An FC 40 is a Phantom with its own camera. I think it has a smaller battery than the Phantom 2 and a cheaper camera than the Vision. It does not have a powered gimbal, you set the camera and then fly, but you have FPV using your iPhone as a monitor. No accidental flyaways, but I did test out the homing system. It's amazing. You send the copter out somewhere and turn the transmitter off and the copter shoots straight up, flies to where you launched it, and drops down and lands.

I'm already there. I have the carbon fiber blades from DLSR Pros.

I think I'll get the gimbal from Rotorpixel. It allows you to retain the "stock" camera rather than buy a GoPro. The reason to keep the camera is that it has the transmitter.

I need to update my research. It was such a bummer after the crash, I just stopped reading stuff.

I did some heavy editing on my post, so some of it is gone. You sound like you're way ahead of me. Everything I've read says the GoPro is a better camera but you can't use FPV because it interferes with the control transmitter. How is the quality with the stock Vision camera?

The stock Vision camera is good enough for me. The problem is that you get jello from the rotors, and the copter will rock when you move side to side. The 2-D gimbal smooths all of that out.

I'm sure that the GoPro camera is superior, but as you say, you need to buy a bunch of stuff, and start with a "Vision 2" platform. You can buy a FPV transmitter, but that all adds weight. As it is, just adding the gimbal will decrease my flight time to around 12 mins from 15, and I would need to buy a second battery and quick charger to get any shooting done.

Somewhere I have a video from the first flight where I fly over the house, film my guys putting stuff into a dumpster, then land. What I don't have is one of the many fly-aways that have occurred. It seems to happen when I fly by a WiFi hotspot or high voltage power lines. My biggest fear is crashing onto a busy street, which is where I want to shoot video. Falling 200 ft onto a car is no bueno.

So when you have a flyaway, what happens? Does it just go until it crashes or can you turn the transmitter off and let it come back? Do you have one of the locator things on it? You fly in areas that would scare the crap out of me.

oh you have no idea!!!!

You lose total control. Maybe one direction only, so you try to make it fly back to you. I turned the transmitter off, but that does not work because it's listening to a stronger signal than yours. It goes screetching off in some direction and you lose sight of it. Hopefully, it goes until the new signal is out of range. When that happens, it does fly back. This happened maybe 4 times at different locations. The last time, it was flying too low because I was landing. It was under control of the WiFi when it blasted into the concrete wall.

With FPV, you are "in" the copter. It is heart in throat time. Google some of the DJI fly-aways. They all talk about being scared witless, and that is exactly the feeling you get.

Is anyone familiar with The Turbo Ace Matrix Quadcopter or the Turbo Ace 830x? I am looking into those copters for purchase.

Have anyone done a DYI build ? (quadcopter)

The first time one falls out of the sky and onto a child everything will change.

Man that looks like fun, and spendy :)

I would love to have one to put my new GoPro on, must resist looking at that site anymore....

With all the drones out there, I got me a good scatter gun.

Flew with a bunch of old timers this morning. One had three quads, ranging from 5" to 24" across. He was a good flyer, but there were a lot of rough movements and every one crashed within 5 minutes. The other guy had a brand new big black thing with 9" rotors that was supposed to be programed with waypoints it would go to. It went up and was completely unstable, pitched and rolled until it finally crashed. He tried the waypoint program and it flew itself into a tree. I was flying my Phantom, while watching all this and everyone expressed amazement at how stable it was. I sent it up and got it on its side and just let go of the controls and in seconds it was hovering straight and level. I tested the return home feature at it works just as advertised. Turned the transmitter off, it hovered in place for 30 sec., slowly climbed to 60 feet and slowly came back to the launch site, slowly let itself down in stages until it kissed the ground and put the motors into idle. I think the Phantom is most amazing machine for $499 WITH the camera.

Pretty cool aerial footage here

Superyacht Cup, Palma 2014 - J Class on Vimeo

Have you seen the Airdog?

