This is my first time getting into RC, excluding the cheap $15-$50 hubsan mini quad copters and the like.

Even though there's a really detailed list https://oscarliang.com/250-mini-quad-part-list-fpv , there doesn't seem to be a lot of direction for new beginners. Do I just pick the cheapest FC, chassis, motor + battery etc. ?

There seems to be a lot of kits out there ready to be assembled but it looks like the general advice is to buy the cheapest kit then after learning how it all works, go out and buy ANOTHER set of parts that I feel is appropriate to what I want; so I'm trying to avoid doing that if possible. Are there any kits out there which is scalable/heavily upgradable? (if that makes sense)

Ultimately I'm trying to build a UAV with the pixhawk (that I already have). http://ardupilot.org/copter/docs/common-...k-overview but in the mean time I'd like to get a quadcopter up and running with that Sony FPV camera and probably a 6CH+ transmitter

For us to give you advice you need to ask us for help with more info. Hopefully InfoFpv will make up a list of " Information required" in the future.
(1) price range  ;  "Cheap as possible " , answered
(2) Upgradable ; Yes or No         "Yes"  , answered
(3) Size            ;                        " 250", answered
(3) radio           ;               " 6 channel", answered
(4) FPV             ;               " Yes "        , answered
(5)  Racing or fun        ?
(6) skill level    ;                  " beginner", answered
(7) battery       ;   3s, 4s , 6s. Pixhawk UAV would be most likely 3s or 6s for efficiancy /runtime. Most mini quads run 4s. Budget persons would like to use the same batteries on different quads, So that means, you will probably pick 3 cell and run them in parallel or series on your pixhawk quad. I GUESS 3cell
(8) What Items do you have now. Pixhawk
(9) FPV or no FPV ;  FPV                      , answered
( 10 ) do you have goggles :      no        , answered



For Budget and repair reasons I recommend a QAV180 quad clone $18 . With 1 modification the main frame is almost indestructible. you will run 4" DAL tri props , being a light build your props will survive allot of crashes. It comes with 6 standoffs , buy another 2 and put them in, or the top plate will break.
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/180-180mm-Ful...Sw3YNXY8CS
Standoff 35mm  (10pack )
http://www.banggood.com/10pcs-M3-Round-A...14732.html

ESC ; LittleBee 20a. good value, BULLETPROOF, will handle race motors on 4s easily, Flash through FC , no need to spend money on flashing tools. The 30a are overpriced and the 20a will do you fine.
http://www.banggood.com/4X-FVT-LittleBee...31934.html

Props DAL 4040tri. They are cheap , resilient  and well respected, buy allot of them, 10 packets + .
http://www.surveilzone.com/2-Pairs-Tri-b...ing-g-1529

Transmitter ; Everyone will say "TARANIS", I say "FlySKY I6". Taranis is $300+, ,Flysky is $70. The range for a FlySky I6 is 1km + when using a long range receiver. The 6channel Transmitter can be flashed to 10ch in 2 minutes and a $10 cable. I prefer a FlySky I6 over my Turnigy 9X, The menu on the 9x is terrible, You cant use all the switches on the 9x unless you buy upgrades/mods, If you buy aftermarket modules and bits , you end up with a poor mans Taranis, If you are technically and computer minded then the Turnigy 9X is worth looking at.
http://www.banggood.com/FlySky-FS-i6-2_4...83537.html

Motors this is something I have bought cheap and regretted every time , Cheap motors are unbalance , vibrate , bearings wear out quicker, less power less runtime , just don't buy nasty motors. DYS MR2205 2700kv. Good motors great price , under $20 each and will last a long time . These are not the latest SE motors , but the spec are close enough not to care. All my DYS motors have been excent .
http://www.banggood.com/4XDYS-MR2205-270...47408.html

FC ; Naze 32 rev5 6dof, works brilliant , and you can flash your LittlBees through it. Rev 6 had some problems , 6dof is all you need , 10 dof is for RTL that Cleanflight dosen't support.
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Afro-Flight-N...SwmtJXaln0

