Santini Air Project (Electronics Assembly)
This section will cover any and all electronics related items. This includes radio, servo, and gyro installation. Plus any extra items like navigation lighting, on board video camera, etc..
I plan to run the motor from an 8S A123 battery setup. I am hoping 8S will be a good a power range without the extra weight a 10S setup like the Tow Defender has.
The servos for this setup are all high voltage type so they can run directly from a 2S lipo/life setup. This means I do not need any voltage regulators. I will probably still do a dual battery
setup with redundant power feeds to the receiver.
First step, test the ESC. I am using a Castle Creations ICE HV80 for motor control. I chose this unit because it has built
in data logging, and will run on the higher voltage I want. I have never used a CC ESC before so this will actually be my first
one even though I have the same thing for the Tow Defender, but it's not installed yet. I used the setup tool from Castle to program
the ESC and I must say it was pretty easy to use. It has pop-ups to explain what each setting is for. Very nice!!
I put the original servo tray back on for flight testing only. So the layout you see
will only be temporary. It will all change once installed in the fuselage. So here's
some initial planning taking place.
I am satisfied so I secure things for flight testing.
I am using the 401 gyro off my Blade 400 right now for the initial flight tests.
I will be trying the Turnigy V-BAR 600 flybarless control after just a few flights with the flybar setup.
I changed my mind after I said I was going to use the Turnigy V-Bar 600. I put it on my Airwolf mechanics
instead. After trying to figure out the translated instructions I gave the V-Bar a test flight. It ended in 30 seconds
with major damage. I will not be using it on this project. The next section will descibe what I did choose to do.
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I actually used the SK360 and 401 gyro for many flights and it worked very well, bt I ended up going with the Microbeast
in the end. After trying one on my Airwolf and Tow Defender and seeing how great it worked, I decided this heli would use
the same system. It's simple to set up, it works great, and the price is pretty good also. So below is the final and current
flying setup. I have been flying it and now have around six flights on it. So far so good.
Here you can see a mount I made for the ESC, and how it mounts on the frame.
