Just had my maiden flight. Very easy to fly in both Q-Stabilize and FBWA modes. Transitions are very smooth both ways. I'm planning to change the cruise mode to acro. If you add FPV, there are few options other than up front which screws up the CG so you'll require some counterweights at the tail. Quality is very good, just don't bother to install the nacelle covers. I'm planning to install my Caddx Vista on top of the canopy to get around the CG problem. The biggest problem right now is that there are ZERO spare parts available anywhere. I'd like to have a spare canopy so I can modify it for the Caddx Vista. Its an amazing plane at a great price but we need parts.

С таким ветром: 😂 всё отлично 😊жду продолжения 😮посадку доработать

Very nice flight demonstration! It's strange looking little plane but seems very efficient on power when in fixed wing mode. Stuck the landings! See you in the Air!

Thanks for the video. Looking forward to seeing advanced cameras mated to this plane.

Nice review mate. A few little tips for you: Firstly the tail motor being tilted to one side is totally normal, it helps stabilize the yaw. Secondly, ignore the current sensor data on the OSD, it's completely inaccurate (notice how your aircraft apparently draws exactly 0 amps when it's on the floor?) Thirdly, I'd recommend changing the parameter ''trim_pitch_cd''. By default it's set to 500 for some reason, which makes the aircraft want to nose up a lot in flight. Set it to 0 and it'll fly much happier :) Funny that yours arrived with a nut missing from the FC stack, mine arrived like that too lol.

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Thanks Giz. Glad I had your videos to watch first. Thanks for the tips, too much wind here for me to do more testing but it's certainly an interesting little VTOL.

Wow Mr Newton, that was an in at the deep end flight that one !, as a veteran Arduplane pilot who is now getting a Ranger T1 vTol up and running, I HOPE my maiden goes anywhere near that well!!. That plane is very small, which is handy for transport but they are so twitchy in flight its enough to make you sick through the goggles.

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Thanks bomber. Do you know what the flashing message was? Waypoint stuff maybe? and do you know how to turn it off?

@bomberaustychunksbruv4119

10 ай бұрын

It looks like its not a message but maybe some faulty font stuff flashing up, its in random places and seems to be just jumbled up. Usually messages schroll right to left at the OSD spot you set. And so maybe this will stop or clear later.

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Yes you're right. Turned off second screen and tried a different font and it's gone.

Definitely an unusual looking wing but seems to fly ok... well done...!!

A very timely video as I have one on the way.Looks much better than the Xiake. Cheers skipper😉

Well explained, reviewed & flown #1. You have never lost your touch!!

@AndrewNewton

7 ай бұрын

Thanks Noel. I do get nostalgic looking at your beach views

@Bellairvideo

7 ай бұрын

The beaches in SA where you are look great Andrew. Hope you are both well & enjoying retirement.

Interesting little plane. Looks really nice.🙂

Very good job Andrew! I'm looking forward to more vtol type planes. I would like to see a 2 motor vtol like the arkbird which hopefully is coming back soon.

Not a bad price @ $229. It will be interesting to see how the craft flys....

Very useful review! I think the leaning tail rotor makes perfect sense: with two rotors spinning in one direction and just one in the other, that disparity has to be offset somehow.

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Good point!

Really good review, thank you man!

Just needs some PID tuning and it will be nice and calm even when windy

Very impressive review! Thanks Andrew. Isn't today's tech fantastic!

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

It really is!

Nice options for folks. VTOL is the future . It will only get better . I think who ever comes out with a good tilt wing will win the lion's share of the folks credit cards .

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Very true!

Looks very similar to the Xiake800 and seems to perform similar

Great maiden, considering the level of aircraft complexity and wind conditions. Landing back on the landing pad/tarp both times is a good indicator of success. For a first Ardupilot VTOL build, it went very smooth. The garbled OSD messages seem like they're menu navigation characters (arrows, etc). It may be an optional misconfigured OSD element, or perhaps two elements fighting to display at same screen location (or perhaps an analog element?). A pretty minor annoyance, if this was the biggest setup/configuration issue. Lee (Painless360) recently noted that Ardupilot version (4.4) just released with many VTOL enhancements. Since it's very new, I would not expect it shipped on the FC from the factory.

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Ah yes, you're right. Errant OSD elements. I'll try different fonts

I'm back at my Fimi Manta trying to get a Boxer (FC version) with builtin ExpressLRS to work with a BetaFPV SuperD ExpressLRS rec but can't get the radio calibration to work. No channels detected. I have green bars but they do not change. I checked the wiring and fc TX goes to rec RX etc so looks good. I created a new model in boxer and set the required ELRS. The radio binds to the rec and rec light is solid. The boxer shows it's connected to the rec. The rec cable is plugged into the FC CRSF UART. It is labled SERIAL6 on my FC board. According to latest FIMI instructions SERIAL6 is used on ArduPilot for CRSF and applicable parms are set per their instructions. I can read/write parms to FC okay. The Boxer is on 3.3.0 and the rec is 3.0.0. Since both on major 3 should be ok. The sensors on the boxer show 1RSS as -23dB and 2RSS as 0dB. The top of boxer screen has BOXER 0/500 C so it is bound to rec. Any suggestions? Thanks John

@jmcfadden8618

8 ай бұрын

IGNORE AS GOT IT WORKING. Must have accidently set SERIAL5 to use CRSF at some point and you can't have two CRSF sets. So just a user error.