Power distrabution boards (PDB) . $5 to $10. OSD PDB $25+

VTX ; Eachine 200mw, This gets a nice range 300m, small, cheap easy to use. Ive used over 10 of these and they have all worked perfect and suvived allot, allot of crashes.
http://www.banggood.com/Eachine-ET200-5_...72618.html

Camera . The standard is a HS1777, about $50. I have recently upgraded to this camera and have returned most of them as faulty , there is some design flaws in them, CCD and crystals coming loose. I recommend this one for your first camera untill the HS1177 problems are sorted.Check you voltages. Don't just colour match the wires , many have done this and failed.
http://www.gearbest.com/multi-rotor-part...76499.html

Batteries . Hobbyking Turnigy are good value
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store...ouse_.html

Goggles ;Fatshark , skyzone, Headplay , quanums.... Banggood has another 10 different ones listed. Look at the resolution , price , reviews. Ask some people that are using them what they think, and make a informed decision for what you want . I use my HeadPlays and sit back and enjoy the marvellous view. I tried FatSharks , not for me .

All these items are good value mid range and can be transfered to another build.

When your building and run into problems , take some pictures or videos and post them with your question.

In a way your question is one that I should have asked before starting my build.  Take a look at the thread as I've tried to include some of my "mental logic" in the posts too (http://intofpv.com/t-my-first-build-cheap250).

The problem with jumping into a "buy the cheapest" idea is that you can end up buying twice - coming up short on all the parts to make things work neatly etc.  At the same time if you are already comfortable shopping online through low-cost suppliers like Banggood, HobbyKing or AliExpress etc you're going to have so much choice and a lot of repeated terms and descriptions for this that are different.

This can be as simple as "250" means anything between 200 and 270mm, and whatever prefixes is more of an indication of the design type.  Honestly this is what really really makes it confusing.  A ZMR250 frame can be 10 different things depending on who/where you buy it.  

My build is basically outdated, cheap, bargain bin parts - it'll be fun, it'll fly, it'll teach me a an awful lot - but I'm in 2014 level and a lot of from users (not here thankfully) simply think that anything outside the current gear is only good for the bin.  In hindsight I would buy some different things, but I'd have to have spent more $$ for what would end up much the same result.

--

As second thought is the amount of supporting parts and stuff you will need.  Buying a complete kit may give you all/most of the parts but you'll still probably be wanting stuff.  I've bought gear to program my (old school) flight controller, an Arduino board to program my ESCs, a few packs of spare connectors and extra wiring just to make things "neat".  

Then there's the extra nylon stand-offs, screws and nuts.  The tube of Loctite and so on.  No one tells you about these things but budget for that too...

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Lastly the advice on forums like this is great but you'll need to balance between what you want versus the advice from people who are a lot of builds ahead of you.  Sometimes the advice will save you buying twice, other times it may inadvertently lead you down and adventure of complex learning that you may not really need to have fun.

There are many options for PDB's out there, but I've been quite happy with my Matek board. It allows me to connect all of my equipment together and provides filtered 5v and 12v to where it is needed.

This is the board I am currently using.
http://www.banggood.com/Matek-Mini-Power...05549.html

This board has just come out and has a built in OSD there are currently no reviews for this though.
http://www.banggood.com/Realacc-HUBOSD-E...68098.html

These fit within the budget aspect of the build as well. Other boards, at the higher end of the market, include the DemonRC PDB and the RROSD.

A Pixhawk may be more suited to a 450 frame rather than a racer.

Thanks for all the suggestions. At least now I have a heading on what to get.

Quote:For us to give you advice you need to ask us for help with more info. Hopefully InfoFpv will make up a list of " Information required" in the future.
(1) price range ; "Cheap as possible " , answered
(2) Upgradable ; Yes or No "Yes" , answered
(3) Size ; " 250", answered
(3) radio ; " 6 channel", answered
(4) FPV ; " Yes " , answered
(5) Racing or fun ?
(6) skill level ; " beginner", answered
(7) battery ; 3s, 4s , 6s. Pixhawk UAV would be most likely 3s or 6s for efficiancy /runtime. Most mini quads run 4s. Budget persons would like to use the same batteries on different quads, So that means, you will probably pick 3 cell and run them in parallel or series on your pixhawk quad. I GUESS 3cell
(8) What Items do you have now. Pixhawk
(9) FPV or no FPV ; FPV , answered
( 10 ) do you have goggles : no , answered

(5) not for racing. Just for fun and messing around.
(6)Should I pick 4S? Unless something needs greater than 12V.

