E3D Hermes is a compact, dual-drive HotEnd extrusion system that enables users to take flexible printing to the next level. It features a highly constrained filament path, fully hardened stainless steel drive train, and a heatsink which has been designed to optimise airflow and prevent warping.

Dual-Drive

E3D Hermes is a dual-drive system with a hardened stainless steel drive train. Individually CNC cutting each hobb allows for a round-bottomed root, with a tooth that curves upwards to a robust, sharp tip. The round bottom of the profile strongly resists filament debris wedging into the drive gear and in almost all cases it’s self-cleaning as any debris simply falls off the teeth.

Compact, Integrated System

We set out to develop a compact extruder and HotEnd system with a reduced part-count. Hermes is a system of components designed to work seamlessly together as a single product.

To achieve this, we have developed a custom motor, based on a NEMA 17 frame, with our own faceplate designs. This is neat as it allows us to use the motor itself as part of the assembly and to add our own features for the user’s convenience, such as the mounting T-Slots.

Unparalleled Flexible Printing

Hermes constrains your filament like no other HotEnd/extruder combination.  You won’t truly ‘get’ the impact of the optimised constraint that Hermes provides until you’ve printed flexibles with it. But trust us – the performance is second to none and also has a significant impact on printing normal materials such as PLA or PETG. 

Optimised Heatsink

Hermes’ heatsink design ensures airflow is diverted up and away from both the HotEnd and the heated bed, reducing the risk of warping and uneven stresses forming in the printed part. 

*Please note* – whilst the custom motor is similar to a Nema 17, it isn’t a standard Nema 17. Therefore, E3D Hermes it is not compatible with other Nema 17 motors and you’ll not be able to swap the motor with either a compact but powerful/ slimline motor or other 3rd party motors.

We have another reivew on how to fix most of the problems here.

The Eachine Wizard X220 is a rtf quad that comes with everything you need to get you in the air except FPV screen/goggles. It includes the following:

1 x prebuilt Eachine Wizard X220 with FPV setup.

1 x 3S 1500mAh battery

1 x Lipo charger (2 and 3 cell balance port charger @ 700 milliamps)

1 x Eachine i6 transmitter, mode 2.

spare bolts and a prop nut tool.

*Props not included

Out of the box you can see some of the extras not normally seen on most mass produce RTF quads. It has motor mount LEDs on all 4 motors and its carbon edges are highlighted in purple to match the 2205 2300kV motors, and motor guards pre installed. The frame looks quite sturdy and capable of handling some impacts, the arms are 4mm and the body is well braced. The Xt60 and VTX antenna both pass through a rubber grommet in the top plate to protect the wiring. The ESCs are Eachine branded 20A Blheli-S 2-4S capable, and the VTX is a 48 channel 5G8 200mW. Wiring looks fairly neat and solder joints are nice an shiny.

Total weight without battery is a bit high @ 386 grams. The supplied battery puts it up to 540 grams.

It comes with Cleanflight installed out of the box on a F3 board, with angle mode engaged and motor stop on. So the first thing I changed was to engage motors once armed.

Please note, it does not include a buzzer. And motors have CW and CCW threads.

Test flight:

I had high hopes for this beginners craft, despite it being a little porky. It appears reasonably well assembled and has some aesthetic qualities in a package that is geared towards the beginner/intermediate pilot who may be on a budget. I was disappointed to find out that the included 3S 1500mAh @ 25C was poorly selected for this craft. With a set of 3 bladed cyclones the quad could barely hover let alone ascend with any speed. Hovering was at over 60% on the throttle and full throttle resulted in a slow, gradual climb more suited to a aerial photography drone. I went back into Cleanflight to double check the Tx was calibrated correctly, and sure enough it was hitting 2000 on the throttle channel. So out of the box with the battery provided I would say its nearly unflyable, with 5 inch three blade props anyway. Perhaps it would be marginally better with a tradition prop, but I doubt it.

As per our other guides, I usually take and test the Eachines new quads before I commit to buying them in bulk and recommending them to customers.

In some circumstances we buy them anyway and sell them as “SUPER UPGRADED” versions with the fixes complete as most people who are buying these quads are relatively new to the hobby and have no idea what they are doing.

You may be interested in my other reviews

Eachine Falcon 180 RTF Naze32
Eachine Racer 250
Eachine Blade 185 Guide
Eachine Falcon 250 STD

Is this ready to fly? NOPE!
If you are a beginner and you can’t follow the guide below, don’t buy this quad! If you are up the challenge of change settings below, you can then fly on Angle or Horizon Mode (auto stabilise) and learn to fly.

