TEST: Eachine E70 mini

[Drone News]

INTRODUCTION

The Eachine E70 min is a basic microquadcopter without ton of advanced and often useless flight modes. The main objectif is just to train and have fun for both indoors/outdoors LoS flights. That’s all. Let’s discover the bundle.

BOX CONTENT

+ 1 x Eachine E70 mini
+ 1 x Transmitter (using 4xAAA batteries not included)
+ 1 x 250mAh 1S LiPo with microLOSI connector
+ 1 x USB charging cable
+ 4 x Spare props (2 CW, 2 CCW)
+ 1 x Instruction manual (English)

OVERVIEW

The Eachine E70 mini is a 90mm microquadcopter “à la” Hubsan X4… one super popular quadcopter 3-4 years ago. They mimic mostly all the design.

The propguard is pre-installed by default

-FRONT VIEW
Two small blue lights as eye… Remind me also my beloved JXD JD 385.

or without the propguard

The Hubsan X4 similarities are obvious in term of design

-SIDE VIEW

-REAR VIEW

-UPPER VIEW

-BOTTOM VIEW
Exactly the same type of battery tray as for the X4.

The battery installed. Maybe a 1cm more longer battery can be installed

-WEIGHT

37.8g with the propguard

Motors and pros

The propguard play also the rol of landing skid but motor are well jailed into their plastic pod.

7mmx20mm coreless brushed motors are installed

LiPo

A simple 250mAH 1S cell LiPo is provided. MicroLOSI connector. No information about the discharge rate.

A 380mAH LiPo can be inserted without any problem… extending the flight duration more than 1.5min

Disassembling

Remove first the four external screws blocking also the prop guard system, remove the props too. Then remove all the main body’s screws.

Two tiny screws hold the FC. If you want to perform the antenna mod, you will have to remove them to have a gap large enough to move the 2.4G antenna

We can find a 2-in-1 PANchip PAN159, a ARM32 core + a 2.4G module and the M540 for the 6 axis stabilization.

Transmitter

A gamepad style radio transmitter without any shounder buttons. For large hands, no probably to grab it. Gimbals are correct. No deadzone observed. You can have relatively precize controls with. No LCD… so all trimming will be done with the buzzer

The speed mode can be selected via the throttle down trim button. Three are available. The last expert mode is more dedicaced to be played in headless mode as you will see in the video. If you click on the left stick, you can turn on/off headless mode. The right click engages automatic 360 deg flips.

4 xAAA batteries feed the radio. Rechargeable Ni-Mh model are working.

The 2.4G RFchip is an XN297LBW… Unfortunatly I was not able to bind and control successfully this machine with an existing radio protocol… but I think the protocol is very close from the GW008 one.

We can have strong hope it can be deviated soon.

UNBOXING, ANALYSIS AND DEMO FLIGHT

First testing indoors with the propguard installed. What I can see say immediatly it’s a super silent machine but not super powerfull. In fact, above 80% of throttle, you have an extra boost… With the propguard installed I find the machine behaviour a bit weird after a turn… some little instabilities nothing catastrophic in general. Probably linked with the lack of power. The major problem comes from the bahaviour of the machine when the transmission is lost!!! A minimum of 12s before to stop motors!!!! It’s just silly…. the machine may fly away over 20-30m in such conditions !!!! inaceptable !!!

I continue more outdoors without the propguard. The 4g saved, boosts more the throttle performances for sure. It’s more nervous but ..Whaoohhhh whati is it !!!!!! ? I lost control sometime beyound 15m !!!! unbelievable…. the control range is so so poor. The first rate is slow especially the yaw rate… so not super adapted for tiny spaces. The intermediate mode is faster for all the main axis… much more fun outdoors whithout being super super fast and neveous. The expert mode incrases a lot the yaw rate…. but almost not the pitch & roll ones. In fact it’s impossible in fast mouvement to have super precize turns with a such yaw rate. The goad of this third mode is more to play with the headless and performs tons of pirrouettes in headless mode. I found after a couple of second, the headless reference started to be confused.

Ok the antenna mod is the must to at minimum to enjoy range acceptable and decreases a bit the high probability of a flyaway

With the antenna mod, results are much better …. no sign of control losts in a radius of 30m … The machine become more relexed to play with. Definitively the intermediate mode is the more interesting for both indoors and outdoors. What a pity they don’t offer a real export modes with faster pitch and rolls rates but a slower yaw one.

CONCLUSIONS

This machine out of the box offers a super poor range coupled with a huge flayway potential… so definitively the machine can’t be recommended as a no-brainer microquadcopter machine. The antenna mod is a must to do with representing 10min of work. In this situation, the machine in intermediate speed mode is fun without being ultra fast and sporty. I hope the radio protocol will be soon deviated to increase the general interest of this machine.

PROS

+ Cheap
+ Nice Lights
+ Durable
+ Silent
+ Good flight time (~6min)

CONS

– Extreme poor range out of the box (~15m)
– 12s of potential flyaway !!!!
– Need to recalibrate gyros often (after a crash for example)
– Useless expert mod with a so fast yaw rate

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 22USD at https://www.banggood.com/Eachine-E70-Mini-Headless-Mode-One-Key-Return-3D-Flips-2_4G-4CH-6-Axis-LED-RC-Quadcopter-RTF-p-1150488.html

Cet article TEST: Eachine E70 mini est apparu en premier sur Drone-Maniac !!!!!!!.

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