TEST: Eachine Racer 130

[Drone News]

INTRODUCTION

“Smaller and smaller, brushless racers will be”. Eachine delivers here with the Racer 130 a compact 130mm FPV racer, a direct competitor of the Tarot TL130H1. A lot of similarities between both models: 1104 motors, 3″ props, Naze32 board, builtin buzzer for example. But the Racer 130 comes directly in RTF version and a 720p camera is added as well. Let’s have a look to the new racer.

BOX CONTENT

First of all, the Eachine Racer 130 comes with a very nice transportation bag, the same in practice of the Eachine Assassin.

Everything is well protected into foam

+ 1 x Eachine Racer 130 (with a 1S 450mAh 3S LiPo with JST connector)
+ 1 x Transmitter Flysky i6(using 4xAA batteries not included)
+ 4 x Ni-Mh AA batteries
+ 1 x Charger
+ 4 x Spare props (2 CW, 2 CCW)
+ 1 x Allen key
+ 4 x Zip ties
+ 2 x Velcro bands
+ 4 x Foam pads
+ 1 x Instruction manual (English)

Thumbs up for the presence of 4xAA rechargeable batteries

OVERVIEW

The general design is more or less a clone of the Tarot TL130H1, a compact 130mm. A solid H 3K carbon frame with 2mm elements. The flight controller is a classic Naze32 why we could expect more a F3 arm core based one. The 40CH VTX outputs up to 300mW through the linear antenna. The 700TVL camera offers 130 degrees of FOV.

Installed on top and strapped with the battery, the 720p camera module. It’s adviced to install a piece of foam to incline the camera with a positive angle.

2mm lower and upper plate of real 3K carbon

In comparaison with the Youbi XV-130 and the tarot TL130H1

-FRONT VIEW

ESC are individual and zip tied on the top of each arms. They are rated 10A (no information about the peak). In the BLHeli suite they are even seen as 20A. They are only supporting oneshot 125 and damping light. No multishot support.

The FPV camera lens orientation can be ajusted thanks to the two latteral vertical carbon element. You can apply a positive angle up to 20-25 degrees approximatively.

-SIDE VIEW

The left side shows the microUSB port for the Naze32 board.

The flysky receiver with the 2.4G copper antenna aligned with the upper carbon plate. For a better range control, you can straight it vertically

The right side welcomes UART ports and the receiver port where the FlySky receiver is connected with PPM connexion.

-REAR VIEW

A unique LED light is installed rear

A 3 positions DIP switch select 8 potential colors.

-UPPER VIEW

For the 300mW VTX, a 6 position microDIP switch select one of the five frequency bands and the associated Vfreq. The race band is supported of course.

The 720p camera must be connected via microLOSI connectors.

-BOTTOM VIEW

A buzzer is integrated, a very important point for compact racers.

In practice, the buzzer start to emit beep after 1min30-2min of flight. Probably, under load, the voltage drops too much. A LiPo with an high discharge rate should solve that problem. Decreasing in Cleanflight/Betaflight the value of voltage thresholds, should help.

Be default, the buzzer is not assigned to the switch B. It’s strongly advised to apply such change in CF/BF.

-WEIGHT

In comparaison with the tarot

Motors

1105 brushless motors, 4000 KV so slightly more taller than the 1104 for the tarot model.

Shaft section of 1.5mm

To secure props installation, you need some M1 x 7mm hexscrews

3″ props, 3020 to be more precise. In practice super fragile. Despite the presence of 4 spare props, it’s strongly advised to stock a lot of spare ones.

LiPo

A 3S 450mAh LiPo with JST connector. The discharge rate is annouced to be equal to 30C… should be enough but since the LiPo power the quad, the FPV cam, the VTX and the 720p camera simultenously, 30C is probably not enough and Under load, the buzzer rings relatively early

Camera module

A 720 camera with a builtin DVR. The FOV for this module is 110 degrees so narrowrer than the FPV cam’one.

