E.Ts F330 DJI Clone....

[English Turbines]

DJI F330 Quad Build....A cloned Frame supplied by Bangood.

Having tried to resurrect my old Alien 500 Quad (which seems huge) I have given it up as a bad job and not bothered.
Fitting an Omnibus FC and Betaflight combined with a 4 in 1 modern ESC using DSHOT600 did improve things but it lacked power and also proved a little cumbersome, heavy, and not very smooth, although it was better.

Instead I have put this F330 together and used the FC and the ESC from the Alien 500. Considerably smaller and lighter I have fitted it out with typical standard 220mm quad motors and for the time being, some 5 inch Gemfans.
I struggled to find props larger than 5 inch, but found some 6 inch Tri Blades on Bangood at a very reasonable price so I ordered a few of them. It should be better on the 6 Inch props, although it flies pretty good on the fives.
  Yet to add a VTX and Camera, but hoping to fit an HD Camera on a tilt servo for filming purposes. It has a crappy D8 on it at the moment while I test it and it works ok, but it will be getting an XM Plus when it arrives.
  Need to keep the weight down as much as possible. So far, pleased for a £7.50p Frame.







                                                                                             :vulture:

[Andy Sayle]

Ah, that brings back memories!  I always used to say the 330 frame was the perfect size, the balance of load lugging, power and agility....  I did a frame design in a TBS Disco style for that.  I've still got a handful of CF framesets knocking around if you re interested ;)

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10154062701410125&type=1&l=bcca4f7c4f

[English Turbines]

Ah, that brings back memories!  I always used to say the 330 frame was the perfect size, the balance of load lugging, power and agility....  I did a frame design in a TBS Disco style for that.  I've still got a handful of CF framesets knocking around if you re interested ;)

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10154062701410125&type=1&l=bcca4f7c4f

Hi Andy,
               Im waiting for my 3 blade 6 Inch props to arrive, although it flies on the 5 Inch, no doubt it will be better on the bigger props, I hope.
  The hover is very stable, unlike the big Alien 500 and it will still hover easily for 15 minutes on a 3S 2200mah. The Alien was / is an amp gobbler.

                                                                                                :vulture:

[Andy Sayle]

I used to fly mine on 8x4 props for acro flying, and 7x6 props for speed.  That was on 2212/1000 or 2212/1200 motors, and usually a 4s pack.  I did try a 5s pack once, but that ended badly.....

[English Turbines]

I used to fly mine on 8x4 props for acro flying, and 7x6 props for speed.  That was on 2212/1000 or 2212/1200 motors, and usually a 4s pack.  I did try a 5s pack once, but that ended badly.....

Hi Andy,
                My6 Inch Tri Blades have turned up, and I have since tried them out. It flies ok on 5 Inch Tri Blades and hovers around 40 % Throttle, however its a bit soft in the climb out.
  Fitting the 6 Inch props has made it very much more responsive, but the motors are getting hot fairly quickly....:(
It's the same story if I try and use a 4S, motors get hot, even on the five inch props....but on 3S they run cold..???
It sounds like a motor timing issue, as DSHOT600 seems like its tuned for 5 inch props and requires appropriate motor timing if you change anything, prop or voltage..?

   Help appreciated, I can access the ESCs via BLHeli without problem, not sure what to try though..?

                                                                                                  :vulture:

[Andy Sayle]

I'm not familiar with BLheli at all sorry, but motors getting hot are either too much load, or the timing is out, usually too far advanced.   If you can, try reducing the timing in BLheli, not sure if it is an auto setting,  bands or actual values, but see what your options are in there.

If that doesn't help, I'd recommend going for larger motors, they'll cope with bigger power more betterer..

Andy

[English Turbines]

I'm not familiar with BLheli at all sorry, but motors getting hot are either too much load, or the timing is out, usually too far advanced.   If you can, try reducing the timing in BLheli, not sure if it is an auto setting,  bands or actual values, but see what your options are in there.

If that doesn't help, I'd recommend going for larger motors, they'll cope with bigger power more betterer..

Andy

Hi Andy,
               Yes, it definitely has more lifting power on the six inch Tri Blades for sure, but I may need to change the timing as you say. The F330 is not that big a Quad and Im trying to use the popular size Quad motors and props if I can.
  It will fly on the 5 inch Tri Blades if I can't get the sixes to work without heating the motors. What I have discovered, is that these motors are pretty sensitive to settings and even voltage.
  My Martian 2 for example, will fly with cold motors on 3S, but if I try a 4S they overheat really fast...on the exact same 5 inch props..???

                                                                                               :vulture:

[Andy Sayle]

  My Martian 2 for example, will fly with cold motors on 3S, but if I try a 4S they overheat really fast...on the exact same 5 inch props..???
                                                                                           

Going from 3s to 4s and leaving everything else the same is a 33% increase in voltage.  Assuming the max current increase is the same at 33% more (it is probably not li ear so will likely be more), that's a 69% increase in max power.   It could easily be the difference between cold motors and hot motors.

Normally reducing the timing will reduce the max current draw too, sonic you can do that in BLheli, give it a shot and see what happens...

Andy

[Loopdreams]

Motors getting hot can be other things too, for instance too high D term will cook motors, various gyro filtering settings as well can cause them to overheat.  It might just be too much vibration in the system causing the FC to make too many rapid changes to the motor rpm.  Betaflight is mostly used on small, stiff carbon fibre racing or freestyle quads, I don't know how it'll cope with the relatively wobbly old plastic types.

[English Turbines]

Motors getting hot can be other things too, for instance too high D term will cook motors, various gyro filtering settings as well can cause them to overheat.  It might just be too much vibration in the system causing the FC to make too many rapid changes to the motor rpm.  Betaflight is mostly used on small, stiff carbon fibre racing or freestyle quads, I don't know how it'll cope with the relatively wobbly old plastic types.

Hi Guys,
               3S is no problem, cold motors...I have since tried switching motor timing to Medium Low from Medium and on 3S it was a bit detrimental, sounded smoother on Medium for sure. Neither settings made the motors heat up.
  My F330 is very smooth and balanced in flight, I have a Mobius on it solid mounted and no jello is showing up, so that's good.
I did have to Loctite all of the motor retaining screws though, as the softer plastic arms allowed some to come loose.
I may just leave it on 3S, it may be the cheap motors Im using, and it will fly on some decent Gem Fan 5 Inch props.

Thanks for the info though, it was helpful.

                                                                                                :vulture:

 

[Andy Sayle]

The 330 frames do fly nice and smooth, more inertia to help reduce the impact of high frequency vibes.

Outrunner style motors tend to work best on medium to high timing, in terms of power/efficiency.  I wouldn't mind betting that a large portion of your issue might be down to the "cheap" motors, not so much the actual props/timing/battery setup...

Andy