Tough Tilt Tricopter Build

When we released the Electrohub we always had a Tricopter setup in mind. We just needed one more piece to put the puzzle together and that was the Tough Tilt.

Now that it's here, we can finally make that dream a reality! If you are interested in living that dream with us, grab yourself a kit and follow along. 

Another HUGE win for us here is that we can finally offer electronics packs directly from our store! 

When you are picking up your kit you can add the Power Pack from the same page. Don't forget your tail servo!

Once you have everything in order we can begin!

First we will assemble the Tough Tilt.

The Tough Tilt comes in three pieces: the base, the motor mount, and the pin.

Grab those pieces along with your tail servo. 

The servo arm looks like a small X but we only need one of the arms. Use some snips to remove any three. 

This will allow the servo arm to slide into the motor mount of the Tough Tilt. Do a quick test fit, and more than likely it will be too big to fit correctly.

Sand down the edges until it slides in easily. 

Once you get a nice fit we are going to lock it down. 

Drill a pilot hole through the farthest hole from the tip. 

Next trim down the securing screw. You DO NOT want this screw to be sticking out of the exit hole because it will catch on the base and cause binding once it's all together. 

Before you lock down the servo arm make sure to sandwith the servo screw between the arm and the mount with the threads showing. This is how you secure the servo to the mount.

Now you can secure the arm down with that trimmed screw. Again, double check that it's not poking out the exit but still secured well. 

When we eventually have the servo sitting in the base it needs to be flush. 

Trim off one of the mounting tabs and sand it flat. 

Before you mount make sure you also center your servo. If you need a cheap servo tester you can pick one up from our store!

Next insert the splines of the motor into the servo arm. Thread a screwdriver through the opposite end of the mount and tighten it down. 

There will be a tiny bit of the servo arm sticking up. You can trim that right off. 

Now we're going to attach the motor to the motor mount. This is pretty self explanitory. Just match the screw holes up and tighten down.

Be aware not to over tighten because this can shove the screw up into the motor itself and make for an unhappy tail motor!

This step is optional but if you would like to screw in the Tough Tilt base to the tail boom you should do that now. Make the end flush to the end of the boom.

This is just an aesthetic thing if you don't want to zip-tie the Tough Tilt. 

Last step for the Tough Tilt is to secure the motor mount to the base by threading the pin through both pieces and using a screwdriver to secure it in place!

Next we can start to work on the frame!

We will need to drill some pilot holes for the booms. Drill the first hole about 1/2 inch (1.27 cm) from the end of the boom and as close to the center as you can. Do this to all three booms. 

Thread a screw through the bottom plate of the Electrohub (the bottom plate has the power distribution pads) to help you find where to drill the second pilot hole. The photo above should help you for the tail boom. 

The holes to mount the front booms will be the closest to the larger holes as you can see in the example. Don't be fooled and measure the ones in the middle!

Then drill the additional pilot holes for the other two booms and thread screws through everything to friction fit it into place. 

You'll end up with something that looks like this!

Now we can mount the motors. For the two front motors we will be using the mounting discs. You'll make a nice sandwich that will look like:

MOTOR

disc

BOOM

disc

Secure this sandwich with two screws and repeat on the other front boom. 

The last motor to mount is the Tough Tilt itself!

If you didn't already bolt down the Tough Tilt here is where you will zip-tie it down to the tail boom. Two smaller zip ties towards the front and a larger zip tie in the back. 

Next we can hook up the E.S.C.s. 

The edge of the PCB board the Electrohub is cut from can sometimes bully wire casing. Thread the black wire under, then up through the larger hole to prevent it from rubbing against the edge over time. 

Trim the E.S.C. wires so they solder nice and clean to the power distribution plates. 

RED = Positive (+)

BLACK = Negative (-)

Don't do this backwards or you'll see some magic smoke when you power this up!

If you've never soldered before, check our Soldering Battery Connectors episode for some tips!

Repeat this for all 3 E.S.C.s. 

While the soldering tool is nice and hot we will also attach the battery connector. 

