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Any new Alta owners out there

Discussion in 'ALTA' started by Jose Luis Ocejo, Aug 13, 2015.

  1. James Adkins

    James Adkins Member

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    Sadly if you choose to operate by exemption things can't move quite as quickly with amendments, registrations and such.
     
  2. Keith Colodny

    Keith Colodny Member

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    No, as we have a Movi M10 and cannot top mount it.
     
  3. Keith Colodny

    Keith Colodny Member

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    Agreed, and we are operating under exemption.
     
  4. Klaus Friedrich

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    Today I made my maiden flight :). Conditions were great, sun with some gusty thermal winds. So my first impression this machine is a Ferrari! Power like a rocket and sensible like a woman. BUT I also experienced some minor issues. In manual mode it was very difficult to keep the level. When I thought I found the balance with the throttle to hover in the same height the thermal gust just pushed the ALTA up or down. Not slow but with quite some vertical speed. I started with manual mode and default setup from Freefly. I also flew without gimbal means no payload. This pumping in the air, does it come from my T14SG? The receiver has a throttle ratchet stick, so without spring.
     
  5. James Adkins

    James Adkins Member

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    No, you have an exemption but are not operating in compliance with it if flying the Alta. It is not possible to have been granted an amendment to add the Alta to your exemption and get it registered already. I know I submitted ours last week.
     
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  6. Steve Maller

    Steve Maller UAV Grief Counselor

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    I'd repeat your experiment with some payload. The ALTA is grossly overpowered when it's got no payload, and not well tuned for that configuration. Just put a couple LiPos or a weight of some kind in the lower battery tray.

    Tabb also mentioned that they now recommend a vertical stiffness setting of 12 instead of the 18 it shipped with. That might make a difference, too.
     
    Klaus Friedrich likes this.
  7. Tom Hirschmann

    Tom Hirschmann New Member

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    Got ours! And it is a wonderful piece of engineering, got it end of last week and spent all of yesterday setting her up. Everything seems well thought out and placed well for a quick and easy install.

    One word of warning, go and check your booms... 3 out of 6 on mine were damaged, the carbon fiber was crushed inwards at the spot were it touches the frame when folded (the part with the little springy arm). Must have happened with some rough handling during shipping. Unfortunately going to have to wait until tomorrow to call FreeFly and see what happens next.
     
  8. Klaus Friedrich

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    Thanks Steve, that was also my first impression with the low weight. The power of this machine is really amazing. When flying in full speed in one direction and bring back the stick in the center position the kinetic energy ends up with a 15-20m (45-60 feet) vertical lift. Ok, I had no payload but 2 x 12000 LiPos.
     
  9. Keith Colodny

    Keith Colodny Member

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    You are absolutely correct sir! No one has an FAA registered Alta operating under a 333 exemption at this time. We filed a flight plan for our commercial shoots, using the Lockheed app, writing in Alta, N number pending, and following blanket COA rules, proceeded with our shots. And although you may have filed for yours, ours was filed as proprietary so you wouldn't be able to see it was an Alta anyway, just as the other heavy lift registered aircraft we operate were.
     
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  10. James Adkins

    James Adkins Member

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    Not trying to grill you on this by any means. I applaud anyone who is making the effort to be in compliance. We both know the vast majority are flying commercial renegade anyway. Since there is already a thread on regs I will make this my last comment. For others benefit, what you did was not in compliance with your 333. All the manuals and registration for the Alta would have to be approved first, no exceptions. The only time it would matter would be if a reportable incident occured. We have so mch time and money invested we can't afford to take that chance. To each his own.
     
  11. JASPER GLAVANICS

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    Hi Keith. Just curious to how stripped back your Red Dragon is to fly with Alta? Are you using small lipos to power it and have a HD downlink? My concern is the weight on a normal Dragon setup ..
    Flight time with Dragon?
     
  12. Ben Ruffell

    Ben Ruffell Active Member

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    Has anyone else's arrived with the controller not bound to the unit?

