Good day everyone and welcome back to TMac FPV-YOUR home for YOUR Journey to
Better FPV Fun, Flights and Racing Stuff! In today's video, we're gonna show you
how to keep this from happening to you.
And on another occasion with a different quad while filming our FPV Drone Lake video,
which you can check out through the link up above, I was receiving low signal
warnings on my Taranas while over water a couple hundred meters from shore.
And most recently while we were filming our Smooth Micro FPV Drone HD video, I
was receiving signal critical warnings on my Taranas while flying through the
trees.
These particular instances of low, critical, and lost radio control signals
somewhat inspired me to research the use of a 900 megahertz system as opposed to
the standard 2.4 gigahertz system. Here's what we found out. So, taking a look at
the pros, cons, and the science behind these two bands, 900 megahertz and 2.4
gigahertz, we find for the same given power output and receiver sensitivity-
using the same antenna gain on both sides factored in-the 900 megahertz band
has 2.67 times more range than the 2.4 gigahertz or another way of
putting it that 2.4 gigahertz has 8.5dB more path loss than the
900 megahertz for the same distance. In addition to the 900 megahertz having
2.67 times more range, it also will propagate through
obstructions more than the 2.4 gigahertz signals-a LOT more by the way!
Obstructions being things that you would fly in and around like trees, buildings
etc One con for the 900 megahertz band is that those signals require bigger
antenna, have lower data rates, and outside the U.S. are highly regulated. So
are these things enough for me to make the switch to 900 megahertz over 2.4
gigahertz? Well, the only other thing I would consider is cost and after
considering cost the answer is "Uh, yeah!" So we have two 900 megahertz systems
available for us-one is the FrSky R9M module that comes with antenna and also
a receiver with the antenna attached to it for $49.99. You can also get the
receiver with an antenna attached to it sold separately for $19.99 each which is
comparable to the FrSky R-XSR receiver which is what I've been using in the
past with telemetry. Or, you can get the TBS Crossfire module with the antenna for
it for $208.99 (USD). You'll still need to get another receiver for
your quadcopter. In this case the Nano receiver, which is the lowest cost
receiver for this at $29.99, but that nano receiver doesn't come with
an antenna attached to it so you need to get the immortal T antenna for an
additional $5.95 (USD). So, a receiver and antenna to go on the receiver comes in
at $36 (USD) as compared to 20 for the R9 system and you can get the module and
antenna for $209 (USD) whereas over here you get the entire package for $50 (USD). So, which
of these two systems do you think I went with? Well, I thought long and hard about
it- actually I didn't-I went with the R9
system. The link to the R9 module complete system with the receiver and
antenna included in the package from Ready-Made
RC or RMRC is in the link in the video description below. So, to connect the
module with the antenna to your Taranis just pull the panel off the
back of the Taranis. There's some pins down here that the module connects to- be
careful not to bend the pins.
It's that simple! After you flash both the module and your receiver with the
same updated firmware, keep in mind the firmware on both the receiver and the
module has to be the same (version) in order for them to communicate properly, then you
can go to your model
and under internal RF you want to change the mode from ON to OFF (or D16, D8
whatever it's on to OFF). We want to change that to off and then under
external RF you want to change it to R9M and in my case it's the FCC version.
Then you just go ahead and bind it to your receiver. Once again, after both the
firmware of the module and the receiver have been updated to the same version,
just bind it to your receiver in the normal way you would any other receiver.
You can set the RF power to 10, 100, 500, and can you hear the buzzing when I set
it to 500?,
or Auto which is less than or equal to one watt-and you can obviously hear the
buzzing now now. What this "Auto <=1 watt" means is its adaptive.
So, it will go up to 1 watt depending on the conditions which which it's
experiencing with regards to RSSI and other factors. It won't exceed 1 watt
but it may actually be transmitting at a lower transmitting power than 1 watt.
I'm going to put it back on 100mW.
And really that's all there is to it. Update the firmware on both the module
and your receiver, change those settings in your transmitter, and then bind the
receiver to the module just as you would any other receiver and you're good to go!
And here's the R9mm receiver with attached antenna that comes with the R9M
module in that package or you can get the receiver and antenna that you see
here separately for $19.99 (USD). I've included a penny for size comparison and I'll
stick my fat thumb in there as a comparison to my thumb. Very tiny, in fact, it
appears to be smaller than the R-XSR receiver that I've been using. All's you
have to do is hook this receiver up the same way you would with the XM+ or
the R-XSR receiver and bind it in the same manner except in this case to your
R9M module. Alright, let's go ahead and take a look at the performance of the
R9M module and this receiver on a quad. And we're gonna be using the same flight
path as we did in the woods that you saw earlier so that you can make a comparison
with the RSSI of the R9M module and this receiver compared to the previous signal
critical of 32 RSSI. Before we get to our flight I wanted to show the installation
of the antenna on the quadcopter. I just zip-tied it with a couple zip
ties to the arm. What you want to do is keep the antenna as far away from the
carbon fiber as possible. Of course, on a micro quad that's sort of difficult to
do. You also want to keep these at 180 degrees from each other or, in other
words, in a straight line. You don't want to bend one 90 degrees to another.
This configuration here as well as a bunch of other tips are in a document
developed by an individual named Justin Kramer.
It's the R9M User Guide and frequently asked questions. It's a very valuable
document and I've put the link to it in the video description below for those of
you that are interested in grabbing that. And one more thing before we get to our
flight. Our Comment of the Week is from KwadLife! "Super interesting content! Got
hooked! Keep up flying man!" Well, KwadLife, glad
you got hooked! Welcome aboard the TMac FPV Team and
we're gonna do some flying right now KwadLife, It's Fly Time! A few things to
keep in mind for this flight. This is video footage of the Caddx Tarsier FPV
camera NOT the HD camera. So it should give you a good idea of what the FPV
camera video looks like. Secondly, I've set the R9M module power output to 100
milliwatts which is comparable to the output power of the stock/standard
Taranis without the R9M module so that should give you a good comparison as
well. Keep an eye on the RSSI value in the upper right hand corner of the
screen and when we get to the point in the flight where we were in the video
you saw previously with the signal critical value RSSI of 32, I'm gonna go
ahead and freeze this video and show you what the RSSI is at that same point in
comparison with a 32 RSSI before we continue on with our flight, land on the
beach, and take a look at our post-flight statistics for the minimum RSSI value
which occurred throughout the entire flight. Let's get started.
We hope you found this video useful. Give it a thumbs up if you liked it, make sure
and share it with your friends! If you know somebody that's interested in
getting started with FPV, have them check out our Fast Track FPV Course as their
Clear Flight Path to FPV Fun! Thanks for your time! We'll see in the next video.
Clear Skies friend!