Again, make sure you are putting RED to positive (+) and BLACK to negative (-). 

While shooting the video we actually forgot to do this step :(

If you're wondering why the battery connector is unreasonably absent from the rest of the build pictures, it's because we're only humans. 

If you are interested in building the Dragonfly setup Josh flew in the review video you'll want to do that now.

All you'll need is two extra booms, motors, E.S.C.s, and Y-connectors. 

Mount the two extra booms 90° to the tail. The booms and E.S.C.s are all secured the exact same way as the others. 

When making your connections, attach the right two motors with a Y-connector and the same with the left just as you see above. 

The only really quirky thing is these additional motors are mounted upside down. This way the props don't collide with the upright motors and still provide additional power and control because of their position on the CG (Center of Gravity). 

This setup is totally optional but worth the little bit of extra work! 

Wether you are now working on the Tricopter setup or the Dragon fly setup the remainder of the steps will be the same. 

To mount the top plate, run all your connection wires up through the center hole and line up the screws. 

Make sure you check to see if any of the wires are being pinched by the booms and the top plate. Needless to say, this is bad!

Once everything is sitting well, secure the whole assembly with nuts. 

Now we can mount the flight control board. Eric designed this awesome little platform for it to rest on. There will be some foam tape in your kit and this will do two things. It will help raise the platform a little more so you can tuck all your wires nice and neat underneath and it also provides a bit of vibration dampening. 

Cut a piece to stick the board to the wood and two smaller pieces for the "feet" that will stick to the Electrohub. 

We trust the tape to hold and we are merely using the screws you see above for alignment. You can bolt this down if you wish. 

All flight control boards are different and make sure you check your user manual for this step, but now you will connect your E.S.C. wires to the control board.

We are using the Naze 32 for this build, and if you want to see exactly how we set this up for our Tricopter you can watch our Naze 32 Board Setup episode. 

The last bit of electronics to hook up is the receiver. Here we are using a breakout cable to make the connections super simple. 

The landing gear can be zip-tied on at this point. If you look at the picture you can see they are tied so the connections from the motor to the E.S.C. are still loose. More on that later. 

The antennas should always be at a 90° from each other to give you max reception. We taped one towards the front and, you can't see it here but, the other is routed straight down out of one of the small holes in the Electrohub. 

To hold our battery we will thread two pieces of velcro through the larger holes towards the front and back. 

These will strong arm the battery nice and tight to the Tricopter. The battery is what will ultimately determine your CG so if your Tricopter seems off balance, adjust your battery. 

We are using a 2200mAh 3S battery but you can go up to a 3000mAh 4S. 

Depending on your control board you will need to follow unique procedures to get your radio imputing the proper controls. Again check out the Naze 32 Board Setup episode for more.

We are almost there! The last step is to make sure our connections are working properly. Plug in your battery and put some kind of marker on your motor that will help you see which way it's spinning. You can make a little flag out of tape, a piece of paper, or a little leftover plastic bag. 

DO NOT DO THIS STEP WITH YOUR PROPS ON!

Nothing ruins a build faster than a surprise trip to the emergency room!

The cool thing about tricopters is they can fly with the motors spinning conventionally (all counter-clockwise).

Secure the props to the motors ONLY AFTER you have all the motors spinning the correct way and you're ready to take it outside. 

As far as tuning your P.I.D. settings for our builds, we are trying something a little new.

At the writing of this article it is still under development but we will soon be launching a new page on the site called Setups. 

You'll be able to find it at flitetest.com/setups and it will contain the settings that are important to get the best performance out of our multirotors and matched electronics. 

We hope that you enjoy your Tricopter setup!

If you are a beginner and nervous about your first flight, have no fear! You can check out the How To Fly a Multirotor episode and Alex has your back! 

If you guys have any questions, concerns, jokes, or strong opinions about why tri's are better/worse/the best/the worst multirotors, we want to hear from you! Be sure to leave a comment below.

LINKS

• Electrohub Tricopter Kit
• Tough Tilt
• Tough Tilt Review
• Power Packs
• Naze 32 Board Setup
• Soldering Tips