    (and the receivers not installed in the craft)

    We were under the impression that this was going to be a turn key solution.

    We spent a weekend binding it, and channel mapping it.

    And... now we have been sent a Alta 14 SG-3 File by Support.... but, for some bizarre reason we need a PC to install it.

    We live in a Mac world here.

    Looking for a way to proceed...
     
  13. Keith Colodny

    Keith Colodny Member

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    No, we have tweaked changed out the dampeners moving between the 5d and the heavier payloads, but have not changed any of the flight settings in the app. We can only fly cameras underslung as we have a Movi M10 which cannot top mount. We would love to try the top mount, but are debating the need for an M15 purchase as opposed to a fix for the M10 Pan tube.
     
  14. MIke Magee

    MIke Magee Active Member

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    Same thing here Ben. I was hoping that they would do that but did not expect them to. The install and binding were easy enough. Last night I used the file support sent and added that configuration. I would strongly recommend that you do. The pc part is just required to add that file to the futaba card because of the proprietary file system they used on the sd cards. It was simple enough - all you need is the sd card and a thumb drive with the software on it, and use a windows box for 5 minutes.

    It really was painless.

     
  15. Robert Eder

    Robert Eder New Member

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    We got ours too. Took me 2h to connect receivers, bind it and get it airborne. Best flying experience I´ve had with a drone. However I have some small bugs I think. No OSD in the video downlink and an accelerometer warning if the rig sits powered for a while without flying. (needs a controller reboot then)

    Also the motor test function in the app does not work. Anyone experiencing similar issues?

    Greetings
     
  16. Keith Colodny

    Keith Colodny Member

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    We have it pretty stripped back with lighter lenses, all cheese plates and accessories removed. We are powering it with a 4s 2500 mah lipo that sits in a second battery holder on our M10. We use the redmote for settings and record function so nothing additional is attached, We are getting around 7-8 minutes of flight time with that setup. All up weight is around 27.5 lb.
     
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  17. Klaus Friedrich

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    I'll have the same issue with the video downlink no OSD. But no accelerometer warning problem so far.

    I wonder if there are other ALTA users using PAL?
     
  18. JASPER GLAVANICS

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    Thanks Keith for the breakdown. Finally someone is willing to tell me their setup. lol
    So you are limited with that setup to 3000ft at 0 deg celsius... I was flying last week at 7000ft at 0deg, so unfortunately I've had to pull out of my decision to buy the ALTA. We also operate in over 30deg heat here in Oz most of the summer, so id be limited to 28.5Lb...
    It seems that there can be no setup with the RED in order to use ND filters or larger primes. Which is really limiting! Such a shame!!!! I was so keen to try out the new Synapse!
    Now its back to the workshop to swap over my X8 heavy lift from MK system to HERK III and A2.
     
  19. Michael Elsegood

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    Interesting data, Jasper... We operate in Western Australia so I can sympathise with your temperature concerns when it comes to UAVs.

    We have an ALTA on order too.
     
  20. Gary Haynes

    Gary Haynes Administrator
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    In regards to the OSD not showing up. I saw this also but got it working. Connect up the app and on the OSD page turn the OSD on by moving the slide at the top of the page to the right. Section below will 'highlight'. Wait 3 seconds for the app to write to the Alta.

    Power down the Alta, I waited 10-15 seconds and when you power up at about 2/3 of the way through the boot cycle the OSD will be live.

    Once the OSD is running any changes, like NTSC to PAL, work as normal. Don't forget to wait 3 seconds for changes to permanently 'write' to the Alta.

    For motor test, and I haven't tried this yet, you need to be outside (kind of obvious since you are going to run the motors) and the Alta needs to be 'Armed'. Then the motor test should work.

    Lastly there is a newer version of firmware and voice files for the Futaba 14SG. Ver 5.0 and Voice V2. With the Battery telemetry hooked up to the Futaba R7008SB and telemetry setup on the 14SG you can have a voice warning set to 22.2 volts and then get a announcement when you get to that battery level.
     

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