This is not one that I have really seen asked and it’s going to be specific of course
to what exactly is being flown.
I have no clue how much wind this would be able to handle.
Obviously it needs to be able to fly forward faster than the wind is to be able to get it back
and be able to fly into the wind and still have authority.
This is NOT the type of question I’m asking about here.
I’m worried or concerned about it flipping over or just not being able to handle turbulence without getting itself confused and out of whack to the point of crashing.
I’m looking to hear from people who have experience with this and might know first hand of it’s
limitations in this regard.
Thanks!
I have an old F450 clone frame running 3000mAh 3S battery,
EMAX 2213-935KV motors
10 X 4.5 props
An APM 2.8 controller
And the latest that will run on it (3.2.1)
Your apm needs to be retired. if you replace it with a modern flight controller board, and an up to date version of arducopter, however, it will handle most any type of wind you throw at it.
Also, supports many flight controller boards many of which are inexpensive, so there’s no good reason to keep the apm.
Hi Thanks!
Let me take a moment here to express myself:
This is not an answer to the question.
And NO!
The answer to every single question about older stuff that actually WORKS fine is NOT
“Your apm needs to be retired. Replace it with a modern flight controller board”
Go away and stop this nonsense!
There is absolutely no reason that you can’t have fun and user older versions of things that
are proven to work and are documented.
Sure a newer unit would be better and have more features.
The older unit worked FINE in 2015 and it will still work FINE today.
Please stop that.
That is not a valid answer and is a very narrow mindset!
I agree newer stuff would be better and any new builds would include new hardware
and software.
But an old WORKING system is not to be thrown away and not used.
Nonetheless thanks for sharing your opinion and taking time to respond.
To be clear - the newer code is SAFER. And that is the main reason to use a newer controller hardware. Its about the firmware, not the hardware, and the APM2.8 boards are only capable of running the older firmware. One can set all added feature arguments aside. Your own post describes that you are concerned and turbulence and the FC getting “confused and out of whack”.
That being said, I also have an old F330 with an APM 2.6 that flies so well. I am not rushing out to replace what works. I get where you are coming from.
Now - to address your question: It should handle some strong winds, but it depends on the amount of available overhead power just as much as the tune. What flight mode are you concerned about? Stab? Loiter? Alt Hold?
Thanks!
I appreciate all of the above.
I do already realize that newer code is better and safer!
I also fly a newer pixhawk cube on a 3DR solo and I have other nicer quadcopters.
The old APM is really just for fun! and I only fly it at a wide open RC flying field as of right now.
The mode in question or that I’d like to test in high winds is loiter.
I’m only looking to hear people’s experience with gusty wind conditions and how it handles them.
And where it may be expected to fail or be unable to keep up.
And I have already tested it at 15-20mph of wind and it does really well.
I also did all of the tuning manually to my satisfaction and tested in stabilize, alt hold and acro
to my satisfaction before ever even trying GPS assisted mode(s).
Anyhow just looking for any first hand experiences with this on the older hardware and software.
As this is my first experience with the older stuff, it’s really just for fun and I don’t know what it’s actual limitations are.
I was not angry in the above comment but I feel it’s important to get the point across those those that don’t even THINK for a moment and immediately pull out the “you need to upgrade your old useless stuff” response.
That’s not how it is.
Thank you for asking the question. I have just completed a second quad. Completely rebuilding a 450 clone with carbon fibre arms and holybro F7 fc with no name 4 in 1 esc. It flies nice but mostly in gps mode. The fc was loaded with the “latest” version of firmware v4.0 dev which come with the caveat “ extreme care should be taken by anyone using it”.
So I try to be careful.
Fortunately I don’t, and believe you don’t either, fly new craft in almost any wind conditions. Stable, latest or beta.
Wind does cause the headroom per motor to be compromised so at some point the craft will be as well.
Your question is important because there are 3 issues. Hardware aging, improved firmware and external forces eg wind. How long should a gyro/accel chip last? Depends on its service? Not important, replace after 5 years anyway? Redundancy.
Firmware improves but you may need new FC. The cost is not always the purchase price but the resources needed to understand,install, program and debug. But that is our choice at days end. We could by off the shelf multirotors.
External forces. In yours and my case concerns about wind. Headroom. Do you know that some of the blheli 32 esc including 4 in 1 have the capability to measure individual motor current, rpm and voltage. That would just about be enough to allow the crafts fc to alarm the person in charge of a pending headroom issue. You could pre-program in the thrust characteristics of the motor prop combination(s) into the fc memory. But we will need new hardware and firmware.
On we go.