Issues

1. i6 Eachine transmitter has locked Bootloader by Default – Can’t change any settings
2. AUX 1 is set to Knob VRA and it does nothing.
3. AUX 2 is set to Knob VRB – AUX 2 Does Not Work!
4. Aerials aren’t mounted properly
5. OSD on same UART port – TX/RX pins need to be removed if you want to access cleanflight.
6. If you turn off dip switch 4 to 0 FC is no longer powered as it runs on the same 5/12v rail.
7. Comes with old Cleanflight 1.12 and nothing is setup at all
8. No Flight Modes set, only Acro Mode!
9. No Buzzer by default – you can add one if required!

Some other improvements they could make

• Use all CW caps on motors, not have them different
• Use proper locknuts for the motors
• Improve battery strap, it is not very strong at all.
• Change to PPM/SBUS receiver

The Solutions

1. To Change the Eaching i6 Transmitter settings, Hold the yaw trim to the right, the roll trim to the left and turn on the transmitter. You can then enter settings by holding down ok on the Transmitter
2. Part of solution 3
3. Now that you can enter the setup of i6, goto Functions Setup, Aux Channels, then change Chanel 5 to SwB and Channel 6 to Swc. Hold down Cancel to SAVE. Switches for modes and settings are way better than turning Knobs!
   On our AUX 2 We could not get it to work with this default setup from Eachine.
   
4. Get some Cable ties and heat shrink and mount the aerials facing upwards so there is no chance props can hit them. In default position they will get chopped by props straight away!
   Another method is just to place aerials inside the frame, however range won’t be as far.
   
5. On theSP RACING F3 version it seems the OSD is running on the same UART port as the FC. If you want to do step 7 and 8, it is required to disconnect it as per pictures.
   
6. I noticed that if you turn dip switch 4 off, it cuts all power to the naze32, so be sure not to do this if you are turning off your lights!
7. see step 8.
8. This last stage is quite a bit of work, but hang in there. We are going to upgrade to cleangflight 1.13 and then set it up correctly and configure the switches on your radio.
   

   Upgrade Eachine Falcon 210 Cleanflight

1. Remove Props from Quad.
2. Install the Cleanflight Configurator from the Chrome Web Store.
3. Download Latest cleanflight or Betaflight _NAZE.hex from release pages.
   For difference on Cleanflight vs Betaflight view this article.
4.  In Cleanflight Configuration, make sure you disconnect from your quad, then click the firmware flasher tab.
   
5. Click Load Firmware [Local]
6. Select file you downloaded from Step 3.
7. Select These options
   -Full chip erase.-Manual baud rate 256000.
8. Click Flash Firmware
9. You are now on Cleanflight/Betaflight!
10. Click Connect at the top right and if successful you should see your quad like this.
    MAKE SURE ORIENTATION IS CORRECT. I CHANGED MY YAW to -90 for SP RACING F3
    
11. You can check what version the chip is running by expanding the log
    
    
12. Place Quad on flat surface and under setup, click calibrate accelerometer.
13. Go to Configration tab
    Change minimum throttle to 1000
    Change Maximum throttle to 2000
    You can also turn blackbox off here if you do not require it, it will give the CPU less work if so.
    Save and reboot
    Your screen should look like this
    
14. Now we need to calibrate ESC,  go to the motor tab. remember, you should have removed props at the start, if you didn’t, DO THIS NOW.
    Unplug battery
    Click “I Understand the risks …….”
    Slide Master to MAX
    Plug in battery, wait till you have heard all different types of beeps.
    Slide Master to MIN
    ESC Calibration is now complete!
    Unplug battery, then plug in again. (power cycle it)
    Click on Master slide and slowing push up with your arrow until all motors come on (mine was 1097)
    If they come on at very different throttle inputs, redo your calibration!
15. Now go back to the Configuration tab
    Change minimum throttle to your number. eg. 1097
    Change Maximum throttle to 1900
    Save and reboot
16. Next go to the Failsafe tab
    Check you are happy with what the failsafe is. I like it to slowly land, others like it to drop. There is pros and cons to both. Research what you want 🙂
17. Next go to PID Tuning
    Change roll rate to 0.80
    Change pitch rate to 0.80
    Change YAW rate to 0.40
    TPA should be 0.20
    TPA breakpoint should be 1650
    You can up these rates more if you like. I personally fly on 0.9 for all three.
18. Now go to receiver tab, and check all your transmitter channels are correct.
19.  Since we changed the knobs to switches for AUX 1 , we can now move on to next section and setup the switches.
20. Go to The Modes Tab
    FYI, No mode selected = ACRO+ / Rate mode by default.
    Altitude mode = Angle Mode
    Rattitude  mode = Horizon ModeIn the below screenshot I have setup the following for my switches.SWC 1 = Angle
    SWC 2 = ACRO/RATE
    SWC 3 = Horizon
    
    If you are a more advanced Pilot, you may want to change SWB 2 to Airmode and still use the Yaw right, Yaw left to arm and disarm.
21. Give it a test flight! Make sure you are open space in case you missed a step and it crashes.

