Not sure if anyone is looking for a low cost quad, but Newegg has the Yuneec Typhoon Q500 with UHD camera and handheld camera mount for $400usd. Just bought one, hope I have better luck than the Phantom 3 refurb I bought a while back. Figure if the camera is decent and the gimbal is decent, it will at least work as a hand held stabilized camera. 6 more days for this sale, no idea what it will cost afterwards. Hope it works because it might be fun for use with my motorcycle racing. Bought this for hobby only use.
Yuneec Typhoon Q500 refurb at Newegg
- Thread starter Greg_E
- Start date
I've seen good looking video and garbage video from it, hope it was just the user not setting the camera correctly. No new firmware for the camera since it came out. But since it has the hand held mode, should be easy to shoot stuff for testing. Oddly the hand held device uses AA batteries and not the flight battery, even though there was room to design it to take the flight battery.
Bassman2003
Veteran
The new model is listed at $499 so maybe the extra $100 would be worth it to not risk the refurb? At least it looks like the same model but maybe not?
BestBuy has it as new at $600. If it shows promise but has a fault, I may go for a new one. But I'd really like the newest H series (but don't want to part with that much money for a hobby item like this). Have to see how it works, most of the video has been on Youtube and as I said, some looks good, some looks like garbage (grass and trees especially). I'll have 30 days to test the camera/gimbal. And since we got an inch of snow in the time it took me to get out of bed and get ready for work, with more falling still, I'm not sure when I'll get to test the aircraft part.
I do know one thing, since the camera slides right off easily, I'll be doing the first few flights without the camera. Or maybe record the ground action for those first few flights with the camera on the hand held portion. Maybe a thick cover of snow will prevent parts from breaking when I crash (and I expect to crash more than once).
And yes if it is worthy of examination (the camera), I can upload clips to my website that can be downloaded so that you are looking at Youtube compression, etc. Unlimited throughput and 500GB of storage on the low end plans that I have, I'll just zip them so the browser doesn't try to stream them. Again, assuming that it's even good enough for hobby work, which is what I want it to be able to do. Don't want to get into all the hassles of paid work and compete with one of our former students in this area. He normally gets $2600 for a 10 hour day and just bought a bunch of brand new stuff.
I do know one thing, since the camera slides right off easily, I'll be doing the first few flights without the camera. Or maybe record the ground action for those first few flights with the camera on the hand held portion. Maybe a thick cover of snow will prevent parts from breaking when I crash (and I expect to crash more than once).
And yes if it is worthy of examination (the camera), I can upload clips to my website that can be downloaded so that you are looking at Youtube compression, etc. Unlimited throughput and 500GB of storage on the low end plans that I have, I'll just zip them so the browser doesn't try to stream them. Again, assuming that it's even good enough for hobby work, which is what I want it to be able to do. Don't want to get into all the hassles of paid work and compete with one of our former students in this area. He normally gets $2600 for a 10 hour day and just bought a bunch of brand new stuff.
Not starting off very good...
It arrived last night and I of course opened it up intending to try some testing with the camera and grip. Loaded the batteries, requires 8 NiMH only batteries in the grip to power the camera. Tried to connect my old phone, realized it was 5.8Ghz and that wasn't going to work. Grabbed my current phone and loaded the app... Fought with the camera for a bit until I saw the wifi pop up as a choice, connected after looking up the password, and launched the app. On the home screen of the app, it showed that I was connected. As soon as I clicked the camera icon to see what the camera was seeing, the connection crashed. Tried that about 4 times and then got out the USB programming device to see what was happening with the camera. Downloaded the application fro Yuneec, installed the USB to serial driver, connected the included adapter to the end of the USB device, etc., etc. No connection to the camera even though the software said it was trying to connect on the correct serial port (in this case com3). Send a support request. Not having a reply by now I just looked at the automatic response and noticed that is says within 5 to 7 days. Going to have to find time to call them if I don't figure it out or give up and return it to newegg first.
I'll get it connected to the aircraft and see if working through the remote is better later tonight. Hope the battery doesn't take too long to charge.
