The $250 RTF 3axis gimbal that rocks!

This is not the prettiest gimbal you have ever seen, its akward at best, but who cares, the price is right and the thing works.

This is a 3axis Alexmoss gimbal, pre-programmed from the factory, interestingly the factory states clearly "DO NOT EDIT SETTINGS"  this thing is ready to fly. 

Click through for VIDEO review and rest of the story... 

 

Weight 288grams empty,  I measured it at 366grams with my GoPro installed.

The gimbal is born with xAircraft rail mount hangers,  if you are flying a x650 or anything with two 10mm rails under the belly, chances are this gimbal will clip straight onto your aircraft.

The gimbal require 11-12.5 v  the manual specifies a 3S battery or to use the recommended BEC,  since my hexa fly 6S, I will be regulating the power for the gimbal.

Size, well this one is a bit bigger than some, however I have already seen pictures of this gimbal flying under DJI Phantom 1 and 2 with extended landing gear.

Dampening is done by 4 fairly stiff dampers,  I have to say I was surprised by the stiffness, however the "proof is in the pudding" they say,  and after flying it on my s800, Im convinced, I had absolutely no rocking or jello.

The camera is mounted on a bottom metal bar, it looks milled,  the bar have 4 taps on it to hold the camera in place,  and a long "stick" on the backside with a twister on top.  simply drop the camera into position on the bar and lock the camera in place by twisting the tab on the stick.  not elegant, but simple and effective.

There is really not much to say,  compared to the xAircraft Stella gimbal I reviewed a couple of weeks back,  this is a bare-bones budget offering,  no fancy foam inserts, no custom printed boxes, just the gimbal wrapped in bubble wrap in a brown box.  But the point is, the gimbal is simple, effective and it works surprisingly well out of the that brown box...  What more do you really want for less than $250.

The gimbal have multiple mode options, the ones im interested in is yaw-dampening and free-running.  most of my flying is done FPV and yaw-dampening to smooth out the camera moves.  now and then I use pitch, but surprisingy little.    and then sometimes I fly legs-off with a camera operator, the operator can then pan 360 without me worrying about the panning..   why am I mentioning that?  Well because this gimbal can NOT do 360 free running.  the control board sit on top of the gimbal mount and the motor and IMU cables are long enough for rouhly 240 degrees turn either direction.    its virtually impossible for a camera operator to know how far the gimbal have moved, so bottom line is,  don't use the gimbal with free-run. this is one well working gimbal, and its best for yaw-dampening not for freerunning.

There are 3 axis control input cables, roll, pitch and yaw,  this is wonderful but a little useless since the gimbal cant go all the way around, I can't imagine ever using anything other than the pitch cable.

Lets talk a little more about PITCH options, there generally are two options, (I have NOT tested pitch yet)  the one is "position" and the other is called "slew" (or speed)  basicaly the position option is locked to the dial or slider you use to control the gimbal, move the slider 45 deg and the gimbal move 45 deg,  this option is very easy to understand, but generally pretty rough as the resolution of the angles are not very fine.   My favorite pitch option is the speed or slew option,  speed works by using SMALL moves of the slider, give it a little nudge and the gimbal start moving at a constant speed until you center the slider,  nudge the slider back the other way from center, and the gimbal start moving back until you again center the slider,  the cool thing is you can give very small imputs so you can get incredible slow smooth tilt moves on your camera.

I bought the gimbal from CNChelicopter 

 

Comments

[Bo Lorentzen]

Hej Mugge, Joda, jeg er pære Dansk.

The problem with the P1, is that its not a particularly powerful aircraft, and almost anything is heavy on it. particularly the budget 3axis gimbal you referenced, the weight on that one helps it being smooth, but its not a good fit for a P1, I flew it on my s800 when I tested it.
There are several options, the xAircraft STELLA is light and quite good, the Walkera 2axis is very light and the Walkera 3axis is 170grams and about $150, but the walkera gimbal controllers are not as good as the stella, or the DJI, (naturally there is a difference between a $150 and a $300 gimbal. there should be, who is kidding who.?
Still, I would probably grab a Walkera G-3D gimbal for about $150, its light and "fairly" good, and would work fine on a P1.
The Scout is one of my favorite quads right now, its well build, more powerful than the P2, and flies really nicely, I'm not keen on the bluetooth features, and honestly recommend getting it for flying using the radio rather than a android tablet.

Bo

[Erik]

Hi Bo

Thanks again bro.
Yes i'm looking for a fairly good gimbal for my Phantom 1 model. Going to buy that Scout X4 later when its in stock here in Copenhagen. Should be the end of NOV :)
But can you point me in the direction of a alright gimbal for that Phantom 1 model ?
I did check your
http://www.fpvguy.com/2014/05/250-bucks-3axis-gimbal.html
model but now your saying it is damn heavy. Thats maybe not so good after all because the Phantom 1 does not hold battery as good as Phantom 2 even i have dual battery setup.
The walkera gimbal 180$ will that install on a Phantom aswell ? and is that what you would suggest me to buy. I'm sure you have tried many different gimbals thats why i ask you :)
BTW, i saw you where writing "Håber the hjælper, du er naturligvis altid velkommen til at PM mig ;-) " are you a damn dane Bo ???

Erik (My nick name is Mugge)

[Bo Lorentzen]

Hey Mugge,

You should probably pick up a new one, stuff I use have a tendency to get pretty dirty and well worn pretty quickly. :-)
Not entirely sure how to mount, but If I recall right, the screw spacing is 40mm which is the hold spacing in the P1 and P2 as well. so a couple of stand-off's should do the trick.

Personally I would just do two stand-offs to a pice of 3mm plywood, then put velcro on the plywood and also on the belly of the P2. these GoPro gimbals are so light that a big square of velcro is a great mounting, and velcro also gives nicely sideways, so its a good vibration damper as well.

The downside with this particular gimbal, its pretty heavy, and I would look at a walkera G-3D gimbal for about $180 first as that is a lot lighter. (though not the worlds best gimbal, you get what you pay for )

Håber the hjælper, du er naturligvis altid velkommen til at PM mig ;-)

Bo

[Mugge TheGuy]

Hi there Bo

Do you want to sell that http://www.fpvguy.com/2014/05/250-bucks-3axis-gimbal.html
?
And do you know how to install this on a DJI Phantom 1 and/or 2

Thanks buddy

Erik DK

[Bo Lorentzen]

Hey Ken, the native "xAircraft" spaced "hangers" will not work for you. the aeroxcraft system also have similar bars / hangers. buy a couple of those and simply unscrew the x-aircraft ones from the gimbal base and replace them with the new wider ones.

Im never completely sure about the NAZA, its either F1 or F2, F2 sounds right. and yes you are correct, turn gimbal gain to zero, but turn ON gimbal in general otherwise nothing come through. ;-)

[Ken]

Bob,

First of all, I want to thank you for providing such great information on FPV. After watching your video on the MC6500GoPro-BLG 3-axis Gimbal I was pretty much sold. I have run into a little problem that maybe your experience can help me. I have the aeroxcraft landing gear for my f550 and I am finding the hooking system to attach to the gimbal/battery arms (aluminum rods) are not quite wide enough. I snap them to one side and then go to the other and the first two Ihave just snapped pop off. I wanted to know if you have seen any modifications or know of any for this gimbal to fit on the aeroxcraft gear effective?
On another note, am I correct in assuming that if I am flying with a Naza I will need to put my pitch cable from the gimbal into the F2 of the Naza and zero out the gimbal settings in Naza considering this gimbal is already programmed from the factory? Again, thank you for all the great info.