Ramblings of a crazy IT support technician…
November 28, 2012
I added a RC helicoper LED mod to my AR Drone 2.0 last night to give it better visibility at night or distance. When the drone is far away it’s hard to see which way it’s pointing to steer it properly.
This mod kit consists of a controller and 8 coloured LED’s which are 2 fast flashing red LED’s, 2 slow flashing white LED’s, 1 red and 1 green solid nav LED and 2 solid white LED’s.
It’s improved the drone’s visibility 10 fold.
November 26, 2012
As promised here is the video I did on the oval yesterday where I did some range testing of the drone’s wifi signal using a range extender.
Also got some height too!
November 25, 2012
Just purchased and setup a 12v battery for my TPLink TL-WAS830RE range extender.
This will allow me to take it out with my drone into the field and extend the wifi range of my drone. Hopefully this should prove to help with range and cover the entire oval where I fly my drone.
It’s a 12v sealed lead acid battery with 2A capacity which should in theory give me at least 1.5 hours flight time per battery charge. The extender runs about 1A and I have a 2A fuse in place.
A quick test at a local park proved the extender to work pretty good. I’ve also test flown it at the oval and got really good range. Probably too good as the drone got caught by the wind and clipped a tree at the far end of the oval and fell from a pretty good height. No damage though thank god! But I didn’t get the video as the app crashed on me before it saved the video to file. Think I need to turn on USB recording.
I’ll post another video of the oval test once it’s completed.
November 23, 2012
Took the drone down to the oval yesterday at sunset and got some good flight time in. Sorry about the occasional darkness, the drone’s camera couldn’t cope with the contrast.
November 22, 2012
Decided to get some backyard flight time as the Melbourne winds had died down from 60km/h+ to around 10-20km/h.
November 22, 2012
I’m working on an idea to use a small parachute as a drone recovery system. These are commonly used on RC rockets and planes but why not on a drone?
Stay tuned for more info!
November 21, 2012
I saw this pic today and thought it was cool. It’s an exploded view of all the components that make up the Parrot AR Drone 2.0
You can see the main cross frame which holds the main board and navigation boards which do all the smart flying and each motor assembly and the prop/gear assemblies. Each of these parts can be purchased and replaced in the event of damage and whilst they aren’t cheap they are certainly cheaper than some more advanced helicopters with the average part costing around $20-25 AUD for a set of props or gears and shafts.
The foam body does protect the electronics which are suspended by soft foam and counter weighted by the battery tray/battery above which cuts all vibration out which is good for the ultrasonic sensors up front which keep the drone at a constant height. The foam really does a good job of keeping it all in place and protected but the boards do get damaged in the event of a high speed/high G crash. Nothing is bullet proof if you nose dive it at speed!
I’ve already given my drone an overhaul after it’s first 5 hours of initial flight by replacing each of the gears, prop shafts and the props themselves. I still have the original bushings in place and these aren’t too worn yet but I have bearings on the way which I’ll install as soon as they arrive. My first 5 hours of flight were fairly brutal on my drone with all my initial learning and I estimate at least over 30 crashes the worst damage I did was bend one prop shaft putting it out of balance which I straightened myself until my new parts arrived in the mail the other day. I have a complete set on hand just in case!
The AR Drone is pretty robust but breakages do occure with probably the worst case scenario is a broken central cross but these are only around $35 AUD so having one spare is a good idea. Most of the time you’ll break a prop or a gear or bend a shaft but if your using a RC mod and get your drone up at height you run the risk of the drone cutting out in an emergency or running into something and crashing from height so you’re likely to break all of the above and some drone users have done just that!
Worst case you do some serious damage to your drone you have the option of purchasing a new one at around $350 AUD and using the old one as spares and this is a bit of an expensive hobby it’s still a lot of fun!
November 19, 2012
Prop is now balanced
From time to time your props will get nicks and scrapes and need balancing. Also props that are new seems to all need balancing on once side due to the injection molding process leaving more weight on one side probably due to gravity pulling the material down during the mould process.
In any case you will need to balance your prop. To do this you need to place the prop onto a shaft of some sort horizontal and spin it around to find which side is heavier than the other. One you know which side is light you can add a small piece of electrical tape on the under side of that light end at the very end of the prop. Add a longer strip and trim off small bits at a time until you get the right amount and the prop sits straight on the shaft and does not favour one side or the other.
One side is heavy
Add a small strip of tape
Doing this helps with vibration and stability in flight and can even mean you use less battery and certainly less wear on your motors, shafts and gears.
Give it a try it works!
November 19, 2012
Parrot AR Drone props are great, durable and hard to damage but eventually they do need replacing.
New props purchased from Parrot need to be straightened and balanced before you can use them otherwise your drone will end up flying all over the place and won’t hover properly.
You can see below that the props come packages well but this leads to them having a bowed form to the plastic no doubt from shipping conditions/heat etc.
The props should touch tip to tip when placed back to back in their clockwise-anticlockwise sets (A & C). If they do not touch it means they are out of shape and need to be straightend.
Prop tips do not touch
You can see they are not straight on the leading edges
To straighten them you need to either put them in a home made jig or clamp them to a flat surface such as a wooden ruler and heat them up for a bit and then let them cool. Most people use a hair dryer to heat them up for 2-3 minutes then let them cool and repeat the process several times which lets them set in the correct postion.
I use an alternative method of taping the leading edges together of a A & C prop set and then dip each end in boiling water for 10 minutes a side and then let them cool in ice water. This has the same effect and is much quicker and easier than the jig method. Pics below:
With 1 side taped you can see just how bent out shape the prop is!
All taped up and ready to go!
Much better now but these will need another go to get them perfectly straight as they aren’t quite there yet.
Stay tuned for prop balancing!
November 19, 2012
Had my iPhone 5 sitting in front of me recording the outdoor flight #3 I posted earlier. Here is the view from that!
It's been a CrAzY Day! 
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