@AndrewNewton

8 ай бұрын

Great news! We learn new ways to prevent success every day. That would have stumped me too.

Strange looking plane. I would like to see it fly on a calm day

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Me too, any wind makes it quite wobbly

QStabilize mode just stabilizes pitch and roll. You still need to provide constant input to keep it from drifting horizontally and vertically (throttle). It would be a lot easier to control in QHover (will hold altitude for you) or QLoiter (will hold altitude as well as horizontal position)

@AndrewNewton

3 ай бұрын

It doesn't have a compass but I must try those modes.

Just a thought Andrew, does the tail motor have ESC braking during forward flight? A rotating prop could cause some interesting trim changes?...🤔🤔😳🇬🇧

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

I'll rotate the camera to find out

Looks good. Small question if you have time to respond. Will the SBUS cable work with a FLYSKY iA10B rec or do I need to get a special FLYSKY cable?

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Supplied cable has bare wires on the receiver end, so you need to solder on whatever plugs in to your receiver.

@jmcfadden8618

10 ай бұрын

Thanks. I was hoping that was the case.@@AndrewNewton

So does it work well with 4s?

@AndrewNewton

9 ай бұрын

Yes, it works well. I have not tried 3S yet

hi Andrew, in the file for special instructions it says (in Chinese) to reverse CH2 on the radio, not in ArduPilot...

@AndrewNewton

7 ай бұрын

Yes it seems both methods are OK in Ardupilot. But you would not do that in INAV

@TheSnow520lee

7 ай бұрын

@@AndrewNewton thanks for your answer. Right, Inav won’t digest that.

Hi Andrew, with the CG did you do the CG with the props in vtol position or wing ? Thanks

@AndrewNewton

Ай бұрын

Um? I don't recall. Mustn't be a big issue

@wayneiona

Ай бұрын

Cheers

Hi. mine pulls a lot of current in qstab, i'm using 25a 2600mah lithium-ion 4s and the battery can get pretty hot! not sure if the motors are 2700kv or 3000kv either way that is a high kv to be swinging a 6s prop, think i may try some 5inch 2 blade props, as i am using 4s.

@AndrewNewton

8 ай бұрын

I get a burst of high current during transition but about 8A for hover

Do you happen to know if the power from the FC to the analog vtx is battery power or just 5 volts? I'm going to try a RushFPV Solo and it needs 7v to 36v? Thanks in advance. John

@AndrewNewton

4 ай бұрын

Just measured it because I wasn't sure. VTx is battery voltage, Camera is 5V

@jmcfadden8618

4 ай бұрын

Thanks for the info. The RushFPV Solo should make for a nice long FPV flight. @@AndrewNewton

I have the Xiake. It flies but bluntly a jack of all and a master of none. In forward flight it isn't a patch on a normal plane and in hover mode it is no quad. I must get it out again & give it another run. Maybe convert to INAV 7.0 as I really am not a fan of some on the ardupilot flight modes like FBWA, too intrusive.

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Yes I'm looking forward to trying INAV VTOL on this

@raptr49

10 ай бұрын

I've used both ArduPilot and INAV. ArduPilot is the more feature rich of the two. You are not restricted to the FBWA mode, you can select Acro or Manual if you think FBWA is too intrusive.

@Andrew newton can you publish you can osd settings?,I have this and have crsf and runcam wasp,and can’t get osd working,I’ve checked the tx to rx etc… but nothing not even battery voltage in dji menu

@AndrewNewton

9 ай бұрын

I followed this info ardupilot.org/plane/docs/common-msp-osd-overview.html Email me at apnewton gmail if you want my parameters file

@wastedworldexploration2842

9 ай бұрын

Ok thanks for reply,I’ve sent you a email I think to right address

@ayoaina_fpv

9 ай бұрын

Hi @@AndrewNewton please can you send me a copy of your Fimi Manta parameters file? I've emailed you. Cheers! 🙂

@JakeBullit123

9 ай бұрын

Same for me .I`m running the same setup with Vista ,but can`t get OSD to display ,I have custom OSD on the goggles,and vtx is wired correct.I`ll shoot you an email for your parameters if you dont mind.Cheers skipper ;)

No home direction arrow?

@AndrewNewton

9 ай бұрын

Just a choice

Hi Andrew, can you upload the data sheet so that I can download the PDF

@AndrewNewton

5 ай бұрын

Data sheet?

@zmiller0119

5 ай бұрын

@@AndrewNewton The special Instructions, my computer will not let me download them from the website

@AndrewNewton

5 ай бұрын

@@zmiller0119 OK Email me

But will it slope?

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

One day

How it is compared to T1 vtol ?

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Dont know the T1 VTOL

@Videolinquency

10 ай бұрын

The T1 uses a magnetometer, which enables position hold in hover mode and precision auto landings. The T1 also has developer tuned setup files ready now, and a dedicated version of the FC in the works. I have had none of these models on the bench yet, but suspect the shape of the bay makes the T1 a bit easier to find batteries for. I'm ordering both, though. Just waiting for the dedicated T1 FC. More knowhow is openly available for the T1, but the Manta seems to be OK if you understand its limitations and know what you're doing.

Disappointing build quality for a plane that has quite some potential. Thanks.

@AndrewNewton

10 ай бұрын

Only the nacelle covers let it down. The rest is very good

For $199 you'd think they could add some nice moulded nacelle covers instead of those ugly as sin sheet plastic flimsies!

@AndrewNewton

4 ай бұрын

Anything, even leave them off