AH-6Z Littlebird Night-Ops build project

[Zeeflyboy]

Before you try and google it, the Z is for Zeeflyboy lol, this will be a build inspired by the AH-6 but takes from several different types and will have a few creative inputs of my own... so not an exact scale model, but a Zeeflyboy special edition if you will.

One thing that irritates me about the Euro is that I have to be quite selective about where I fly it due to take off/landing considerations so the solution to that is clearly a VTOL. I briefly considered the Osprey but decided against it for a few reasons.... A scale cockpit stuck in a quad ain't gonna do it for me either, so that leaves Heli's! The only thing that I've found tricky in my experience is hovering with a head tracking camera. Even with an external frame of reference it can be a tiring and wobbly experience... I have plans for this however, Skookum's soon to be released GPS unit that should bring some very helpful abilities to the table along with the natural stability of a heli this size.

So while the Eurofighter still isn't entirely finished in terms of exterior polish it is flying and functionally complete, thus I need something new to sink my teeth into... And this time I'm being a bit more ambitious and hope to end up with a more impressive model. The euro is fun to fly and was a great build to do, but this is going to be better! I have yet to see a scale FPV heli (perhaps I'm the only one stupid enough to try?) so who knows, maybe it'll even be a FPV first.

I chose the Littlebird in the end because I always thought it looked awesome when decked out with weapons, and the design affords absolutely fantastic forwards visibility from the cockpit, something that is lacking in most other attack variant heli's. I already have a 500 sized Cobra, and while it would be great to turn into FPV it's just a bit too small to work with and the visibility is comparatively poor from the cockpit. The only problem is that the kit comes with slightly tinted windows - I may have to pull my own clear ones.

So a brief outline of the project goals then:

- Build a semi-scale 12S powered 600 size AH-6 heli
- Fully featured scale cockpit with working rudder pedals, cyclic and collective
- Active glass cockpit display perhaps with live feed on one screen from FLIR, and cockpit illumination.
- Pan/tilt mounted cockpit camera, no OSD but audio alerts (voltage, mah, signal loss etc) active
- FLIR-esque B&W low light exterior camera with IR illumination, HUD style OSD and auto iris lens
- Remote operated camera switch to change between views
- External navigation lighting to allow LoS orientation in low light
- GPS position hold/atti mode and RTH courtesy of the as yet unreleased SK720 GPS unit
- Dual vTX diversity using Immersion RC 5.8ghz vTXs and 5800DUO (modified for dual channels).
- And finally, once again, to have a model that is visually and physically pleasing to fly LoS as well as FPV

My lovely, lovely girlfriend has been kind enough to buy me the MD500D scale fuselage from Century for my birthday (so I'm not allowed it until my birthday in late September lol), while the equally lovely parents got me an HK600GT to go in it and a few other bits and bobs. My cockpit kit just arrived though and hence this is where my build begins.... I'm afraid to say that once again this will be slow and painful, but this time not simply due to the work required.. Also the expense! It's going to be a complex build with lots of kit and it's going to make the euro seem cheap I fear. It's too much for me to stomach all at once so I'll be parting out the purchases over the course of a few months (and hopefully santa might bring me yet more bits for christmas!) With a bit of luck I'm aiming for a flight in the new year just after Christmas but we shall see...

So, here begins the journey... This is the present from the girlfriend which is currently being held in customs (for a week thus far... sigh. Hopefully it arrives before my birthday!)





And now I want to make it look like something roughly resembling my own interpretation of this, but with something more like the glass cockpit from an AH-6i:







My first goal is to build the cockpit, followed by the fuselage and finally the mechanics will come later and be extensively test flown separately before finally being introduced to the fuselage.

Hopefully Sassy Sander is going to give me at least 10 channels to play with, and it'll be assigned something like this, though exact details depend upon how the skookum GPS needs to be operated... Given what I've been told about how the GPS operates I can lock the gains as usual with the skookum, thus removing the need for a gain channel. I can then use a 3 position switch to determine choice of GPS mode.

Ch1: Aileron
Ch2: Elevator
Ch3: Throttle
Ch4: Rudder
Ch5: Pitch
Ch6: GPS mode
Ch7: Pan
Ch8: Tilt
Ch9: Camera switch
Ch10: Either landing light on/off or fun stuff eg "firing" miniguns

And hopefully by the time this project is done, I'll be able to have RSSI from the EZUHF rx without losing a channel in the ppm stream.

As always, I am 100% open to all suggestions and inputs. You guys improved my last build greatly with your comments, criticisms, suggestions and general support... Couldn't do it without you guys! Apologies once again for the somewhat verbose first post, so without further delay let's do this thang....

[Zeeflyboy]

So to kick things off, I've built the basic structure for the cockpit... bit of a brain exercise as there were no instructions!







