Step 3: Add Electrical Components

The electronic components of a quadcopter consist of:

  • Motors
  • Electronic Speed Controllers
  • Receiver and Transmitter
  • Flight controller.

For the flight controller we are using the HolyBro Kakute F7. The manual can be found here http://www.holybro.com/manual/Holybro_Kakute_F7_Manual.pdf

We are using a stackable 4-in-1 esc from HolyBro which can connect all the motors to a single stackable board.

Our receivers are FrSky X8R which can support up to 16 channels on a single SBUS connection. These are connected to the FrSky Taranis Q7s.

Soldering:

Before attaching any electronics, you want to complete all soldering on the separated components. See this guide to soldering (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMSlF1xFozc). You can get some hands on practice at the lab or Tinker!

You will want to make the following solder connections: 

The connections and process for setup are listed in the HolyBro manual above.

You will want to solder male pin headers to the flight controller instead of soldering directly to the board. This can be seen here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3230nCz3XQA). You also want to be careful not to overheat the ESCs since they have huge pads!

 

Bonus:

Research the protocols used by the ESCs to convert the signal from the flight controller to motors (https://oscarliang.com/esc-firmware-protocols/)

Research the protocol used by the transmitter to communicate with the receiver (https://www.getfpv.com/learn/new-to-fpv/all-about-multirotor-fpv-drone-radio-transmitter-and-receiver/)

 

Step 4: Program control