the wasp stings!

[flybywire]

The etching looks the part. If you got it flaunt it.
Was there any reason for not using fibreglass sheet  for the frame.?
I get mine from a chap near Ely, he does all different thickness';s  and it comes return of post , brilliant service.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1-6mm-Fibreglass-GRP-sheet-12-X-6-for-Quadcopter-or-Mardave-stock-car-saloon-/291367567928?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item43d6dc4238

Yes, unfortunately our laser will not cut fibreglass very well.  Last time we tried, it got about halfway through a sheet of 2mm.  I';m not sure if a recharge of the gas will enable it to cut this material or not, but as we are a cash strapped academy, I don';t suppose I';ll be finding out anytime soon!

That does look like a decent price, thanks for the tip HF, now, if I could get our little ageing CNC router working properly....


Andy

[richardg6paj]

Hi Andy,
I';ve just got around to cutting two plates out of 3mm ply. I have to say, I';m really pleased with the results. I';m still going to use carbon arms and going to sandwich arms between two silicon rubber discs between the plates. I';ll send you a pic of progress so far.
Your geriatric laser should be able to cut 3mm ply. I haven';t used the best ply for the job. That will come later. Feels very strong and not as heavy as g10. Should also soak up any vibration that gets passed the silicon. Oh! And most importantly, cheap.

Richard

[flybywire]

Hi Andy,
I';ve just got around to cutting two plates out of 3mm ply. I have to say, I';m really pleased with the results. I';m still going to use carbon arms and going to sandwich arms between two silicon rubber discs between the plates. I';ll send you a pic of progress so far.
Your geriatric laser should be able to cut 3mm ply. I haven';t used the best ply for the job. That will come later. Feels very strong and not as heavy as g10. Should also soak up any vibration that gets passed the silicon. Oh! And most importantly, cheap.

Richard

Hey Rich!  I like the sound of the silicon discs. 
It was cutting 5mm birch ';faced'; mdf when I last saw it, so yes, it will do ply quite nicely.  What frame are you working on ATM?

Cheers

Andy

[richardg6paj]

Hi Andy,
It';s a slightly overgrown 250, in fact 300mm.
Here';s a pic of it half done. Only a prototype at the moment. But at least it isn';t going to cost as much as g10 when I modify!

Richard

[flybywire]

Just a mini update!

I';ve been musing about how to make a very clean install of all the gear, and this is what I have come up with so far, in the absence of the bottom integral arm plate (which I may have to wait a couple of weeks for  ) I may not need to make the inward pin header dodge, as the pins may well clear the top deck at the front of the Naze 32.



I plan to make this mini quad a simple as possible, so mounting the FC in this way will do away with the 3D printed case.







Just a quick comparison with the previous version, looks slightly ghostly compared to the machismo carbon & G10, a bit like the Milky bar kid!



Really looking forward to getting this ';vision in Delrin'; in the air sometime soon.  The Naze will be a learning curve, but I think I';ve read plenty on MR-UK to see me through ok.  I hope I have success with the Spektrum Dsmx Satellite Rx too. 

Ciao for now.

[hoverfly]

Looking good,  I would  still be slightly worried by having  a pc board uncovered  a lump of wet mud would really spoil your day.  A thin strip of celluloid over it might be a good idea, something like a blister servo cover.

[flybywire]

Looking good,  I would  still be slightly worried by having  a pc board uncovered  a lump of wet mud would really spoil your day.  A thin strip of celluloid over it might be a good idea, something like a blister servo cover.

Cheers HF.  Yes, I was thinking along those lines, I had a similar experience with a gopro that had it';s side cover off and recieved a dunking in water & mud.  Digging it out of the USB port afterwards was not fun!
I think, a simple perspex cover would suffice, just to keep the damp from entering via the top, hopefully being set between the two frames will offer some further protection.   

[flybywire]

Agh!  Frustration!

First of all, thanks to Danny for the heads-up vis-a-vis the Flip 32+, what a great bit of kit for not much money.  I think BG have now sold all their x000 units, which is a shame, cause I could';ve done with a couple more.

Well, I';ve jumped from my airplane of relative safety, and crashed through the twin barriers of atmosphere that are Baseflight & Cleanflight, managing to escape being battered to death by my own stupidity in the free-fall, and have seemingly landed the right way up, with both legs intact!  Yippee! 

Anyhow, I';ve had one eye on other folks endeavors on here over the past year or so re BF & CF (and lets face it you can';t really miss it) aided and abetted by the likes of Bruce almighty (I mean that affectionately BTW) and Dennis Baldwin (what a job that guy has?  And a nice garage too?) so, I have hit the ground if not running, then at least crawling, so to speak.
When Danny posted the Flip 32+, I took a punt.  As I mentioned a few days ago, I had some teething troubles with firmware, but that was mainly brought about by my haste, and stalwart refusal to read instructions, although in my defence, I did read plenty, just not quite in the right order.   

