TEST: Eachine Aurora68 (74.6g, F3+BetaOSD, 10A BLheli_S/Dshot600, 25mW 48CH AIO, carbon ducted propguards)

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INTRODUCTION

The Eachine Aurora 68 comes after the Aurora 90, the eachine clone of the Halo 90, i.e. a ducted brushless racer. As for the EA90, the EA68 integrates a powerfull F3 Omnibus FC with a builtin OSD, a 4-in-1 10A BLheli_S ESC board and the classic 48CH 25mW AIO FPV cam. Three choice of receivers are offered:i) FrSKy D8, ii) FlySky AFHDS-2A and iii) DSM2/X for spektrum radios. If the EA90 suffered of serious drawbacks (Props contact with the aluminimum standoffs, drifts in stabilized mode and Rear-right motor thurst lost), we can hope that most of these problems are away now for the EA68. Let’s discover the bundle.

BOX CONTENT

+ 1 x Eachine Aurora 68 (with a 2S 400mAh LiPo with JST connector)
+ 1 x USB to microJST connector
+ 1 x microUSB to microJST connector
+ 4 x Spare props (2 CW, 2 CCW)
+ 1 x Screwdriver
+ 1 x M2 Allen key
+ 5 x Rubber band
+ 1 x Piece of velcro band
+ 1 x Instruction manual (English)

OVERVIEW

The EA68 is the last input in the Aurora’s serie. From left to right the EA100, the EA68 and the EA90.

In practice, the EA68 is just slightly smaller than the EA100 without propguards. In term of design, the EA68 is a direct shrinkage of the EA90 with also four carbon prop guards, a tall camera support.

-FRONT VIEW

With the battery installed beneath playing the role of landing skid too

The carbon camera mount is simply clipsed via four thin carbon arms.

In case of top crash, these arms will main certainly break. The first weak point of the EA68 structure. The front left side welcomes the microJST port where you will be able to plug one of the two provided cables.

-SIDE VIEW

A JST connector is here, should be enough for the 2S setup.

The antenna guard protects well the cloverleaf antenna. The left side shows the 2.4G antenna for the FrSky receiver. THe wire can be installed more vertically to extend the control range.

The second weak point of the EA68 structure. If the clearance is now large enough to avoid any prop hit with the orange standoff, the choice of plastic material is pretty bad.
Indeed it’s not the carbon ducted structure who will break but this orange standoff. I advice to stock some in advance too.

-REAR VIEW

By default, the four LEDs light are well programmed in BF 3.1 with a scanner larson effect

The external lights indicated turning direction while the two central the amount of throttle.

The bind button for the FrSky D8 receiver can be found left of the buzzer. Since the FrSky is simply taped on the F3 omnibus FC, it’s a little but harder to click on the bind button.

-UPPER VIEW

-BOTTOM VIEW

It’s strongly advised to check is all ESC’s wire connexions. Some reported some modflight crashes due some loose in these connexions.

It’s also strongly advised to protect a bit the lower FC from any short with wet grass by spreading some liquid electrical tape

With the battery attached

-WEIGHT
Close to 51g standalone, so far from the advertised 48g !!! close to 3 extra grams.

Motors

1102 brushless motor announced to spin at 11500Kv !!! super fast motors but don’t dream to run them in 3S. They will burn.

The 1535 props fixed with the M2 hexscrew

LiPo

The LiPo is simple 400mAh 2S model ending with a JST connector. This moodel is advertiszed to offer only 3min !!!! it’s short… So think to stock a lof spare one.
Not sure in practice, it’s a 400mAh model… I guess a good 500mAh will be more suitable for this model.

AIO FPV Camera module

The same 48CH 25mW AIO FPV camera as for the Aurora 90 & 100.

Two buttons are present. The front one select the NTSC/PAL if long pressed. If short pressed, you can mirror the video signal. The rear button selects the current Vfreq if short pressed and one of the six Vbands if long pressed.

The AIO module uptilt angle can be ajusted. Be default the angle is set to the max positive value.

UNBOXING, ANALYSIS, BINDING, CONFIGURATION AND DEMO FLIGHTS

The machine comes with betaflight 3.1 pre-installed and pretty well pre-configured for PIDs, ESC and LED lights. Only the OSD uses default settings and can be largely improved.

First testings indoors and it flies well …. hover from 45% but it’s Noisy …. so not super ideal for indoors applications. No drift observed with stabilized flight modes. That’s good. The FPV signal offers vivid colors and light sensitivity is relatively good too. Default voltage alarms threshold are badly tuned and the machine stat to ring super fast after take-off. Theses threshold must be lowered a bit. As expected, flight time are poor …. 3min in average :(..

In outdoors conditions, the EA68 flies great. Not as powerfull as the EA100 but largely powerfull enough to have fun with acro. Flips and roll are well stabilized. No FoD reported of Uptilt mouvements. That’s good. The EA68 just deserves a better battery. Be aware, I observed some radio lost in relatively close distances. Be sure to correctly installed vertically the 2.4G atenna. Probably, with a lighter camera mount, by removing also the LED bar, around 5-6g can easily saved and should extend defacto the flight times.

CONCLUSIONS

In term of flight performances and electronics installed, the EA68 is really a compact but Advanced brushless racer for both indoors and outdoors applications. The OSD informations a nice addon and from now should be included in all coming models. The EA68 is powerfull but flight times are poors. More prop guard standoff will bread versus time as well as the antenna carbon mount structure. Think to stock these spare in advacnces.

PROS

+ F3 Omnibus w/ builtin OSD
+ BLheli_S/Dshot600 ESC
+ Well configured out of the box w/ BF 3.1
+ Good AIO FPV camera
+ Powerfull enough for acro flight
+ Carbon ducted system
+ No drift in stabilized flight mod
+ No FoD
+ No rear-right motor uptilt

CONS

– 3 min of flying duration
– Fragile orange standoff
– Fragile camera mount locks
– Modest 2.4G range (~100m)

dump_BF_3_1_EA68

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 140USD at http://www.banggood.com/Eachine-Aurora-68-68mm-Mini-5_8G-600TVL-FPV-Racing-Drone-BNF-with-F3-OSD-48CH-25mW-VTX-p-1132680.html

Cet article TEST: Eachine Aurora68 (74.6g, F3+BetaOSD, 10A BLheli_S/Dshot600, 25mW 48CH AIO, carbon ducted propguards) est apparu en premier sur Drone-Maniac !!!!!!!.

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