#racingquad

After the success of the World Drone Grand Prix in Dubai, every kid  would be dying to get their hands on a quarter million bounty for the next race.

The problem is however, racing quads are difficult to build and fly. So this is where Walkera has positioned itself.

As you may know, this is not the first attempt by Walkera at making racing quads that are RTF. They have had several high profile crashes with the Runner 250 and 250 Advance models which should never have seen daylight but now, the 210 hopes to change that with a racing quad that fixes all the glitches of the 250.

First, the F210 is much smaller in size than the 250, this is Walkera’s first attempt at a 210mm quad so it makes sense. It looks like a stocky, more muscular cousin to the Runner 250.

This time round, it is more robust, built with more carbon fiber than the cigarette paper thin version used on the Runner 250. Weighing in at roughly 500grams, it feels heavy for something this small.

This is no denying the build quality, along with the Devo 7 controller which I have a mouthful for much later....

Now does it fly?

Yes, it does and you don’t need that GPS built in found in the Walkera Runner 250. Why you wonder? Well, let’s say that as a beginner version for racing, it’s one way to know it is very stable when left to hover. But to achieve this, you need to fly in Stabilized Mode, which takes most of the fun out of the racing.

In this Stabilized Mode, you can fly it around like like a GPS enabled quadcopter. Think of it as training wheels on a bicycle. What you won’t be able to do is to flip around those sharp turns and make steep banking moves that normal racing quads do. So technically speaking it does not behave like a racing quad until you learn to turn off Stabilized Mode and go full throttle. For beginners, flying on rails is not really much fun till you are brave enough to lose the Stabilized mode in due time.

It is fast. Flips. Sharp turns and pretty much everything else before you end up crashing it. The controls can be twitchy, too much power suddenly and you go off into a lamp post. So you’d be well advised to trim the controls.

But this Walkera isn’t fast enough to win the Grand Prix.

Using 4S LIPOs to power its flight, you are limited to only 9 minutes of flight time.

The FPV camera that is built in also supports IR or infra red video, meaning you can literally fly in pitch darkness with the help of IR LED lights mounted on the front. Video beamed to your FPV goggles is in HD.

Because it is made for racing, the FPV camera on the F210 does not have a SD card slot for you to record your moment of glory. Instead, you are left with the option of recording it only from the FPV feed.

Due to the way the quad is built, you can’t attach a Mobius camera on it. I have seen people stick a platform on the hood of the drone with a keychain camera but that’s as far as you can go on this.

Sure, in time you might be able to buy a 3D printed attachment for a secondary camera but don’t count on it happening too soon.

What I like about it is the size. What I don’t like about it is the Devo 7 controller. It uses 8 AA sized batteries. I am sure you could have found some way to shrink the power needs by now...either that or they had an oversupply of the damn thing and decided to toss it into the package.

There is very little telemetry data on the OSD to warrant a big size controller like the Devo 7 so why the bulk?

The whole package which includes the quad, controller and optional Fatshark goggles fits well in a backpack and you can travel to many places to fly with it.

As a racing quad, it is probably the right fit.

Built to be tough, easy enough for a beginner to fly and comes in an almost complete package for roughly US$380 sans FPV goggles or display.

Contrary to popular belief, a racing quad can be used for video recording and this can be seen from the folks from TBS.

There are two ways to do this, you can have a Mobius cam or GoPro strapped to the front and fly FPV. You can also record via the FPV feed though that would impact your battery life.