Not sure if I should get goggles or not. They're kind of expensive. Looking at getting a simple monitor/display and first practising with that.

Whats the difference between 250 frame and 450 frames? is the number just the width/length of it?

I also have a 3D printer so I could theoretically print out spare parts.

This is a 450 frame.

http://www.banggood.com/Diatone-Q450-Qua...42100.html

Goggles for sure! It is much more fun than looking at a small screen. Check out the quanum diy v2 or the pro version on hobby king. They are quite cheap and works good. You also need a video receiver like a boscam rtx and an antenna from banggood. The aomway antennas are good. You also need a battery for this, and any 2s/3s will work just fine.

Another recommendation for the Quanum v2 goggles here. They are going to cost less than a screen, and it's a 5" screen you could take out of the goggles if you didn't want to wear them on your head. The only thing I don't like about them is the portability over Fatsharks. They are still portable, just not AS portable.

On the frame numbers: it means "how many millimeters from motor to the other motor on an angle". i.e. The distance between motors 1 and 2 in this picture. It's not always exact (like Aaron said above, what someone calls a 250 might be 230-270). The usual sizes are: 130, 160, 180, 210, 250, 450, 650. Any given frame will probably be advertised as one of those. The other measurement you'll here on frames is what prop size. Some people prefer that because they don't care if their frame is a 210 or a 250, as long as it can use 5" props. If you want 5" props you probably need to get 210 or higher. I only know of one sub-200 frame that can do 5" props, the X-Labs Shrike.

Prop size doesn't always mean a faster quad by the way. There are Falcon 130s using 3" props that can top out above 60mph and there are ZMR 250s on 6" props that can't do that. It's all about the full package.

About the quanum v2, I guess you do have a point if I don't like it, I can just take out the screen.
If I go for the 450 frame, do I have to change out any parts like motor and prop?
I feel like if I get the 450, I'll have more room to mess around with and shuffle things around in the middle.

With a 450, you will have to compensate for the extra weight. This will entail bigger props, larger motors with lower kV, possibly higher rated ESCs (maybe not), and of course, larger batteries. I have an earlier version of that frame that Hamster linked. I built it for aerial photography. I'm running Turnigy SK3 2822 1090kV motors with 8" props and using 3S 2750mAh batteries. (These particular motors have max current rating of 7A so I'm running 12A ESC's.) My FC is a KK2.1.5. It's great for what it does, however it is not acrobatic at all. Just steady, smooth flight. But it will carry a gopro or mobius with a couple of extra servos running a gimbal for the camera. I never set it up for FPV though.

(22-Jul-2016, 07:15 AM)tecnix Wrote: Thanks for all the suggestions. At least now I have a heading on what to get.

(5) not for racing. Just for fun and messing around.
(6)Should I pick 4S? Unless something needs greater than 12V.

Not sure if I should get goggles or not. They're kind of expensive. Looking at getting a simple monitor/display and first practising with that.

Whats the difference between 250 frame and 450 frames? is the number just the width/length of it?

I also have a 3D printer so I could theoretically print out spare parts.

to answer (6), yes definitely go 4S if you are planning to get batteries. the most common is a 1300mah. if you find that a 4S battery to have to much power, just switch your props to a smaller, less pitch one. which in turn not only reduce the power, but give you longer flight times.

If your current rating for your motor is 7A, shouldn't you get an ESC which is >28A? since you have four motors ; 4 x 7A?
I'm sure I'm missing something so feel free to enlighten me

You are missing the fact that you actually need 4 ESC, one for each motor

Ah I see how it is. Starting to see how this is an expensive hobby

(25-Jul-2016, 03:45 AM)tecnix Wrote: Ah I see how it is. Starting to see how this is an expensive hobby

Warning!:  it is also addictive...