Model UAV: RD-3 (Codenamed: Rusty )
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Current Objectives for this Model
Model Components
Flight Controller: Quadrino Zoom
History
RD3 started out as an Octo. During a test flight in a gymnasium a physical failure of a motor connection casued a crash from 30 feet that broke 3 props and two arms. RD3 was rebuilt as a Quad and pieces of broken carbon fiber were used to construct the custom airframe of RD5.
Update: This unit has been rebuilt as a Pirate ship, Its currently running the latest pirate (As in Ardupirates) code - its not quite stable enough yet though and needs work.
Another Update: This bird is now a quad, powered by the OpenPilot CC. It is named in honor of Russell "Rusty" Duffy aka 13brv3c I would post a picture in his honor but Rusty is very good at not leaving net footprints, I was only able to find a single photo with his face from back in the 80s (Next to his then new 85 RX-7), so we will forgo the photo. Rusty is the North American distributor for the OpenPilot products, and has been instrumental in guiding me to Important projects that matter. You can visit his store from the Links of Honor section.
RD-3 Renamed as "Rusty" Our OpenPilot Quad
Over the past two years, I have had the great fortune to deal with Rusty @ above Ground Level Hobbies, Heck of a good guy, and I have quite a bit of his gear, Frames, OMM Adapters etc. Anyhow, over those two years, Rusty and I have exchanged quite a few emails about what we expect out of these projects we spend so much of our life energy in. Rusty has given me great advice every time, and I have learned from his posts on the myriad of forums he frequents as 13brv3.We talked about ArduCopter which has matured since then and has become the mainstay for my models that have autopilot. Recently, because of one of those long email discussions I decided to check out the OpenPilot project. To summarize, I have found an Opensource project I can look up to.
I am more excited about OP than any UAV project to date. For this and many other reasons, besides the obvious that Rusty designed this Frame (Rusty's Rev 7 frame), RD-3 in its OP CC Incarnation has been given the codename "Rusty" as a small tribute and thanks for his tutelage and guidance which has led me to OP.
Thanks Rusty!
OpenPilot CopterControl Arrives
Its Here at last!
Finally the Holy Grail of Multirotor Flight Controls has arrived. This board is so rare that the last time a batch of 50 units was brought into the US for sale online, they sold out in 4 minutes.
This board promises incredible control and plug and play setup. time will tell and we will push this board to its limits.
RD-3 Redesign now runs OpenPilot
With the copter control installed,
I had to determine the shortest possible arm length that could allow 12 " props, and I cut the arms from a 12mm CF tube from hobby king, bummer that the OD of the tube is not consistent, one end is 12 and the other end is about 11.
I then cut 4 arms and installed them, mounted the motors and then test fit a 9" Prop
Next I wired it up, ESCs went in, Lipo etc/
Last threw on the RX, Lipo alarm, and set up the CC as per Daves nice setup video (OpenPilot TV Ep 1)
and threw on some some props and flew around the living room!
RD-3 The Modularization of Rusty
In a forum discussion on openpilot.org we were talking about making a test quad that could allow us to compare the performance of multiple controllers, So I thought I would take a stab at making RD3 modular enough to take all different flight controllers.
To start, we look at how it is:
I have siad before that the FC is too high and when it tips over or crashes inverted this will put the damage on the FC, so to begin with we need to lower the stands, the current hight without flight controller deck looks like this:
So I decided to lower it by about an inch. Compare:
Looks good so moving on.... All changed:
Using a FrankenQuad CC protector with some added rubber to absorb vibration
I devised a better CC protection method, by inverting it and mounting it under the plate instead of above
On the standoffs this means that even in a direct hit, the CC would be protected byt the frame contruction and then in the worst case scenarios by the frankenquad gaurd.
Then with the dome on...
Now with an MK style FC
And with a Dome
Here we test fit the AQ Mini, which I will set up for flight next.
I will use mini o-rings for vibration isolation, below the board ......
And above the board. Now with screws in and tightened
Finally its RTF. Modularization complete. I can now swap out any number of boards quickly. Fortunately most FCs want the motors turning similarly eg. AQ, AC2 and CC = Front-CW Right-CCW
RD3 + AQ50 Pro = AWESOME
So after the modularization of this airframe, RD3, aka Rusty, I decided to try the new AQ50 Pro FC that is destined for my Y6 Scorpion (RD25) and fell in love with this simple controller.
First I took the AeroQuad Mini out.
Then installed the AQ50 Pro
tested the dome
Spent 30 seconds setting up the radio with the FC (using the sticks and a button on the FC) Then it was RTF, test flight video should be at the bottom of the page
RD3 - Rusty tests a new brain The Quadrino Zoom
I installed the Quadrino Zoom flightcontroller onto the RD3 testing platform and then began the onorous task of trying to set it up. After nearly a month of messing around with differnet versions of the software I got it to arm, and then to fly in stable mode and then in manual. I am not ready to give a review of this controller becuase it has issues that I have yet to resolve and most of these flight controllers requires some tuning, but in short I was surprised to note that I could get it in the air in manual mode at all, and in stable mode it fell out of the air so no doubt some tuning is required, but we are on our way.
Model Flight Logs
Newest at the top, oldest at the bottom.
DO NOT TRY THIS IN YOUR LIVING ROOM. This is very dangerous. This video was taken with everyone else safely out of reach of the aircraft. This flight was recorded after many weeks of testing and debugging. This video was taken when RD-3 was a UAVX Octocopter
Out of the box, onto the frame, pluggd it in, and spent 30 secs on tx calibrationn, and then flew on a dead 3s turnigy-nano 2200 mAh pack. It even passed my gyro confusing stationary lean test. this is going to be one fun FC.
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