Scratch-Built 5" FPV Drone

Built using this video as a guide, only difference being that I replaced the flight controller and ESC stack with a cheaper one.


Parts List


Walk in the Park

  • Railroad Swing Bridge
  • Speed Test
  • Prairie Hill
  • Horseshoe Pond
  • Heron Friends
  • Two if by Sea
  • Walk in the Park
  • Stunts and Speed
  • Close Shave
  • First Week of Acro
  • First Acro Flight
  • Pre-FPV Test
I wanted to fly my drone by the railroad swing bridge, as it's a very interesting and very old landmark. My flights were interupted when I was on the track and it started beeping, indicating it was starting to move and that a train was probably on the way. I ended up getting lucky as I was able to show it moving as well as a train passing over.
Finally got around to adding a GPS to the drone. Decided to see how fast I could make it go. I hit 111mph, not too bad. I almost didn't make it across the pond since I severely drained my battery, I was lucky it died shortly after crossing the water.
This is a pond near a local tech school.
A retention pond near the local tech school. Some Herons come here to feed, and I was lucky to be able to fly around a bit with a few of them.
This was my first attempt at flying over water. Seeing I had only learned to fly within the last month, I was seriously freaked out and ridiculously nervous. The first flight lasted less then a minute, I didn't realize the power/cable lines were so close to me with that tower out there, and so I landed just to calm down a bit. The second flight was better. The third flight I was able to move down and away from the tower and cables, so felt a bit more comforable flying.
I found a local park with some well spaced out trees, so I decided to try do do some higher-speed flying with obstacles around.
This was my first actual flight flying in acro mode. The difference when looking at the video is amazing, it's so much smoother than when flying in angle mode.

Check out the 3D camera I made for the drone here.