I really like this design. The camera cage kind of reminds me of the Speedybee 5" frame. If you want a guinea pig for the Caddx Vista test I would be happy to oblige.  I will pay for the frame of course. Not looking for freebies lol. I do have all the components to build another 4" thought including the Caddx Vista. Just Saying 

Good eye, wll.  The camera cage was indeed heavily inspired by the SpeedyBee frame.  I wished I could go milled aluminum ... oh man the design avenues that would open up just makes my creative juices ... flow.     But unfortunately, I just don't do anywhere the volume that would make it make sense.  Hopefully one day!

As an aside, a lot of the design elements I use are heavily inspired by what I've built in the past.  You'll see a lot of Diatone Roma vibe particularly in the Mk1 series.  And one of the main reasons I started designing frames was that I kept finding all of my favoritist-frames-ever always seemed to be missing one thing ... and what if I could take all those things I liked and frankensteined them into one frame. 

With that said, I'd also like to think that roninUAV has it's own sense of style and my ultimate hope is that you can look at the frame and immediately spot it as one.  Now that would be kinda cool.  


[edit] Almost forgot - there's no way Mk2 would be possible without the support and feedback from everyone that got a Mk1. So everyone that's pruchased an Mk1 will get another big discount towards the Mk2.


[edit] I made a very very last minute change lol. I decided to go back to the beefy arms of prototype v1. We'll find the weight somewhere. Like we used to say in college, if you're walking on thin ice, you might as well dance. lol

Behold ... prototype v2  



It may not be as apparent at first glance but a lot has changed here.  For you DJI folks, that's a good 31mm of clearance between the "B" pillar standoffs and 39mm lengthwise from the rear of a whoop stack to the front of the rear standoffs ...



But try as I might, I just could not accommodate the gnarly length (49mm or something stupid like that) of the Shark Byte "20x20" race VTX.  Personally, the whoop VTX has worked just fine for my freestyle needs.

The cam cage has been rejigerred to be a lot more secure.  I also added 0.3mm so the clearance is 19.3mm so it's not so tight with the micro cams.



This one's huge.  All of the self clinching nuts are now clear of the electronics no matter what size components you use.



Also, I'm looking to source black clinch nuts to up the bling game.  

Although the arms are not thicker (still 3.5mm with a 2mm brace plate), they are on avg 1mm wider than the Mk1 arms (0.75mm wider at the "wrists," 1mm wider at the middle and about 1.5mm wider at the base).  The base and bottom plate arm extensions have also been offset to prevent a single point of pressure in a crash.



I do plan to beef up the power system from 1404s to 1504s to see if it is worth +10g.



The frame is coming in 7g heavier than Mk1 ...



For the Mk2 line, I've switched to using a 4S 700mAh (~80g) lipo from an 4S 850mAh (~100g).  I and others were getting upwards of 7 min flighttime with the Mk1 on 850s.  That is great but I think leaves a lot on the table as far as adding to the durability and performance of a freestyle frame.  So now I'm targeting closer to 3-4 min of flighttime with a far more durable and capable platform.  I dunno, but personally, 7 min is too much time for a good rip.  I feel that knowing the clock is ticking forces you to not dilly dally lol.  It's also more in line with typical freestyle flight times.  If you guys think otherwise, please let me know.

So with the +17g unfavorable delta, I'm hoping that the -20g favorable on the smaller lipo will pretty much keep everything net net at just below 250g ... exciting lol.  

(21-Sep-2021, 02:03 AM)the.ronin Wrote: Behold ... prototype v2  

I do plan to beef up the power system from 1404s to 1504s to see if it is worth +10g.


 

Hi Ronin, 

I have the BrotherHobby 1504.5 motors on my Katana-LR4 build; they are just fine. 
In fact, I like the way it flies...butter smooth with loads of power {for me}.
You have the Katana frame for arm size comparison.

Also, I was running 2203 motors on my 5 inch Katana build...no problems... very smooth,
very powerful, and it flew just fine {until I lost it}, but it was a little heavy with those motors.

So, I guess my 3s 1100 mAh (67-73 grams) batteries should be just fine. 

Looking forward to getting more of your frames to market. 

Thank you, iFly.  My constraint is with the 250g limit and not necessarily the motor size.  This thing can handle 200X.  But then I'm using 2 motor screws and nickel and diming every gram I can get and that's with a 200mAh lipo if I'm lucky lol.  Not worth it.  I figure if you are using half motor screws and tiny lipos that get you 2 min flight time to get to sub250 ... it aint sub250.

I am really stoked on this frame.  Everything really came together.  I was afraid the press nuts, while out of the way, would still be butting against the stacks.  Not at all ...



And finding the optimal place for those "B" pillars was a stellar pain in my ass.  The moment of truth was seeing if I could still plug in a USB to a whoop FC which is not really something you can accurately model in a 3d program ... and that would an affirmative, ghost rider lol.



(lol that hot glue on the ufl looks gnarly)

I didn't snap a pic but AUW with a 700mAh and kitted with the Brother Hobby VY 1504.5's came in around 230 or 235.  Well under 250.  I threw the 850mAh on there and I was at 252-ish.  Winner winner chicken dinner.

Just put in the production order ... along with some prototypes for the Shinobi and Sohei Mk2

I'm really excited about this one guys.  It really is the culmination of all the frames that came before it ... the thing flies like a dream.  And man I just love the way it looks lol.    







I was runnin around like a headless chicken for the past couple weeks trying to get the finalized prototype to my guy in China before the country shuts down for a week next week.  I really like the dude I'm working with - really bends over backwards for a tiny inconsequential little customer like me.  I'm lookin to drop this guy by this weekend.  I think I'll push hard on getting this guy out in the wild.  roninUAV is ready.  

Finally got around to this ... serious procrastination going on at the ronin house lol.    

The Mk2 chassis has been updated with a thicker 3mm brace plate (with corresponding camera plates) and longer M2.5 x 10mm flat head screws.  The result is far more rigidity for only 3g in additional weight.



Since this is how the Mk2 really should have been all along, I'm shipping "upgrade kits" free to everyone that's purchased the Mk2 kit (free domestic shipping and half off international).  If you haven't gotten your notification email, let me know and I'll have a update kit sent over post haste.  

Sometimes you just wanna rip.  

Here's the Digisight v3 withe the fixed firmware in freestyle conditions. Glad to have a legimate alternative to the HDZero Runcams ...

I like the annotation of the parts at the beginning of the video.  

Yea ... I love this thing.