I just went and got some M6 Nylock nuts. Doesn't really matter if you have a nice spinner on the end.
Especially if you are upside down.
That's all they use on race quads and they are taking the entire pressure of the torque, without letting go.
These DJI style have the pressure of the torque held by the keyed section on the shaft. All the spinner nuts are doing are holding them down.

I use plumbers thread tape or nyloc nuts and do the nuts up as tight as I can. Haven't lost a prop yet due to nuts coming loose.

Thanks for the nyloc tip. Sometimes it is the simplistic things that go the distance. I think a large part of the problem running those spinners is that the added mass just has too much inertia that you hit the reverse thrust the forward momentum holds that spinner in place just enough to abrubtly let the shaft unspin . With conventional multirotor motors we have left and right handed motors with the threads reversed against torque to work in our favor. Not going to help here because when you reverse direction everything changes. However there is one nice feature running spinners on this machine. It is the ability to land inverted or to rest the craft upside down. In otherwords the pointy 'er the better a bearing surface to support the craft inverted. But the friction of the spinner running on the point similiar to a top also can create drag enough to unwind it from the shafts of the motors. Of course if we run the nylocs the exposed top of the shafts can also spin on the ground , not the perfect point but small enough a bearing surface with the added bonus that if ya do it enough you dont have to worry bout those nuts coming loose once ya tear up the threads. L.O.L.
BTW... I am going to try some nylocs . Better than every other time I reverse midflight i lose a prop.

I've been looking into INAV with a flight controller with Mag, Baro and adding my GPS module.
The Chaotic is really big enough to make a reconnaissance drone with waypoint mapping, return to home autolaunch etc.; with the added bonus of not costing $1000+.
I think I will go this way. I can do without the 3D for now. I have a 250 race class drone for ripping around. I just needed a bigger and slower platform for video.
Looking forward to having a play with waypoint autopilot.

It would be a lot faster than a Phantom so I'll bet it would work great. Just wouldn't have the super stable video from the gimbal.

Originally Posted by XionUAV

It would be a lot faster than a Phantom so I'll bet it would work great. Just wouldn't have the super stable video from the gimbal.

Has anyone ever tried to hook a head tracker to a gimbal setup for steering so turning your head left,right,up,down steers the camera and the copter follows the camera? You could switch your radio so that when in head track mode, the yaw still works, roll is limited and works like strafe in video games, pitch becomes forward and back, throttle becomes climb and descend. Video would remain level with the horizon and the copter would allow you to look around and only move when you input.

I need to do some homework. This would be so easy to fly that my wife could do it.

Originally Posted by dougroundup

Thanks for the nyloc tip. Sometimes it is the simplistic things that go the distance. I think a large part of the problem running those spinners is that the added mass just has too much inertia that you hit the reverse thrust the forward momentum holds that spinner in place just enough to abrubtly let the shaft unspin . With conventional multirotor motors we have left and right handed motors with the threads reversed against torque to work in our favor. Not going to help here because when you reverse direction everything changes. However there is one nice feature running spinners on this machine. It is the ability to land inverted or to rest the craft upside down. In otherwords the pointy 'er the better a bearing surface to support the craft inverted. But the friction of the spinner running on the point similiar to a top also can create drag enough to unwind it from the shafts of the motors. Of course if we run the nylocs the exposed top of the shafts can also spin on the ground , not the perfect point but small enough a bearing surface with the added bonus that if ya do it enough you dont have to worry bout those nuts coming loose once ya tear up the threads. L.O.L.
BTW... I am going to try some nylocs . Better than every other time I reverse midflight i lose a prop.

Another alternative is a normal nut (or nyloc) and use the spinner as a lock nut against the first nut if the thread is long enough.

Originally Posted by 2fat2fly

Has anyone ever tried to hook a head tracker to a gimbal setup for steering so turning your head left,right,up,down steers the camera and the copter follows the camera?

That would definitely be an interesting experiment.

