Thursday, February 11, 2010

Roll Your Own Drone

via David Schneider...
This new branch of the [model airplane flying] hobby goes by the name first-person view, or FPV for short...

Having read up about this activity at such sites at DIYDrones.com and FPVPilot.com, I was eager to give it a try. I purchased a tiny SN555 video camera for US $129 from Hobby Wireless, an online seller of FPV gear. While there, for another $95 I also bought a diminutive 0.5-watt video transmitter and a matching receiver tuned to 910 megahertz, which is well separated from the frequencies used for radio-controlled model aircraft in the United States (72 MHz and 2.4 gigahertz).

The big question was what model to use. I ended up with a plane called the Twin Star II, which is manufactured by Multiplex Modellsport of Bretten-Gölshausen, Germany. It normally retails for $150, but I picked up a kit for this model at the bargain price of $86 from BP Hobbies of Piscataway, N. J. (more with video) (another high roller)