Okay, that being said, cutting to the chase, my reason for the purchase (apart from the amazing value of a 10DoF controller with similar spec to Naze 32 (full) for £18) is to use it in conjunction with a Spektrum DSMx satellite Rx and slap it all in my Wasp project, for total neatness, and freedom from mucho wires (cheat';s ppm for Spektrum-ites).  I should point out here, that I also have a Naze 32 acro that I bought ages ago, but failed to get round to using, so I have the two side by side, micro USB at the ready.

First up, here are the instructions that I followed to the letter, firstly in Baseflight: https://github.com/multiwii/baseflight/wiki/SerialRX--like-SpekSat,-Futaba-SBUS,-Graupner-SUMD

Secondly, in mirrored fashion, in Cleanflight: https://github.com/cleanflight/cleanflight/blob/master/docs/Spektrum%20bind.md

Newcomers to either of theses open source firmwares for the STM32 chip, would be forgiven for thinking that they had stumbled upon a parallel universe, or Twix factory schism possibly?  Buscuity-ness covered in chocolate, and chocolate full of buscuity-ness indeed?   
Both methods are very similar, with one or two exceptions, the CLI commands to enable Speksat support for one, plus, simultaneous settings for enabling the support in configuration tab, which is slightly confusing (do you need to enable in both CLI & gui?) I suspect not, but have tried both for belt & braces approach.
I have both boards currently running the latest CF firmware, as by the look of it, as mentioned on this forum many times, it does quite a bit more for your money.  So, both boards are hooking up fine, and by the looks of the data output are doing exactly as they should, I have configured the Flip 32+ upside down and back to front, but I hope the photo';s will show why I need it that way, and it works a treat.
However, on both boards, after fol;owing all the steps I can find documented, and successfully binding my Speksat to both boards, I cannot get anything to show up in the Radio tab, nothing!  ALso, rather worryingly, despite saving the speksat enable command in the CLI, and having it acknowledge it has set, it loses this config on reboot, and also in the GUI as well!

I haven';t given in, merely paused for thought, but it looks to me for all the world, like I have a duff Speksat device.  I have quite a few others on various other craft, and I';ve just hoiked a Lemsat (not Lemsip!) off ebay for a tenner, well, they get good reports, so I';ll try anything, as long as it';s DSMx.

If anybody can suggest something else I may have overlooked, please feel free to chip in.   

(I may well wait until the Lemon arrives, as I have other stuff to crack on with, like ripping out a kitchen, sub-floor and all, being one of them).

Whatever happens, and I will prevail, they are a great FC, massive value, can this stuff really get any cheaper?   

P>S Actually, I';m getting ahead of myself a little, as I haven';t posted any pics of the Flip, only the Naze 32 acro (well spotted if you did).

[flybywire]

Reading/re-reading this at the bottom of the page may explain the Flip failure to work with Speksat:

"Connecting a Spektrum-compatible satellite to a Flip32+ flight controller

The Flip32+ is wired in a rather strange way, i.e. the dedicated connector for the satellite module uses the same UART pins as the USB adapter. This means that you can';t use that connector as it maps to UART1 which you really shouldn';t assign to SERIAL_RX as that will break USB functionality.

In order to connect the satellite to a Flip32+, you have to wire the serial data pin to RC_CH4. This is the fourth pin from the top in the left column of the 3x6 header on the right side of the board. GND and +3.3V may either be obtained from the dedicated SAT connector or from any ground pin and pin 1 of the BOOT connector which also provides 3.3V."



Well, it was late last night.  I';ll look into this.  It may explain why the board refused to connect a few times, Doesn';t explain why it still fails on the Naze tho, as I gather it is pre enabled for pin 4, and that';s where I have it.   

[kilby]

When I briefly had a satellite attached to a Naze this page covered everything http://www.netraam.eu/nazewiki/pmwiki.php?n=Howto.HookupASpektrumSatellite

[flybywire]

When I briefly had a satellite attached to a Naze this page covered everything http://www.netraam.eu/nazewiki/pmwiki.php?n=Howto.HookupASpektrumSatellite

Thanks Kilby.  Yes, I followed those instructions, and the similar ones for Cleanflight.  I';m pretty sure my Spek satellite Rx may be borked.  I always had one that was dodgy, I had it originally on my flagship CX4 with WKM, but often found that when booting up the radio & FC, the satellite orange light failed to come on.  I think this may be the same issue.

The Lem-sat Rx is on it';s way, that';s what I call service!  Should be here tomorrow.

