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7Jun/160

ZMR250 v2 Build – Part 10 – MW OSD Artificial Horizon Reverse

The Problem:

The default settings in the MW OSD on my configuration resulted in the artificial horizon on the roll axis being reversed.

The Solution:

Edit two settings in the MW OSD firmware.

In config.h, uncomment "REVERSEAHI" as below;

#define REVERSEAHI                // Reverse pitch / roll direction of AHI - for DJI / Eastern bloc OSD users

In screen.ino, I used these settings;

#if defined REVERSEAHI
pitchAngle=pitchAngle;
rollAngle=-rollAngle;
#endif //REVERSEAHI

 

 

8May/160

ZMR250 v2 Build – Part 9 – Fpvmodel.com ZMR250 PDB connections

In this video I go through the fpvmodels.com ZMR250 PDB and what connects to where. Oscar's site (https://oscarliang.com/zmr250-v2-build-log-mini-quad-with-pdb/) is a great resource for figuring this out with some great diagrams.

3Apr/160

ZMR250 v2 Build – Part 8 – FC Power Connection

Initially I hooked up power to the Flight Controller from the 'BEC' and 'GND' pins next to the FC but this didn't work..... the reason..... the BEC pin is designed to take 5V from the ESC BEC which of course I don't have because I'm using the LittleBee 20A ESCs which don't have a BEC.

The alternative is to use the 5V regulator built into the PDB. Oscar Liang's web page has some excellent diagrams showing the layout and connections of the ZMR250 v2 PDB.

ZMR250 V2 Build Log – Mini Quad with PDB

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24Mar/160

ZMR250 Build – Part 7 – Buzzer Connection

The early versions of the Banggood SP Racing Flight Controller have an issue where the buzzer connections don't work. To get around it is an easy fix and just requires soldering a couple of wires from the bottom side of the FC to the buzzer connections.

 

 

24Mar/160

ZMR250 Build – Part 6 – Little Bee ESCs

The EMAX 12A ESCs don't support damped light so I ordered four LittleBee 20A ESCs. This video shows a quick comparison between the two ESCs and the effect of active braking.

 

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23Mar/160

ZMR250 Build – Part 5 – EMAX 12A ESC Update

In this video I look at updating the EMAX 12A ESCs with a direct connection to BLHeli via an Arduino Uno (as opposed to going via the flight control board). Initial reading of the supported SiLabs ESCs documents indicated it wasn't going to be straightforward. After some Googling I found the video below which shows  step by step instructions how to do this.

The alternative would be just to buy one of the EMAX $10 programming cards which I guess is simple enough but then I'll never be able to do BLHeli firmware updates plus I like being able to use the BLHeli to check and set the ESC parameters.

After going through the process of soldering on a wire to each of the four ESCs and updating to the latest BLHeli, I found these particular ESCs don't support damped (damping?) light / active braking which is a bit of a bummer so I ordered four Little Bee ESCs instead. It would be interesting to compare between the two types of ESCs when it comes to flying but I'm not sure I'm up for the hassle of swapping out the ESCs.

 

 

 

 

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8Mar/16Off

Industrial Producers

Many industrial producers think primarily in terms of geographic coverage before considering distinct market or customer segments. But market segments and customer segments must be identified in order to develop an accurate product, service and pricing framework. And it is this step that many industrial producers fail to take.

Industrial Manufacturing | New England Wire Technologies

Industry-Specific Business Model

Industrial producers like those that manufacture industrial rubber products often define their own business model, the way the product is delivered, marketed and priced, and the way it is integrated into the larger industry, rather than aligning with the prevailing business models of their competitors.

Industry-specific business models result in different financial incentives for business owners, and, in turn, different business models and revenue expectations. There are four major types of industry-specific business models: "non-distributed," "distributed" and "remote."

Industry-specific business model "non-distributed" refers to an industry that is controlled by the small number of large, capitalized players who are the gatekeepers of all of the market access, prices and distribution.

Industry-specific business model "distributed" refers to an industry where the large players control the bulk of the market. "Remote" refers to the industry where there are many small players, but most of the price discovery and distribution are done by large, centralized players.

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8Feb/160

ZMR250 Build – Part 2 – Power & ESC Check

In this video I hook up power to the fpvmodel PDB and to the EMAX 12A ESC. I'm trying to decide whether to solder the Sunnysky motors directly to the ESC or to the ESC leads. Removing the heatshrink from the ESC shows what looked like dodgy solder job touching the pins of the ICs. I wondered if they were going to work at all. After hooking up power and successfully testing them, I decided to use the ESC leads to connect to the motors for two reasons;

  1. Unlike other ESCs that have the three points at the end of the ESC to connect to the motor wires, these EMAX 12A ESCs have them along the middle of the board which means the wires would be staggered (different lengths).
  2. The connections are inbetween ICs and some of them make contact with the legs of the ICs. I don't want to break the connections with a messy soldering job.

31Jan/160

ZMR250 Build – Part 4 – FC Firmware Flash

In this video I hook up the SP F3 Flight Controller to update the firmware via the Cleanflight Configurator app. Even though I've done this a heap of times I still manage to make mistakes doing the firmware flash. Some of the mistakes include;

  1. Wrong settings in the app.
  2. I'm so used to flashing my Naze32 rev5/6 boards, I uploaded the wrong Betaflight firmware (now I'm using the SP F3 FC).
  3. Leaving the "flash on connect" setting active in the configurator without realising it and interrupting a firmware update before it finished.

I remember reading somewhere that "you can't brick these boards" because the bootloader is stored in ROM. Just short the boot pins and flash again. Lucky for me the boards are resilient in this way as I've had to use the bootloader pins a number of times.

I never did get the 4way BLHeli firmware update to work via the FC board so in the end I gave up on that option and looked at updating the ESCs with a direct connection to the board. More on that in the next video.

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31Jan/160

ZMR250 Build – Part 3 – Motor & ESC Test

In this video I let Grace take the controls of the motor and test it mounted to the 4mm arm. The first thing I noticed was the motor stuttered at low throttle. Looking closely at the bottom of the motor mount I noticed the circlip on the motor shaft was stuck against the side of the hole cut through the arm for the motor shaft. For this test I simply centred the motor so the circlip spins freely however I think the better long term solution is to enlarge the hole.

Gracie gets a chance to check out the running lights on the PDB and quite likes them.

 

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