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Fly an Aerobatic Quadcopter with Curtis Youngblood (Video)
It goes up, it goes down, it goes upside down and keeps on flying. We're talking about Curtis Youngblood's latest quadcopter prototype, but as his website says, "Curtis has been flying and competing with RC Helicopters since the early 1980s and is a Multi-time World Champion and Multi-time 3D Champion." This lucky dog has managed to turn his hobby into a business; he makes and sells radio controlled helicopters -- not the $60 ones from Harbor Freight, but sophisticated aerial beasts that can carry still and video cameras and could easily be used as short-range drones, except that these are hobbyists' toys -- for hobbyists who can afford to spend hundreds and even thousands of dollars, anyway. There are plenty of quadcopter kits on the market for lots less than Youngblood's creations, along with build-it-yourself guides. But these won't fly upside down. For that, you need variable-pitch rotors and sophisticated control systems. "But what about 3-D printing?" you ask. Of *course* you can use a 3-D printer to make a quadcopter. That was an inevitable development. Here are open source instructions for building one. Enjoy the ride!
Try this youtube video of Curtis visting the guys at Flitetest for a really great look at how it works, flying it, etc. from some guys who really know their RC stuff:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Flitetest is pretty awesome, by the way; I stumbled across their channel a couple of months ago and have been quite entertained. They're the closest thing I can think of to "Top Gear, only with remote control things that fly."
And I do mean "things" that fly; they routinely have a "can we make ___ fly?" episodes. I think I recall one challenge involved getting a cinderblock into the air.
Please help metamoderate.
At least not the smaller ones, people have built ones which brute force engine reversal and use symmetric propellers.
http://hackaday.com/2013/11/26...
This is new. This is the MantaRay Prototype. Much larger (1230mm). O.S.105 nitro motor and 325mm blades on each half of the rotor. The Stingray (smaller) proved we could maintain stable flight with collective pitch and a single motor. 3D is just an awesome bi-product and we can turn sharper in pylon racing and event courses. Now that we know we can use a single motor, we can scale up the machine to handle larger gasoline or possibly turbine drive-trains. Imagine search and rescue or surveying with camera on a platform that can stay in the air for hours. Folding blades cause less damage than props in the event of a crash, and this will have many options for recovery. So while the machine is only as safe as the pilot, this is still a much more stable platform than anything modelers and industries have had up to this point.