[Hands0n]

Just as a matter of interest, what sort of range can be expected of a satellite? Failsafe?

Good to see progress being made. The documentation is all over the place. Pulling it together is a real challenge

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[flybywire]

Just as a matter of interest, what sort of range can be expected of a satellite? Failsafe?

Good to see progress being made. The documentation is all over the place. Pulling it together is a real challenge

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

Danny, I can';t say TBH, as I haven';t cracked it yet!  But, I would guess at ';parkfly'; range?  Say, 350m ish, something like that.  Failsafe would be ';as bound';, so I';ll set low throttle & buzzer on.
The Lemon sat arrived today, it';s even smaller than it';s equivalent Spektrum counterpart!  The little whisker antanae are much stouter, and less prone to the ';Salvador Dali'; tache effect (if you know what I mean?!).

All I need to do is make it work.   ::)     Basically, I can bind the Tx to the Rx, but get no control of the board, it';s pretty frustrating I tell you, argh!  Why do the commands not hold after a reboot?  Oh well, it';s late, and the wine has done something to my thought processes, so tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow I think.

Catch you later

Andy

[Hands0n]

From what you';ve said earlier Andy, it looks like the cable needs a bit of hacking to get the RX to the correct Input pin on the FC. I';ve got a Spektrum satellite so will give that a bit of a play when I get back to Blighty.

The CLI config not sticking sounds like one or more config commands are missing. I experienced similar when setting up SerialRX for S.Bus the other week. Once all the required commands are executed the config will take effect at the Save command.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[flybywire]

From what you';ve said earlier Andy, it looks like the cable needs a bit of hacking to get the RX to the correct Input pin on the FC. I';ve got a Spektrum satellite so will give that a bit of a play when I get back to Blighty.

The CLI config not sticking sounds like one or more config commands are missing. I experienced similar when setting up SerialRX for S.Bus the other week. Once all the required commands are executed the config will take effect at the Save command.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

Ah, yes, that makes sense.  I tell you, I';m liking this Lemon satellite, it';s really tiny, and £10.  I guess it could be incorporated into a flight controller board, if one was clever enough, plus tiny osd, that would be mind blowing.
I think you';re right about the commands tho.  I think I';m getting bound to the Tx, but the board is not recognising the serial_rx input for some reason.  I don';t know if I need to configure the bind pin?  I thought pin 4 for speksat was defacto?  If it';s looking for say, pin 3, then it';s not going to work, bit can';t find a parameter in the CLI to match.

Hmm, later';s, as I';m starting to sound dumb even to myself!

[Hands0n]

I';m nowhere near my resources until Tuesday. Hope you have that Eureka moment before then ::)

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[flybywire]

I';m nowhere near my resources until Tuesday. Hope you have that Eureka moment before then ::)

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

Cheers Danny.  I';ve not had a great deal of time to devote to the wonderful world of tinkering and stuff, but I have had a nose around the vasteness that is t';internet, and found a couple of interesting posts:
http://www.helifreak.com/showthread.php?t=683925

And:
http://forum.flitetest.com/showthread.php?16012-Naze32-Flip32-satalite-reciever-fix

So, I need to make sure UART2 is set to rx_serial on the ';ports'; tab, and then set the receiver mode to rx_serial on the config tab.  Both of which I thought I had done via the CLI, but hey-hum.

The Flip 32+ board is a proper enigma, as why would you design it with a dedicated Speksat port, only to share the UART connection with the USB port?  Madness or what?!  , but all the conventional wisdom says that this is the situation, so instead of using the signal connection on the dedicated port, you must use pin 4 (as does the Naze 32).  I suppose you could use bluetooth to connect, dispensing with USB, hmm. 

The above mentioned flight test forum member has cut the trace to the signal pin on the port and added a jumper to pin 4, but that seems a little over the top to me, I will use the 3.3v supply of the dedicated port, but simply route the signal wire to pin 4.

I';ll try again later tonight.  Technology eh?       

[flybywire]

Yay!  Cracked it!  Just that silly old UART2 to serial rx.  Doh!     I';ll do a range check when I can.



Let the new build continue!  I';ve ordered some 4mm Delrin to try and cut for the integral arms/bottom plate.  I think it may be the optimum thickness.   

[Hands0n]

Grats fella and you have it all working from the Satellite connector on the board. Nice.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[flybywire]

Grats fella and you have it all working from the Satellite connector on the board. Nice.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

Not quite Danny.  the Naze Acro is working (pin 4) but the signal wire on the flip needs moving to pin 4.  As it is, it conflicts with USB connection.  I guess maybe, if you were using Bluetooth to connect to the board, it may be ok.  I don';t plan on using Bluetooth tho.

