I heard through the “grapevine” that 3DR were working on some upgrades to increase the poor flight times. I have 2 Iris’ and was wondering if the upgrades would be available to existing customers.
I have added custom Stealth Retracts to mine that increases the weight including Longer Legs by only 136grams. But that really does not seem to lower my times at all.
IRIS flight times : 9 minutes and 14 minutes
First my IRIS :
Iris developer edition – DX8 and AR8000
brushless gimbal front mounted (Beholder Gimbal), replacing the original fixed go pro mount
(this makes it low easy to transport) No Jell-O!!! (It took me 4 months to get it right)
200Mw FPV TX (soon to be replaced by 600mw)
I’m, using Turnigy Nanotech 4.5 A ( hobbyking) ( bit expensive $57, but light and small)
Flight times (not Hover – I’m talking about FPV continuous flight) : 9 minutes ( 10 minutes until failsafe kicks IN )
I have also tried two nanotech 4.5 A in parallel to get 9 A, and I got 16 minutes of continuous flight,
I’m counting for 14 minutes.
I did two flights in this setup, and it’s becoming a bit of a heavy quad , the only concern that I have is that around 12 minutes in to flight….suddenly I noticed a sudden lack the power….( I need and help in identify what is going on with help of a log reader).
I hope this info will help IRIS users in deciding the batteries.
I also need help someone could look over my logs and let me know what is going on when I lose power around 12 minute in to flight ( 9A) (I have specify 9000mah , in parameter ).
FYI : I have also tried ZIPPY 5000 mah (cheaper and heavier than nanotech 4.5) …. After 6 months the flight time on these batteries dropped to 6 minutes.
Just got the new IRIS+ battery from 3DR and tried it out on my old IRIS. Flight time with new battery is 19.5 minutes and 12.5 minutes with Tarot gimbal. With my original batteries I purchased with the copter and after 300 flights with it I noticed about a 20% decrease in flight time and about 35% decrease with Gimbal. I would expect the same from this new battery as the internal resistance seems to go up as you use the battery. Charge times go up and discharge times get shorter with the batteries hitting the threshold sooner but after checking them the voltage is back up to 3.7 volts after flying showing that the internal resistance has gone way up. It’s nice that on the new battery it now shows the proper handling of the battery.