Unfortunately I was the pilot for one run where the sun was in exactly the wrong position and I got momentarily blinded. When I found the EasyStar again I couldn’t tell what it’s orientation was. Needless to say, ten seconds later it was in the top of the highest tree inside the gate of a super-secure National Laboratory. Yikes.

I dropped the kids off at home and went to the main gate of the lab and explained what happened. To my astonishment, they neither laughed at me nor arrested me. Instead, the head of security escorted me to the cyclotron and we started looking around. I went and got the transmitter and gunned the motor, and eventually we were able to find the plane by following the sound. Sure enough, it was 60 ft off the ground in the tree and really wedged in.

DIY Drones

My GY401 setup tips - RC Groups

Here’s a stock tail fuselage. Problems are: easily broken, acts like a sail in the wind, ugly :(.

Nifty refit kit from BoomTown Hobbies, $26 on ebay + free skids that don’t break everytime you look at them.
After picture.

Maybe I’ll take it into work for a test flight at the end of the week. Expecting good things.

DIY Drones

This is a resource for all things about amateur Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs): How-to’s, links, videos, images and a discussion group.

Among other things, this is where we’ll be listing all the parts, software and instructions to build each of our UAVs. Here are some starting links for the first five (and a PDF/poster that shows how the first three compare to military and commercial drones)

building my UAV
Here’s how I’m building my UAV… well, at least, how I’m starting to… Basically, I bought a Blade CX2 heli, complete, for about $200 and hacked the heli, added sensors, microcontrollers, etc.

The CX2 controller has 4 potentiometers into which I spliced a breadboard. A Parallax Propeller (prop chip) is used to read the control stick voltages through a simple Delta - Sigma ADC… receive live data from another prop-based system resident on the heli, some control laws are (will be) applied, and the new voltages are output using a PWM based DAC (couplea caps, couplea resistors…). The prop also can talk to a laptop thru its USB port. I have some java code which displays various outputs (very much a work in progress and not currently a high priority)

I have a CX2 also, and I really would not dare to do this.

I have some more photos of the helicopter.

Also, I just met this skink who appears to have moved in under the front steps. I’ve decided to name him lefty, since he’s missing his right front mobility function.

Right now, it looks like this.

When I’m done, hopefully it will look like this.