Andy

[Hands0n]

Ah, ok, I got all excited just then ::) Bizarre that they built it that way on the Flip32. I wonder if they';ve fixed it on the newer Flip32+ that has the Satellite socket already soldered to the board, plug n play.



Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[flybywire]

Ah, ok, I got all excited just then ::) Bizarre that they built it that way on the Flip32. I wonder if they';ve fixed it on the newer Flip32+ that has the Satellite socket already soldered to the board, plug n play.



Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

Hmm, well, I';d like to think so, but...!  Actually, I thought I had bought the ';new'; Flip 32+, the one you linked to from BG, but when it arrived, it had the holes, but no socket.  Strange.  Some appear to have the socket, others do not, but from the hazy advice on the forums, they all conflict with USB!

[Paul01]

I had a good look and couldn';t find anyone selling the latest revision board yet

[Hands0n]

This is the newest version of the Flip32/Flip32+ and as far as I can tell it isn';t available from anywhere else ... yet. http://www.readytoflyquads.com/the-flip32

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[flybywire]

Cool!  Sensational price, shame about the $10 postage.  I';ll wait until BG stock them I think.

[hoverfly]

I thought I';d show you the finished prototype, now cut from 4mm mdf.  It has a nice look and feel to it, somewhat reminiscent of a child';s jigsaw puzzle ATM, but I';m imagining it hewn from some 24k carbon fiber, mmmm sweet!  ::)

I started imagining it in carbon  and now ime embarrassed to stand up. :embarrassed
Cant wait to see the beast in the air.

[flybywire]

I thought I';d show you the finished prototype, now cut from 4mm mdf.  It has a nice look and feel to it, somewhat reminiscent of a child';s jigsaw puzzle ATM, but I';m imagining it hewn from some 24k carbon fiber, mmmm sweet!  ::)

I started imagining it in carbon  and now ime embarrassed to stand up. :embarrassed
Cant wait to see the beast in the air.

Lol! 

Well, I have actually been flying the carbon beast, and indeed it flies well.  Such is life, I get very little time to fly theses days, that';s why I enjoy cobbling them together so much myself to make up for that fact. I';m starting to learn ';Autodesk/Inventor'; as it';s freely available where I work (play really!).  Designing & building is very addictive, once you start, you notice little things that you could have done differently/better, so it';s a continual process, or evolution, I guess!

I';m always looking for the next ';big thing';, whatever that might be, ideally I would be able to cut carbon fibre, but TBH, if Delrin works ok, I';m ok with that.   

[flybywire]

Chaps, I have an update!  After weeks of waiting for the dreaded laser cutter, I have at last managed to get a couple of my new Wasp v5 frames hewn from it';s slab of 5mm Delrin.  Despite two passes of the laser, it wasn';t an easy birth!  However, even before the laser had done its job, I noticed that the motor mount part of the arms, looked a little weak, in that the motor & centre holes all seemed a bit close for comfort.
So, I managed to snap a frame out, and to be honest, it wasn';t as weak as I';d figured (being cut from 5mm), but unfortunately, when I got them home, I noticed that my new  Emax plastic motors were a little larger than the conventional ones, so it didn';t really hang right for me.

In the cold daylight, I decided to modify the frame CAD file, and turned out to be pretty easy (I must be getting better at it!) Today, I managed to cut two new frames from a sheet of 4mm I bought some weeks ago, and voila!  I';m really liking it, it feels and looks ';just right'; to me.

I';ve started a little mini build guide, and I';ll let anybody have the dxf file if they want to have a go at building one, then I';d be chuffed pink.   

Here';s the new smaller, bottom ';sexy-all-in-one'; V5.1.0.
my now pre requisite Cheapo pdb in place.


turning of the screw...
The nice thing about these Emax plastic';s, is that they provide 3 different lengths of hex bolt.   


Satisfaction moment warning!!!


As this is my first time with a Naze 32 (acro) I had to Google the motor config, think I got it right!

Full house!    I luv ';em, god knows what they fly like tho!  I';m beginning to understand ';cat'; from Red Dwarf more each day..

Using Bruce';s trick of removing the unwanted heat shrink from my beloved 12a Afro';s, they do fit rather nicely, and also allow the wires to be neatly routed to the corresponding motor.






Here she is, not much larger than an ipad mini::::
Google cardboard anybody?


Lights in place: 


Tomorrow...

Back to the kitchen! 

well, it is bank hol, so I may get jiggy with the iron maybe, bullets to solder and all that.

Luv FBW

P.S Argh!!!!, got an esc upside down!!  I';ll just go and torture myself!!.

[arturios]

Looking good Andy

[flybywire]

Looking good Andy

Cheers art!