Post by Burkeomatic on Jun 20, 2022 1:21:50 GMT
I am not sure how I feel about this thing. I bought this flight controller to try, because I am experimenting with different flight controllers. Anyways, other than that one mysterious incident with the Dragon, the original sparrow flight controllers have served me well. But this is the evolution of that flight controller, and I don't like it nearly as much. But I will discuss it and hopefully give you all some guidance on whether it is for you or not. To be clear, I am talking about the black "sparrow 2" and not the purple one, which I am also experimenting with.
Sparrow 2
Let's start with the positives, it is dirt easy to set up.
It is very easy to change modes through the controller, and reverse stabilization. You arm it by going full throttle then back to zero again. Before you arm it, all you have to do to reverse stabilization is hold the aileron or elevator stick for a second, and it will reverse it. To change plane type, all you do is flip channel 5 on and off quickly to change flight mode. You reverse throws on the radio, and it has nothing to do with the gyro. If I were to recommend something super basic to someone who just wants very, very rudimentary stabilization and RTH and wants something to be as hands off as possible, this would do it. But... that is about all it is good for. RTH works as expected.
Apparently it would provide OSD if I had DJI. It has a DJI port on it, but I don't have digital FPV gear. If there were a way that I could incorporate this with the analog 5.8g stuff that would be a huge positive mark for this. I highly doubt folks that pony up for DJI would waste their time with such a peasant spec flight controller. Would I trust $150-200 of camera equipment to a $35 FC? Probably not.
Now the negative.
I first tried this in my S800, and it was complete failure. The plane either gyrated or didn't have enough control, no matter what I did. Then I switched it to the night fury, it was flyable, but not the greatest.
There is only one gain control, and the aileron and elevator gain can't be adjusted separately. So if elevator needs to be higher, you have to turn up the aileron too.
Rates are directly related to gain. So if you need to get more aileron throw, you are turning up everything to get it. Then once you get enough aileron throw, the gyro is too sensitive, and the plane will gyrate on small bumps. Annoying. So you can somewhat counteract this by cranking the rates in the radio, but then manual mode goes out the window and it isn't all better still.
Then there is this weird thing it does, sometimes it will really slow down servo movement, and sometimes it won't. I have no idea why it does this. You can flip to max throw, and it might take the servo a second to complete the movement. Sometimes it doesn't. The lack of consistency is annoying. Sometimes the plane took the whole field to complete a 180 degree turn, sometimes it didn't.
It also seems like it is struggling to keep up. Sometimes, you can be flying and hands off the stick, and the plane is perfectly stable, and sometimes the little thing is struggling to keep up and it feels like it takes a second to react to what is going on. In fairness, this was on the nightfury, and even loaded with the largest battery I could put in it, (a 4S 4000MAH is the largest I can squeeze and it still balance) it still has a very low wing loading. I don't think it breaks 3 pounds with that set up.
This also doesn't have geofencing, which since I upgraded to ELRS, is a feature I have decided is completely useless to me. I actually stopped using geofencing long ago, and just rely on my plane failsafing to RTH to bring it back. But if you feel like you need geofencing (I don't think you do) then you would want to pass on this.
Here is the real and final problem, it's predecessor exists. The OG sparrow flight controller stabilizes better, has independently adjustable gain for aileron and elevator, and is cheaper. It is a little more persnickety to set up, but not impossible at all. It also has geofencing if you are into that kind of thing. I really see absolutely no reason to buy this thing unless you want a $35 flight controller of poor to mediocre quality and limited adjustability to link up with your super expensive DJI set up. Actually, I would say combined with the wolfwhoop WT03 this was actually the crappiest usable FPV set up possible. I didn't get to range test my new rx, since the wolfwhoop camera at the same power as the VC400 AIO had about half of the range.
OG Sparrow
Sparrow 2
Let's start with the positives, it is dirt easy to set up.
It is very easy to change modes through the controller, and reverse stabilization. You arm it by going full throttle then back to zero again. Before you arm it, all you have to do to reverse stabilization is hold the aileron or elevator stick for a second, and it will reverse it. To change plane type, all you do is flip channel 5 on and off quickly to change flight mode. You reverse throws on the radio, and it has nothing to do with the gyro. If I were to recommend something super basic to someone who just wants very, very rudimentary stabilization and RTH and wants something to be as hands off as possible, this would do it. But... that is about all it is good for. RTH works as expected.
Apparently it would provide OSD if I had DJI. It has a DJI port on it, but I don't have digital FPV gear. If there were a way that I could incorporate this with the analog 5.8g stuff that would be a huge positive mark for this. I highly doubt folks that pony up for DJI would waste their time with such a peasant spec flight controller. Would I trust $150-200 of camera equipment to a $35 FC? Probably not.
Now the negative.
I first tried this in my S800, and it was complete failure. The plane either gyrated or didn't have enough control, no matter what I did. Then I switched it to the night fury, it was flyable, but not the greatest.
There is only one gain control, and the aileron and elevator gain can't be adjusted separately. So if elevator needs to be higher, you have to turn up the aileron too.
Rates are directly related to gain. So if you need to get more aileron throw, you are turning up everything to get it. Then once you get enough aileron throw, the gyro is too sensitive, and the plane will gyrate on small bumps. Annoying. So you can somewhat counteract this by cranking the rates in the radio, but then manual mode goes out the window and it isn't all better still.
Then there is this weird thing it does, sometimes it will really slow down servo movement, and sometimes it won't. I have no idea why it does this. You can flip to max throw, and it might take the servo a second to complete the movement. Sometimes it doesn't. The lack of consistency is annoying. Sometimes the plane took the whole field to complete a 180 degree turn, sometimes it didn't.
It also seems like it is struggling to keep up. Sometimes, you can be flying and hands off the stick, and the plane is perfectly stable, and sometimes the little thing is struggling to keep up and it feels like it takes a second to react to what is going on. In fairness, this was on the nightfury, and even loaded with the largest battery I could put in it, (a 4S 4000MAH is the largest I can squeeze and it still balance) it still has a very low wing loading. I don't think it breaks 3 pounds with that set up.
This also doesn't have geofencing, which since I upgraded to ELRS, is a feature I have decided is completely useless to me. I actually stopped using geofencing long ago, and just rely on my plane failsafing to RTH to bring it back. But if you feel like you need geofencing (I don't think you do) then you would want to pass on this.
Here is the real and final problem, it's predecessor exists. The OG sparrow flight controller stabilizes better, has independently adjustable gain for aileron and elevator, and is cheaper. It is a little more persnickety to set up, but not impossible at all. It also has geofencing if you are into that kind of thing. I really see absolutely no reason to buy this thing unless you want a $35 flight controller of poor to mediocre quality and limited adjustability to link up with your super expensive DJI set up. Actually, I would say combined with the wolfwhoop WT03 this was actually the crappiest usable FPV set up possible. I didn't get to range test my new rx, since the wolfwhoop camera at the same power as the VC400 AIO had about half of the range.
OG Sparrow