This Guy Built His Own FPV Drone — Including the Motors

Go into any drone community and tell them that you built your own drone. It will be like reenacting that scene from Jurassic Park — see, nobody cares. Anyone can order a set of off-the-shelf parts and then bolt them together and start flying. But things get more impressive the more that you’re able to do yourself. If you can do everything on your own, then you’ve really achieved something. And that is what Logan was able to pull off, with this DIY FPV drone that even includes handmade motors.

If you don’t know why that is so impressive, consider this: nobody builds their own motors. Most people wouldn’t even consider it, because they’re hard to make and motors are easy to find at relatively low prices. But Logan was committed to the “completely custom” idea and followed through.

However, we do need to be honest that Logan didn’t make any of the electronic components. Those include the flight controller, ESCs, and battery management. And, of course, he didn’t make the batteries either, because that would be insane.

The frame is a combination of 3D-printed plastic and hollow carbon fiber tubes in a traditional X configuration. Logan designed that in CAD, then 3D-printed the custom bits with the help of a friend’s printer. Even the propellers are 3D-printed.

But the motors are what we find most impressive. Logan designed and built those himself, down to winding his own coils. He 3D-printed the bodies and there are bearings to keep everything spinning smoothly. Those motors work with the aforementioned off-the-shelf ESCs.

After assembling his parts, Logan ran into the same problem as every other drone builder: PID is hard. PID (proportional-integral-derivative) control is the way that drones stay aloft and achieve stable flight. Looking past the complex math and algorithms, PID control comes down to providing real-time corrections without overcorrecting. That overcorrection is a bit like losing control and fishtailing in a car — you’re just making things worse.

When it comes to drones, PID control is critical. But it is also, without fail, very frustrating to tune. Fortunately, Logan goes into great detail about the PID tuning process for anyone who wants to learn. And by the end of the video, his (almost) entirely homemade FPV drone was flying very well.