A quick hello đź‘‹

Thought I’d put out a formal introduction on here. I’m James, I’ve previously been a member of Hackspace and joined SLMS quite some months back. I’m yet to really use the space as it takes me a while to orientate myself and until so can be quite shy.

The current project I’m working on is I’m building a hexacopter that is capable of autonomous flight, performing aerial photography.
Why did I not just buy a high end drone capable of achieving this?
I want to put my DSLR in the sky being able to capture the shots I want with the camera I choose. A store bought drone would only be capable at best of lifting a go pro, whilst you can achieve good shots on a go pro I need something a little bigger to get a dslr in the air and also method to control the camera.
My plan is to once I have a flying machine to build a 2 axis brushless gimbal for my camera using both 3d printed and laser cut parts. Once again thank you @petra for putting on so many laser cutter inductions. Next im waiting on is @3dtechs putting on some more and I’ll be way on my way.
To control the camera itself, whilst aerial im using a raspberry pi, apache and gphoto2 to create web server from which I can remotely control all camera settings from any browser. Currently I’ve got a pi zero on order so ill be looking for ways I can hack the antennas on that.

Other than that I love making things for the house but often lack the space and tools to achieve my dreams… Really looking forward to getting on one of the @woodtechs inductions.

Any way…

Im likely going to be in the space more and more often as my project develops. If anyone is around in the space who doesn’t mind showing me around the electronics station a little more in detail it would be greatly appreciated. I plan on spending some time desoldering and soldering over the weekend.

Have a great weekend guys!

James

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Welcome to the makerspace and best of luck on your project. Hopefully I’ll be able to start 3d printer induction in September.

May I ask if you have built a multi rotor before? I yes than kind of ignore the rest but nonetheless you should read it.

I will like to point as someone that has build many multi rotor that you have a misconception about bought drone and you should expand your search as many store sell “Heavy Lift multirotor/drone” example

Interresting comparison in here

IMHO from experience building an heavy lift multirotor require a rather large budget as you don’t want to go cheap and have a failure of some sort that will increase the risks of destroying your prised camera. Furthermore when building it yourself the DIY way you have to be pretty sure of what you are doing everything right and going large is hard, otherwise again your chance of saying goodbye to your camera increase exponentially (this is not a joke)

FYI unless you have an idea already:
For what you want to do, the frame should in the 690 hexa class otherwise your flight time are going to be rather short on smaller size

So finally I will says: what do you want to do most building a multirotor or playing with it if it’s the later buy it

Hi James,
To somewhat echo @laurent_muchacho, I appreciate your enthusiasm and optimism but having seen some fairly advanced home-made drones and also a professional one on “Storage Hunters”(TV show) with DSLR attached I think your chances of success are fairly low.

If you still want to proceed, I’m happy to help when/where possible. I made a good home-made drone contact at a recent event. I’ll try to find the details

Good morning Laurent. This will be my first multi rotor build… it’s been years of fascination with these models that has finally got me building it.

In those years of fascination. There have been many planned projects and I have an understanding of the requirements in terms of lift with load. Prop and motor config.

The frame I have chosen to use is the fy690s. I did look at an octocopter frame but from what I understand the hex will be sufficient.

I don’t plan that on day one of flight I’ll strap a £500 camera to it and hope for the best. This is a project… I need to make sure it’s safe first and for that I plan to build in as much automatic fail safes as possible.

I’m sure this project will have delevoled and evolved a lot over its course

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Morning Robert, I understand my chances of achieving everything I want may be small but I always choose a challenge and believe I can achieve what I want. If not, it’s a lesson for next time.

I really appreciate your offer for support and may likely be calling on that if at all possible.

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That’s an excellent philosophy and similar to my own. Now you’ve elaborated a little I think you’ve got a fair chance. And as you say you’ll learn a lot and hopefully so will I.

I love the idea of a self-build world where the tools of production are available to all. It’s certainly true that for the apparent immediate convenience we tend to opt for corporate made things. Which ultimately disempowers us further down the road by becoming totally reliant on them.

Eg. A huge increase in AI robots could really help us be more sustainable. But who makes, owns and controls them?

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Is there anyone in the space tomorrow who wouldn’t mind showing me the around the electronics area? Just need to know where things are or is it okay to just delve in…?

There’s usually someone around, and I stand to be corrected, but I think you can just delve in. I think it’s one of the few areas which don’t require induction. Although I’d seek guidance if you’re unsure how to use anything as some of the equipment is delicate and/or very hot/dangerous