It arrived last night and I of course opened it up intending to try some testing with the camera and grip. Loaded the batteries, requires 8 NiMH only batteries in the grip to power the camera. Tried to connect my old phone, realized it was 5.8Ghz and that wasn't going to work. Grabbed my current phone and loaded the app... Fought with the camera for a bit until I saw the wifi pop up as a choice, connected after looking up the password, and launched the app. On the home screen of the app, it showed that I was connected. As soon as I clicked the camera icon to see what the camera was seeing, the connection crashed. Tried that about 4 times and then got out the USB programming device to see what was happening with the camera. Downloaded the application fro Yuneec, installed the USB to serial driver, connected the included adapter to the end of the USB device, etc., etc. No connection to the camera even though the software said it was trying to connect on the correct serial port (in this case com3). Send a support request. Not having a reply by now I just looked at the automatic response and noticed that is says within 5 to 7 days. Going to have to find time to call them if I don't figure it out or give up and return it to newegg first.
I'll get it connected to the aircraft and see if working through the remote is better later tonight. Hope the battery doesn't take too long to charge.
Youtube has the problem sorted... When using the "required" NiMH batteries, the voltage is too low. The popular hack is to pull the battery holder out and add a connector and then use a 3s LiPo and maybe a 4s LiFePO4 pack. I think a hack to use the flight battery is in order just like I saw on one of the videos.
They do say that regular alkaline batteries work, but only for about 15 minutes which might be enough to test before I tear it apart.
Still need to try this camera on the aircraft to make sure it is working. Will update in the future.
They do say that regular alkaline batteries work, but only for about 15 minutes which might be enough to test before I tear it apart.
Still need to try this camera on the aircraft to make sure it is working. Will update in the future.
OK, so support has been really good. Most of my problems have been worked out, but two still remain. The camera can get "stuck" tilted to one side, it stills rolls around that axis fine, but comes back to rest in a tilted position. I need to do some calibrations and see if that fixes things more permanently or if it needs to go back for service.
The image looks soft, it looks like they set the lens to focus close thinking that everything far away loses detail because it gets small. Sony did this with a bunch of the Action cameras, so did Panasonic with their action cameras. The fix is to either send it back and hope someone actually focuses the lens farther away, or take it apart and do the job myself so I know it is done to my satisfaction. I'll need to make it fly before I commit to taking the camera apart. There are videos on adjusting the lens, and videos on replacing the lens with a "better" lens. Pretty straight forward procedure, but not without risk and voids the warranty.
The image looks soft, it looks like they set the lens to focus close thinking that everything far away loses detail because it gets small. Sony did this with a bunch of the Action cameras, so did Panasonic with their action cameras. The fix is to either send it back and hope someone actually focuses the lens farther away, or take it apart and do the job myself so I know it is done to my satisfaction. I'll need to make it fly before I commit to taking the camera apart. There are videos on adjusting the lens, and videos on replacing the lens with a "better" lens. Pretty straight forward procedure, but not without risk and voids the warranty.
Well good news is that it flys pretty well considering its technology level. The video is actually pretty sharp so I don't think it needs adjustment.
Bad news is that the video to the "ground station" is delayed by several seconds, going t need to just fly it and hope it records what I want. Need to check with the grip again and see how it performs.
he grip has crappy power connections, even alkaline batteries don't work through the bad solder joints. Fix is a new battery.
This is no Phantom, much slower than a Phantom. But pretty good for a cheap trainer. Pretty sure Newegg has them on sale again.
Bad news is that the video to the "ground station" is delayed by several seconds, going t need to just fly it and hope it records what I want. Need to check with the grip again and see how it performs.
he grip has crappy power connections, even alkaline batteries don't work through the bad solder joints. Fix is a new battery.
This is no Phantom, much slower than a Phantom. But pretty good for a cheap trainer. Pretty sure Newegg has them on sale again.
I put a 3s Lipo pack in the grip, now that part works great. But what I'm finding is the the video still seems soft. 4k is probably usable for aerial work, but not with the grip. The 1080 looks just yuk, need to figure out what is going on and it may need to go back for warranty repair. Can't see if there is a way to refocus this lens, might be the new design that can't be fixed.