The Carrotcopter

by Codzilla | May 12, 2014 | (14) Posted in Projects

What do you do when the frame of your Hubsan X4 Micro-quad breaks, and you're either too cheap or stupid to go and shill out the £3.06 for a new one?

The Carrotcopter happens... 

 

 

'But how does a peasant such as myself make a Carrotcopter?' I hear you cry.

It's fairly simple really, all you will need the electronics from a micro-quad such as the Hubsan X4 or the Blade Nano Qx, a soldering iron, CA glue and a carrot.

 Start by disassembling your micro-quad in to its individual components.

You will only be needing the motors, control board, battery and propellers. Everything else can be stored somewhere safe, for when your Carrotcopter starts decomposing because you forgot to refrigerate it.

 

Re-solder the motors back on to the control board.

Be careful to get to polarity of the wires right, noting this down beforehand is a good idea! 

 

Begin slicing your carrot. You will need 4 arms 5-6cm long, a couple of disks for the body.

One carrot is more than enough for the quad.

 

To attach the control board use some CA glue to glue a piece of strong tape sticky side up on to the carrot. The reason CA is used is because most glues won't stick to the damp fragile surface at all. CA was originally developed for surgeons to use instead of stiches; hence it glues living tissue very well.

CA Glue will certainly glue you securely to your carrotcopter too, so be careful. If you need help unsticking yourself from a carrotcopter it makes people question your sanity.

 

Glue the carrot sticks you cut out earlier on to the bottom of the control board carrot in an 'X' configuration, again using generous amounts of CA.

Once you have all 4 carroty arms attached, test the length of the motor cables and cut the carrot to the correct lengths.

Before Gluing the motors on wrap the body of them in masking tape, this will save you covering your motors in CA if you ever decide to go back to the boring old plastic body. I won't blame you, the carrotcopter only has a shelf life of a few days even if it is kept refrigerated!

Cut out a couple of small support blocks from your carrot and glue them, with another carrot disk above the control board to form the battery tray.

It is very important at this point not to eat the carrotcopter. It may look tasty at this point, but resist the urge to take a good bite out of it.

Using the same technique as you did for the control board, CA some tape to attach the battery to the quad.

You're now ready to take to the sky with your new organic carrotquad!

 Best of luck building your carrotcopter!
Codzilla 

COMMENTS

Battershell on May 22, 2014
Maybe a small Tupperware container on top to house the PC board and Dip?
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Codzilla on May 22, 2014
I'd sacrifice flight times for cheese and chive dip any day!
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PaladinDG on May 22, 2014
That is hilarious!!!
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MEbyGood on May 22, 2014
That's just silly. I love it
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DAZ on May 22, 2014
Give it a week and Hobby King will release their version, but it will be made out of a turnip!!

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FTDude on May 22, 2014
Very funny. Looks delicious.
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FSMultirotors on May 22, 2014
If 24 carrots were used in the build process, it could be considered a 24 karat quadcopter!
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ScrapDaddy14 on May 22, 2014
That's just to funny. I believe humor is a prerequisite for this hobby of ours.
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lFritZl on May 23, 2014
Ha, this is brilliant, and kinda seems "how to basic" inspired? Am i right? (punch "how to basic" in youtube search if you need to know what it is, most of its hilarious, some bordering on creepy/disgusting)
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Codzilla on May 23, 2014
Hehe, yes. His videos definitely had an impact on this. Although the main 'inspiration' for the whole thing was probably just a rather dull, sleep deprived night! =P
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HilldaFlyer on May 23, 2014
So good! Thanks.
Just one question... do you store it in the crisping drawer in the fridge, or just next to the milk?
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gustyk on May 25, 2014
Spaghetti-copter anyone?
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BillyBird on May 27, 2014
THIS IS THE BEST IDEA EVER! (I am not kidding this amazing).
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RCairforce on May 28, 2014
Awesome, now someone just needs to make a plane out of lettuce and we'll be set!
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The Carrotcopter