This guide is designed to walk you through flashing MWOSD software to any OSD board, or update to a newer version.

There are many ways of configuring your inbuilt OSD and many different variations of the software you can use. It is compatible with Multiwii software intended for Minim OSD, which comes as a standalone chip. With it integrated into the flight controller you are able to minimise your wiring and layout, and monitor all sorts of details from your craft. Specific versions allow for direct links to Cleanflight, using data from the FC itself to minimise connections. It also allows for customising the look of your OSD including layout, features and fonts used for display.

This tutorial will cover the reflashing and setup of the OSD part of the FC. The FC itself is setup as normal. Note that the OSD is not configurable via USB connector. This is reserved for FC configuration. There is also a switch on the FC itself, this switch must be off if one wishes to configure the FC via USB as the USB and OSD share the same UART port. If you have unusual sluggish behaviour or inability to connect via PC the chances are the switch is on and must be switched off. Inversely, if you are ready for flight but have no video feed you may have forgotten to switch the OSD back on after configuring via Cleanflight/Betaflight/Raceflight, assuming your setup is correct.

For simplicity we will only look at a few vital features here. You can experiment at your leisure with some of the more advanced ones.

Components needed:

F1/F3 + OSD FC

FTDI adaptor and cable for connection to PC

Pin headers

Arduino and MWOSD software.

Your first step is to find the correct perforations on your flight controller that allow you to customise your OSD. They are marked:

DTR/Tx/Rx/5V/GND/GND

They can be seen on the F1 below the USB connector, and near the switch on the F3. The F3s ports are marked on the underside, and it would seem the Tx/Rx markings are reversed, depending on your perspective of things. Regardless, if you hook up Tx/Rx wrong you should get sync issues and not be able to flash it correctly, so if you are having issues look at this first.

These pins are also mirrored on the FTDI adaptor, which can come in many different forms. Here is the one Ill be using. Its important to check that it is configured for 5v operation if you intend to power the OSD off the FTDI during the programming process. This one has a switch for 3.3v or 5v near the USB port.

You will also see a pin labeled CTS, it is not needed in this instance. The pins should line up for direct connect, minus this CTS, so you can use single/double dupont connectors (servo) to match each pin to its counterpart on the FC. If you dont want to solder pins into the FC you can use a row of header pins and just hold them in place on the FC for the next few steps. If you ever need to reflash or reconfigure you will need them again, so keep a set aside for this purpose.

SOFTWARE:

Download and install Arduino and familiarise yourself with the basics.

Download  Scarab OSD. Match the pins up via your temporary wiring harness.

Once connected you need to open the Arduino file found inside the Scarab OSD folder called MW_OSD and check some of the settings on the Config.H tab.

There is alot of parameters you can change here but everything should be set how we need it by default. Double check #define CLEANFLIGHT is chosen.

Under the Tools/Board menu in Arduino check that Arduin pro or Pro mini 5v/16 MHz ATmega328 is selected and that you are on the right port.

Now hit upload in the top left hand corner of arduino. It should start compiling and then upload. If you have any errors check that your ports are correct and that TX/RX is connected the right way.

Once this is complete you can close down arduino and open up MW_OSD_GUI. You should see your available COM port, select it and hit READ.

Select your FONT first and write it to the board. Once this is done you can pick and adjust all your display options. Make sure you select USE FC MAIN VOLTAGE for voltage display, this will use the voltage reading from Cleanflight, assuming you have connected Vbatt.

Make sure you have written any changes and thats it. Your OSD is now ready to use.

Kombini Flight Controller is a FC and PDB all in one. I was given a sample to review and below will be my build log and initial flight experience.

TL;DR This is am amazing FC, a little fiddly to wire together, but the space saving offered by this means even the the smallest of frames are easy to build.

Unlike any other current brushed Flight Controller, the Komobin is the first to bring to market a FC + PDB all in one and can handle 150A of current @ 5s (18.5V). Based on the very latest F3 chip processor this FC can be loaded with CleanFlight or BetaFlight.

