TEST: Eachine X73S (~44g, Naze 32, 1103/1000KV, 48CH 25mW AIO cam)

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INTRODUCTION

The Eachine X73S comes after the fiasco of the Eachine X73, a 73mm whoop machine completly rotten by a brownout problem for the receiver. With the X73S, a lot of thing have been redesigned and introduced. Now we have a 1S brushless machine with 1103 motors. It should offer much more power compared to the former brushed edition. Except that, the machine is still based on a Naze 32 FC but now flashed directly with Betaflight. The FPV rig is the same AIO 25mW 48CH 5.8G FPV camera. The X73S comes in BNF version with three choices of receiver: DSM2/X, FrSky D8 and Futaba SFHSS. Let’s discover this product.

BOX CONTENT

+ 1 x Eachine X73S
+ 1 x USB to serial module
+ 1 x Prop guard

No instruction manual …. especially for the AIO FPV camera Vfreq selection.

OVERVIEW

The X73S is a micro X 73mm brushless quadcopter with main structure based on a 2mm PCB board where all the electronics is installed on the upper side. So no carbon element. Like many nano’s
the idea here to use the PCB as main frame is challenging for a machine potentially three time more heavier. Like most new X-quadcopter, a surelevated FPV rig is installed on top of the structure.
First absence … a buzzer and for such tiny machine it was a must to have …. but there will have two small workaround…

-FRONT VIEW

-SIDE VIEW

The 2.4G antenna of the FrSky receiver is attached via a UFL connector. If the extremity is well tuned to 32mm, the antenna is a little bit too long IMHO.

The left side welcomes the UART port where the USB stick need to be plugged for Betaflight configurator or to flash a new ESC’s firmware.

The right side shows the bind button of the FrSky receiver. You will need to keep it pressed while powering the battery to enter into bind mode (see video)

Good news, the FrSky D8 module have been flashed with a telemetry compatible firmware. You can retrieve at least the RSSI value on your radio. A very useful help to search your lost machine into high grass.

-REAR VIEW

The same FPV camera is mounted on top

Unfortunatly, the installation of the camera on its seat pleace will be less and less strong versus crashes. It will be required to glue it. More it’s strongly advised to add a drop of hot glue on the 5.8G uFL connector to avoid any damage to the buitin VTX in case of ejection

In practice, the 2.4G antenna can be installed vertically as follow

-UPPER VIEW

Each arms welcomes all FETs of the ESC. The open question: how strong/robust will be the arm at least for electrical tracks present on each arms ?

Good news, ESC can be flashed directly via BLheli configurator or BLhelisuite. They are flashed with the 14.8 version. They are referenced as DP-3A. They handle 3.5A (with a peak at 4A) so no way to run them in 2S configuration.

Nice light effect with the transparent props. White color for front, and green for rear. The rear lights will blink as soon as the LVC is reached.

-BOTTOM VIEW
No electronic installed on the bottime side, just the battery bay able to welcome a 600mAh 1S LiPo without problem.

Four small plastic pads are also here to increase a bit the ground clearance to make more easy take off.

With a 400mAh LiPo battery

600mAh LiPo of all the Eachine QX’s/NX’s are also fitting perfectly

-WEIGHT

Standalone, the X73S weights 31g … pretty light just a 2-3g more than the original brushed version.

The prop guard adds 2.3g ..

With a the 400mAh battery

Motors

The main originality of the X73S: brushless motors are installed on the bottom side, IMHO to free the FOV of the AIO FPV camera.

Some 1103 motors announced to be 10 000 KV !!! so super fast but will the torque strong enough for the quadri-blades props ?

By consequence, you have to install your X73S perfectly horizontally for take-off and obviously motors are directly exposed to any crash :(… A small light motor’s pod would have been a more secure solution.

