Innovative DIY Remote Can Control Drones Using Motion

Remote control (RC) vehicles have existed for several decades now, and the radio transmitter controllers for the hobby have evolved to suit those more traditional vehicles, like RC airplanes and RC cars. Those transmitters are great for what they’re designed to do, but they don’t always suit the drones and robots that are becoming commonplace today. They can also be quite expensive, with mid-range transmitters starting at around $100. If you want to control a drone you built yourself or one that uses a standard radio receiver, then you should take a look at this innovative DIY radio transmitter remote that can control drones using motion.

This transmitter can control a drone using gestures similar to what you would use with a Wiimote or virtual reality controller. To make the drone fly forward, you can just tilt the remote forward. The same is true for other directions, and there is also a joystick and button for additional control. This provides a far more intuitive way to pilot a drone compared to traditional RC transmitters. Pilots who are doing advanced flying, such as drone racing, will probably want to stick with a more conventional transmitter that is better suited to fast flight and quick directional adjustments, but this is a great option for leisurely controlling a drone.

Most importantly, this DIY motion controller can be built very inexpensively using off-the-shelf parts. The primary component is a TTGO LORA32 V2.0, which is an ESP32-based development board with a built-in LoRa radio transceiver and an onboard OLED display. If your drone is equipped with its own LoRa transceiver, then you can control it directly through that radio. Otherwise, you will need to add an appropriate radio transmitter. That latter is how it is demonstrated here, using the remote as an OpenTX trainer slave. The other components are an MPU6050 gyro/accelerometer module that monitors movement, a couple of a push buttons, an analog joystick, and an 18650 lithium-ion battery cell. All of those are attached to a simple 3D-printed frame that is designed to be held in one hand. If you’re using OpenTX, then instructions and code are provided to get you started. If you aren’t, then you will need some programming experience to modify the code for you setup.