Took one of the Chaotics out for a fly yesterday, this one has brand new Cobra motors and had brand new Leap 450 props fitted. Unfortunately the Leap 450 props did not cut the mustard on 4S battery. First punch out, about 3 seconds into flight, and one of the props broke and the chaotic came tumbling out the sky.
The Leap 450 props are very flexible and not up to the power on 4S. Even if you can get some Leap 450 Props you would be wasting your cash, so don't bother.

Yeah man these Chaotic birds have alot of potential for so many things. Just an incredible deal at 60.00 pnp! I am waiting for two more! The thing that makes this such a great deal is that its so complete. Otherwise there are many different flavors of 450 frames avail. I have a very similar frame collecting dust. I was thinking I might give inav a try. Just need to figure what FC would be a likely choice maybe a REVO? I dunno? getting off topic ..... I Like the jam nut on the spinner idea too.
Ya kow what keeps me from pushing the limit on this quad is the difficulty of replacing the props and the avail parts. I am getting collection of inexpensive craft but they are too difficult to replace because of stoopid availability and not so much the initial cost. I am not sure where to find a good locally and/or easily avail prop for the chaotic. I have two more chaotic packages on the way. One is spoken for by my coworker for his son, the other is going to be my only spare. I know I can never replace for the price I paid! However I see that HK does still offer an RTF bundle for $78 but no free shipping. I believe that they will be discontinued as is the Madcow FC, Is this indeed correct?

I believe that they will be discontinued as is the Madcow FC, Is this indeed correct?

It would have to be as they are not doing the mad cow. It's a shame they didn't just revisit and create a Madcow-2, change the Giro chipset and keep the software that allows stable mode inverted. I don't think anyone else offers this yet.

I wonder what the Madcow is actually based on? Knowing Hobby King they surely borrowed the basics from somewhere. Has anyone tried to reflash one of these controllers or open one up to compare with the topology of other boards? It be interesting to hookup to say Cleanflight and see if gets recognized?

I bought several of these when they were 60$ and they are fantastic quads if used properly. Just a couple things I have done you might want to try. I bought a cheap f330 race frame on eBay and moved all the electronic including flight controller to this lighter ,smaller frame. It flies great right of the bat and is considerably faster and more agile. Also try xk x350 props that also can be found on eBay they are reversible and more efficient. One more thing if you are trying to learn inverted flight and like me crashed them into ground full throttle with motors going wrong way I found a simple soulution to avoid crashes. I moved my flap channel to my gear channel and only use two flight modes the sport and 3 d modes you really don't need beginner mode anyway. So the flaps are set to 0 and 100 and then assigned to gear channel. Then I have it set so forward is 3D and down is sport mode. Then when I flip it to 3D I keep my finger on it if I get into trouble I just flip it down and it immediately goes level even if screaming towards ground

Not a bad idea. I have a couple of these 330 Alien frames that are getting built out with 2208 1800kv and 2000kv motors that will use 6" props. Just did a mock-up with the 8" props and they clear with about an inch between them. These Alien frames are pretty nice as well considering they're as low as $11 shipped for the ones with red front arms and about $16 for the ones with all black arms.

The problems I see are the Chaotic ESC's are huge and will look really bulky on this frame. I'm using the cube ESC's for my Alien builds just to keep them clean, with regular ESC's on the 500mm builds since the frames and arms are much larger. Also, since the Madcow pins are on top, placing the controller on top of the frame may be the only option for clearance issues. But then it won't be protected. Or if the pins could be moved horizontal or shorter pins used, I suppose a top battery, middle FC and bottom ESC's could be done.

Not sure it would be worth the trouble for most of us, but it's definitely an interesting idea.

Do you have some pics of yours?

Originally Posted by dougroundup

I wonder what the Madcow is actually based on? Knowing Hobby King they surely borrowed the basics from somewhere. Has anyone tried to reflash one of these controllers or open one up to compare with the topology of other boards? It be interesting to hookup to say Cleanflight and see if gets recognized?

Good idea, I might give it a try and see as I was considering swapping it out for another till I could fly properly, might have some coin