatever you want and will auto recognize what motors you have, the frame, and will automatically set the PIDs. No tuning, or auto tunning the first time you fly it without any input from the pilot.

That single board will snap in to a modular base that already has a printed circuit board and power distribution system. No wiring components individually. Micro connectors to plug in legs with motors already attached. Or legs with printed circuits like the base so the motors just need to be snapped in, not wired in.

The Eachine Racer already has a pre-printed base with power distribution system along with micro connectors to make attaching a FC a single cable operation as opposed to a soldering adventure. Before long, it will have pins to just plug in a FC. No cable.

It is the most forward looking quad on the market right now.

For you code writing Neanderthals and weekend soldering smiths, i know, it makes you feel like your time is coming to an end. As it should. Pick up another hobby. Build a radio from scratch or something. Computers did not really take off until they became intuitive and easy to use. Remember when you had to load firmware just to add a drive? A lot of people making a living working on computers probably hated plug and play tech. Millions of normal people loved it though.

There are going to be advances in individual components and programming in the near future, but plug and play will mark the true start of mainstream popularity. Same with transmitters. Right now they are very crude in operation and programming. Wont be long before you see one with a touch screen wifi and downloadable formats for different FC firmware and receivers.

The Eachine racer is on the right track. Nothing else out right now is looking forward. Most of it is all minor advances in individual components, nothing tying it all together. Just individual companies trying to make s dime on a product with a very short shelf life. In the last 60 days i have seen the Emax 2305 motors fall from 100 bucks a set to 39 dollars a set.

When modular comes out and the jockeying for format starts to die down, ie windows, mac, you will see some incredible advances in function over the tit for tat bantering over the most popular components like we have now. The focus will shift from "who's motor do you have" to "what are you flying, driving to work."

it may have started with an andrino board and a roll of solder, but so did phones, computers, radios etc.

Modular. Eachine. No one else is going there yet. The cube will be gone before the year is out, replaced by a single board that will be able to do it all instead of three boards bolted together. We already have 4 in 1 esc boards. Will not be long before it is included on a FC.
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You two should meet. With fully integrated OSD where you can set up your quad through the goggles, will kick the E Racer's ass in every flight category (but random crashing and breaking and cheap parts... the ER250 wins hands down) Say hello to last years vortex:
http://www.horizonhobby.com/IRLVXAT...263578446178&gclid=CM-21rDi2NICFd63wAodHCkLYQ

If you want big fat stupid arms you get carbon tubes that have breakaway release and dont shatter like the ER250. Also this thing doesn't handle like a pig. ER250 cannot say that.

There's a Vortex 250 if you want a little smaller and more advanced tech.
 
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