A unique button to press & hold more than 2s to trigger recordings.

With the 720p, two cables are given. The two wires one is the one to be used with the Racer 130. The four’ one, permits to retrieve the AVout to be send to a VTX. In practice, the module also can be used for DIY project as a 720p+FPV cam combo.

The files are recorded in AVI format @30fps.

I noticed than the frame rate is in practice slightly slower than 30fps since I can’t synchronize it with a true 30fps video source.

Here is a raw sample of the 720p camera

As you can see, the video is slightly blur. IMHO, the guilty is the cheap plastic lens installed, not compatible with the higher resolution of the 720p sensor behind.

Transmitter

A classic rebranded FlySky i6. To enter into the menu, you will have to press inner both horizontal trims while powering the radio.

Good news, channel 5 and 6 are correctly assigned to the switch C (3-way) and the switch B (2-way) respectively. However, you will need to assign the buzzer function between the AUX2 and the Switch C in CF/BF.

Default Cleanfight settings

By default, a relatively old Cleanfight OS installed (12.1)

For my personal case, I installed relatively soon betafligh 3.0.1 as depicted in the next video.

UNBOXING, ANALYSIS, CONFIGURATION AND FIRST TEST FLIGHT

In practice, the Eachine Racer 130 with the camera installed, without being a monster of power is really enjoyable. The FPV camera is far Superior versus the poor Tarot’s model. FPV is much more easy with. With the default BF settings, only small vibrations can be observed for high throttle inputs. Playing with TPA will probably solve. Despite the linear antenna, the FPV signan is strong. The Racer 130 is stable and is a good acro trainer machine. No problem to flip and roll with this machine. As expected, the 3″ props are super fragile and never forget to bring with a set of spare props and the allen key on the field. The buzzer starts to emits first treeble sound after 1min30-2min …. probably too early. The guilty is main certainly the battery with only 30C of discharge rate. A 45C or more should be more suitable. In practice, you have around 6min of flight time with the camera installed before to hear the acceleration of the treeble sound. The measured voltage is about 11V.

FIRST USAGE

The acro flight mode is relatively easy even for beginner…. Nice trainer btw. The FPV camera handles better light transition versus the 720P one. I am pretty sure than a mini-möbius camera without the builtin camera and directly powered by the main LiPo can be installed instead.

CONCLUSIONS

To make short, the Eachine Racer 130 is one of good Eachine model andsSuperior to Tarot competitor especially for the FPV part. The structure is super strong, ESC are also stronger (10A vs 6A and I wouldn’t be suprize dif then can even support 4S) and a relatively satisfying 720p camera is offered in the bundle. Except the props, there is no weak point for this machine. One can argue than a SPF3 would have been better but the Naze32 do already a great job especially with Betaflight. One last important remark, think to stock a lot of props, they are breaking super easily.

PROS

+ Strong and solid 130mm racer
+ Good FPV camera (versus the tarot model)
+ Orientable FPV camera
+ Strong ESC with oneshot 125 support
+ ESC firmware can be easily updated
+ Naze32 board
+ Builtin buzzer
+ AA Ni-Mh batteries
+ 3S system
+ 720p camera can be also used as FPV camera
+ Price segment competitive

CONS

– Fragile props
– Blurred 720p videos
– No microSD card provided
– Buzzer starts to beep from 1min30

RCgroups thread: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?2718933-Eachine-Racer-130-(Under-construction)

This quadcopter have been courtesy provided by Banggood in order to make a fair and not biased review. I would like to thank them for this attitude.
You can find it actually for 210USD at http://www.banggood.com/Eachine-Racer-130-Naze32-FPV-Racer-Drone-RTF-with-HD-ActionCam-700TVL-Camera-p-1080548.html

Cet article TEST: Eachine Racer 130 est apparu en premier sur Drone-Maniac !!!!!!!.

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