Quadri-blade props are 50mm model, not flexible but build with a hard plastic so potentially much more breakable. If you plan to fly the XT3S more indoors it’s strongly advise to install the prop guard first and also to stock some spare props. What a shame no extra props are given in the original bundle.

Shaft section is 1.5mm

Camera module

The same 600TVL CMOS camera as for the X73. A 1/4″ sensor with a light sensitivity announced to be around 0.5Lux … Not so bad but can be better.

In practice, there is a small positive inclinaison something around +5degrees. But not real possibility to set this angle since the rear plastic camera mount blocks any ajustement.

The 6 dip switches role is given in the follow table

IMHO, this FPV camera is saturated for the white balancing, colors not super vivid as you can see in this raw video sample:

Anyway, the video is relatively clear and precize.

Betaflight default configuration

The X73S comes with betaflight 3.0.1 pre-installed on the builtin Naze32 board. Only two ports are available.

For ESC PWM is pre-selected but oneshot 125 can be turned on. The FC runs at 1Khz… we can’t go faster.

The PIDs are settings are nothing else than the default betaflight.

In practice, I found that increaseing D values to 40 for both pitch & rolls offer more stable flights.

Two flight modes are set by default: angle and acro.

As said previously, the X73S’s ESC new firmware can be flashed directly by BLheli configurator… I advise actually to not flash any new firmware. I advise more to set the “beacon delay” to 1min to let buz the buitin piezo associated to each ESC.

UNBOXING, ANALYSIS, BINDING, CONFIGURATION AND DEMO

Before take off, you have to check several point more or less all linked with the props. They must be installed/pressed enough to not pop off midflight and not to far for being blocked by a CMS conpounds.

The main good news: no more brownout problems !!!!! yeah.. The machine flies beautifull until the end. The LVC alarm let the rear props blinking.

A more Advanced flight. Here you can check that motors are strong enough for real acro flights, for flips and rolls. In comparaison, it’s similar to a Eachine QX95 and more powerful than the QX90. Despite the strong windy conditions, the machine with ajusted PIDs works beautifully.

One potential negative point. I observed a lot of vertical desynchronuzations in the FPV signal really annoying. I don’t know if it’s linked with my ground station part but I don’t think so. It’s confirmed that the FPV cam is probably one of the weakest point with the props. I had many crashes and I was positvely suprized by the robusness of the frame at least for ground surfaces. For more hard surfaces, without prop guard … I am not sure it will be the case. As expected the FPV camera pop off several times from its seat. I confirm also that the RSSI is a big plus to find your lost model. With the 600mWh LiPo, expect 6 min of flight time.

CONCLUSIONS

The Eachine X73S represents first of all a fixed and working X73’s miniwhoop: no more brownout, strong flight time, punchy machine acro compatible with betaflight pre-installed. For indoors applications, the prop guard must be absoluptly installed because the props are relatively fragile and no spare are given. More generally, I feel the X73S won’t be a super durable machine for some reasons: i) motors installed bottom side and directly exposed, ii) PCB body based with a potential electric shorts and iii) fragile FPV camera support.

PROS

+ No more brownout problem
+ Lightweight Brushless racer (~44g w/ 400mAh LiPo)
+ Betaflight ready (w/ 3.0.1)
+ Powerfull enough for acro flips & rolls
+ FrSky D8 with telemetry
+ Nice light effect
+ iPX/uFL connectors
+ 6min of flight duration w/ a 600mAh LiPo

CONS

– No spare props
– Fragile props
– No buzzer
– No instruction manual
– AIO FPV cam white balancing too saturated
– Prop guard installation

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 96USD at http://www.banggood.com/Cheerson-CX-10C-CX10C-Mini-2_4G-4CH-6-Axis-RC-Quadcopter-with-Camera-RTF-p-989909.html

Cet article TEST: Eachine X73S (~44g, Naze 32, 1103/1000KV, 48CH 25mW AIO cam) est apparu en premier sur Drone-Maniac !!!!!!!.

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