Uses a virtual tether system to follow you.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/airdog/airdog-worlds-first-auto-follow-action-sports-dron

Skip the video and scroll past the logos for the description.

I'm seriously considering a drone.

The new "hot" thing in real estate around here is aerial shots of homes.

People behind me are selling and the realtors photog spent an hour setting up a boom on my neighbors driveway to shoot the backyard behind us.

Seemed really inefficient.

And illegal. Commercial use of a drone is against FAA regulations. I have no idea what the FAA can do to a non pilot but it is the government.

Don't get me started. It is illegal to fly UAS for profit in the US. The fines are going to get ridiculous. I am in this trade space across a number of market verticals and we have stopped pushing the envelope with regards to UAS flights without following the rules to a "T".

I mussed up the boundaries for years but won't anymore...too many folks breaking the rules and the FAA is getting very serious about going after offenders, especially given some of the really egregious (flying near airports, crashing at sporting events, injuring spectators, etc.) violations.

I have contracts to fly UAS in the Philippines and two other countries as I type this.

It is really inefficient (again, think of all the things these UAS can do) but before you get started you need to ask yourself a few questions:

Where are you going to get liability insurance? If your UAS crashes into little Suzy standing in her driveway watching you fly, best of luck.

How much are you going to charge? It will be a race to the bottom.

What is your initial investent?

I could go on. When the airspace opens up, go for it. I will be.

I don't know how the FAA is going to enforce current laws. The FAA is plenty busy now, but with tens of thousands of new machines going into the air every month, I just don't see how they can keep up. I expect to see local ordinances against these, enforced by local LEOs, not the FAA. Local regulations will really clamp down on us.
There are so many legitimate, safe uses for these things. Farm field inspection, power line and gas line inspection - things that are done today at great expense by skilled licensed operators could be done with drones far more cheaply. It would be sensible to legalize regulated commercial use, but I don't see it happening soon.

http://i57.tinypic.com/2573tax.jpg

Here is me flying the first commercially available "drone" in 1998 i think

I really love RC toys, always have. I think its cool the quads have made brought alot of people to the hobby.

I play with something RC several times a week: maybe a parkflying plane, or a micro heli, or a car, it depends on my mood and my sons mood who I like to play with

Anyways I really like the Horizon hobby Eflight and blade product. Some will disagree with me. THey arnt always the best value. But parts are always available, customer service is great (considering most of these things have NONE), and the parts are pretty interchangable between some of the models.

Anyways I havent had a quad since 98. A week or 2 ago I bought a blade nano QX to fly indoors. It is fantastic and only about 80$. It is the easiest to fly helicopter type thing I have ever owned (and there have been LOTS).

There is probably some 45$ amazon equivlant, but I say go ahead and pay for the blade version for your model.

I think the smaller model and the ability to practice indoors with no wind make the nano qx the perfect first model.

As I was typing the above a friend texted this to me:

U.S. Moves Toward Opening Skies For Commercial Drones


As I said, it will take years:

"Finalizing the regulations, however, could take several years, in part because they involve numerous FAA offices and other agencies, such as the Pentagon and Department of Homeland Security, said Ted Ellett, a former FAA chief counsel who is now an attorney at Hogan Lovells in Washington, D.C.

"Until the final rule is issued, which is going to be years from now, the exemption process is the only game in town," Ellett said."

I havent kept up with what the FAA is doing about all of this stuff, but I do have a sudgestion for them. Dont regulate anything that meets the following criteria:

1. under 15lbs GVW
2. under 500 Watt hours total bat capacity
3. Stays under 500 ft
5. Actively flown by human inputs
6. doesnt carry explosive, bio hazards etc

They really need to carve out some simple sensible space for hobbiest, or they are terrible people who dont care about the spirit and wonderment of flight. The government should be encouraging parents to build RC models with their kids. You know, STEM and all that good stuff