Features & Capabilities:

• Latest Generation F3 Processor Chip
• Simplicity Defined with Built In PDB
• Massive 150A PDB Current Protection
• 5S 18.5V Ready
• Ultra Compact Design for Ease of Installation
• Gold Plated Pads for the Very Best Connectivity
• Heavy Duty 2A BEC @ 5V Output
• Firmware Perfection via CleanFlight & BetaFlight
• BLHeli Pass Through Setup
• Compact Sizing w/ 30.5mm x 30.5mm Mounting Holes
• Sbus Ready w/ Built In Inverter
• Included Spektrum Satellite Port
• FrSky Telemetry, Ready & Waiting
• Full USB Support
• Built In Buzzer
• Mounting Simplicity via 3mm Screws

The initial concept of a PDB+FC all in one was great to me, until I head the FC in my hand and realised how precise my soldering will have to be. I was lucky enough to be able to use Phasers as my workshop to put this into an existing quad. First up was to add the XT60 power cord, which I needed to shave down a little so it would fit on the pads without shorting.

Pro Tip: ALWAYS use a multimeter to ensure you have not bridged your positive and earth BEFORE plugging in a Lipo

Once the power cord was added and tested I soldered up the RX, FrSky XSR w/ CPPM and SPort (for Telemetry). You can refer to the wiring diagram further below, please note that in order to get Telemetry working you will need to bridge the RX and TX of UART2 then connect your SPORT to either as they are bridged.

Once the RX was added and tested all that was needed was to solder the ESC’s to the board, only the signal wire is required as the FC shares earth from the ESC power cords. I decided to solder all 4 ESC signal wire earth together in case I needed them for a future build. No need for VBAT or power for the FC as it has its own built in BEC to provide 5A

The only issue I had with the Kombini was the built in Buzzer didn’t work for me, RCGroups forum is also a little confused as the FC description has both “Built in Buzzer” and “Buzzer Port”. All I know is once I connected a external buzzer to the Buzzer port, it works perfect.

Here is the maiden DVR, note that there was 40KM/h winds on the day:

And here is the DVR from a NSW Multi-Rotor Club Fun Fly day:

Full Wiring Diagram:

Written by KaosFPV

Matthew Evans did a great job with working out how to setup the Tiny Whoop with Orange Module 1.2

This page serves to be a complete guide with screenshots with every page on Taranis.

If you are having troubles the key points is this:

• Set Orange Module so that it flashing ONCE.
• If no throttle, power cycle quad and lift throttle up then down then up again and then repeat if nothing happens.
• If still not having any luck, you may be missing a setting. Download my EEPE and load it here.

Complete Guide – Tiny Whoop Taranis Orange Module 1.2 Setup

1. Screen 2/12 – Set a name, then turn internal RF OFF, external RF to PPM and ch1-12 
2. Page 5/12 – The key is to setting SH to ch 5 so you cna flick the switch to switch between self level and ACRO mode.
   
3. Page 6/12 – Set as per screenshot
   
4. Page 7/12 – Set as per screenshot
   
5. Now if you have done all the above, your orange module like below should be turned on. Push the Bind button three times (slowly) and it should change mode and blink once every 1 second.
   Once its blinking in the correct mode, turn off your Taranis, hold the bind button, and turn on taranis and keep holding bind until the quads lights stop flashing. You are now bound!If no throttle, power cycle quad and lift throttle up then down then up again and then repeat if nothing happens.

   

Please note this guide is updated regularly – Last Updated 8th April 2016
If you follow this guide and want to add or contribute to pictures/guide, please contact us.

This guide is a combination of “Setting up Eachine Racer 250 With I6 Flysky Receiver” and “Convert Eachine Racer 250 CC3D from Openpilot to Cleanflight”

Guide ONE – Setup drone with Transmitter

First you will need to un-box your drone and your controller.

Take out these cables from your drones small bag of cables. Continue reading “Setting Up Eachine Racer 250 With i6 Transmitter Then Flashing Cleanflight/Betaflight” »

We received our Samsung 950’s today and I tried to do a clean install of Windows 8 (My person windows license is that) and it could not find the drive at all. Luckily after an hour of searching someone had put up the driver so you can load it at the windows installation and browse to it and VOILA! It works 🙂

DOWNLOAD HERE – 32/64bit Samsung NVMe Driver v1.4.7.16 WHQL

SOURCE: http://www.win-raid.com/t29f25-Recommended-AHCI-RAID-and-NVMe-Drivers.html#msg25

I then upgrade to windows 10, installed the samsung 950 Driver from website and all is sweet.

My computer specs

MSI X99a Gaming 7
5820k
512gb Samsung 950 Pro