“Betamax” Quadcopter test flight video

“Betamax” Quadcopter test flight video

Today I tested my first ever quadcopter, built as part of a recent workshop at the Vancouver Hackspace (VHS) . My initial test flight lasted a whopping 10 seconds and ended with a spectacular crash on the concrete parking lot in front of VHS, just minutes after I finished my build. The “landing” broke the original legs and one of the arms. Nothing that some glue and duct tape could not fix, fortunately.

For my second attempt, I swapped the legs with styrofoam ones and chose a softer landing surface. This and the extra flying practice helped a lot! I have to admit: my better half seems to be a better pilot as well…

I couple of trees tried to get in the way, but no quadcopters, dogs, humans, or large vegetation were harmed in the creation of this video.

The quad uses all standard components that can be found in hobby shops. Its “brain” is a MultiWii board, using the same processor as the Arduino Leonardo that can be programmed via the Arduino IDE. You can find more details here:

And here is my mod for the legs:
Quad legs mod

Ted also built a version of this quadcopter, so there will be more videos of crashes and mods in the near future.

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3 Comments on ““Betamax” Quadcopter test flight video

    • Thank you, Alan, yes it definitely is! Also it is painful to see it crash, which seems inevitable at some point. I am in the process of re-doing the frame after one such hard landing at the moment. Fortunately, the guys at Marginally Clever who designed the build, graciously made the frame design open source…

      • i know how that feels i am 16 and i built one of my own and i have probably completed 20 or so frames to replace crashed ones.

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