And here you can see I'm sizing it up for a 1.8" screen. I think it'll fit okay but I may have to do some custom work on the upper frame just to make it work.





Lots of space inside to put all the electronic goodies which is nice! I need as much weight as possible upfront.

this is the screen I'll be using for the live feed



of course it'll need to be separated from the driver board, and I anticipate some UHF noise from that ribbon cable - It'll be positioned well away from the EZUHF and I may look into some shielding too.

[Zeeflyboy]

And finally for now, the pilots need somewhere to sit of course! Where better than this cushioned seat I ask you....




And safety first of course, so seatbelts have been added (will trim to length later when I've seated the pilot/passenger)

[W0LF]

Very cool

[Dizzy]

Very smart this i do like very much  :)

dizzy

[Coyote]

Yes looks another great project coming up :)

[ak47]

This looks cool..

Where did you get the seat from Zee, could do with some for my Huey!

Best of luck with the build.

Ant

[FPVSteve]

No doubt this will be another amazing build - looking forward to this a lot, good luck with the build.

:popcorn:

[Zeeflyboy]

Cheers chaps!

So this is my idea for cyclic.... it allows everything to be contained within the seat which should be nice and tidy.

I carefully cut a slot up the bottom shaft of the stick, and then cut a piece of plywood to place in between. This gives it a flat extension.

I then took some aluminium tube and drilled an axle hole through before then slotting the end... finally I cut a piece of carbon to size and use as an axle.






This whole assembly will then be mounted to the seat, with the tube free to rotate. One servo will be attached to the seat, linked to the underside of the tube and operate aileron, the other will be attached to the tube itself and have a small linkage wire connecting to the flat piece on the control stick and operate elevator.

Should look pretty good I think once the front cover is made up and the tube painted black.





Ant - the seats are made by Proheli, as are the seatbelts. I got them from Skyhunter hobby, but be prepared to have a small heart attack at the price. If you do want them and order them there, be sure to email them for a proper postage quote as for me it defaulted to like $70 which is ridiculous.

[Zeeflyboy]

So, just quickly stuck a single seat on to get an idea for how this is going to work. Looks good!








I have managed to find some 10" figures on ebay.co.uk called "HM armed forces" which come with proper clothing and weapons etc. The 12" figures are a bit too big and 10" equates to somewhere between 1:7 and 1:8 scale, so should suit this build nicely. Obviously one of the poor bastards is going to be decapitated and turned into a cyborg with a camera for a head, but oh well... you win some you lose some.

Here's my passenger



And my pilot (I may change him into the same camo as the passenger, bought a spare set just in case)



I imagine they'll need some significant lightening up, but we'll see when they get here.

[wgt40w]

Zeeflyboy

I have really been missing keeping up with your build thread since the last project was completed.

I am soooo happy for you to now be giving me a new project to follow.

From reading the above - one possible point:-
I have a Trex 600 electric with a scale body on :
https://www.scaleflying.com/Eurocopter-Fennec-AS350-Civilian-Fiberglass-Fuselage-600-Size_p_1824.html
- to access the battery, the front cockpit section pulls off forward. Bearing this in mind are you going to make your scale cockpit mechanical operations (control stick) self contained - to enable battery access on your body without having too many electrical and physical connections to disconnect ??

[Zeeflyboy]

Yes, the front section pulls off to access batteries.

The whole cockpit will be self contained and attached to the front section, so will come away when you pull the front section off. I will use plugs (I think two 8 pin plugs should carry all required connections) in order to quickly hook/unhook the whole unit, there will be no physical connections to connect. I've not yet decided if this will be an automatic process like the eurofighter canopy - I will wait until I have my hands on the fuselage to decide.

The problem is CG. From what I've seen, in order to balance this heli typically has to have the batteries mounted quite far forward, basically where the pilots are. I'm hoping with the large amount of electronics upfront (OSD, sensors, screens, cameras, video splitters, servos, 6.0v buffer pack etc) combined with the weight of the scale cockpit and pilots will be enough to allow me to have the batteries mounted slightly further back.

[wgt40w]

Totally understand and agree with all you say.

In my case there is some room available under the cockpit floor - I assume yours will also have room there foe some of the electronic boards.

[Zeeflyboy]

Yeah there'll be some space for some kit under the floor.

So when are you making your AS350 FPV? ;)

[Pasty]

very cool project and subject!

I'm a bit tired of the usual slap a camera on top of a plane/copter thing, it doesnt feel like your flying anything particular, just moving through the air.... I do fpv for the challenge of flying not for sight seeing and something like this might reinvigorate me.

I've been thinking of doing a scale cockpit type thing on a P38... maybe its time to get on with it.

thanks for the inspiration.