The unboxing and first flight experience with the BetaFPV Meteor85 (as a first-time quadcopter user) was… Something.
Because the Meteor85 flight controller has SPI ELRS on board, flashed with ELRX 2.x firmware, the first thing I had to do was to flash the latest Betaflight firmware on the controller. That’s exactly what everybody warns you not to do, but I need the latest Betaflight firmware to get ELRS 3.x support on the SPI receiver. That was a bit of an adventure as the web Betaflight Configurator doesn’t seem to be able to make the flight controller enter DFU mode – but the desktop Mac app. does! After figuring out that little mess, things more or less just worked after updating the firmware and setting the ELRS binding phrase.
I noticed that air mode is enabled by default from the factory and the switch settings to toggle between flight modes favor angle mode, so I remapped the switches a little, but it was more or less ready to fly once firmware was up to date. I took the time to update the Walksnail VTX firmware (damn, the BetaFPV and Walksnail USB dongles are tiny and fiddly!), bound it to the goggles (oh, yeah, that binding button is well-hidden under the drone’s canopy) and did a quick test flight in the back yard.
Hot take #1: the Liftoff Micro Drones simulator doesn’t do the real flight characteristics justice. It isn’t miles away, but the real drone is far more unstable and fussy than the simulator. Once in the air, I think that it is closer but the takeoff experience is definitely harder than the simulation. Lots of splats into concrete and plants, there.
Hot take #2: I need a bigger back yard! Well, I need to practice somewhere bigger and wide open because that “drunken sailor” first flight experience between oak trees and tall vegetation is not the best…
Hot take #3: This 85mm whoop is really easy to lose in vegetation! It doesn’t have a buzzer or LEDs, so it is surprissingly hard to find once it goes down.
Hot take #4: The Walksnail Avatar 1S VTX on the Meteor85 overheats really fast! Not a problem once you’re flying, but when you’re mostly crashing and searching for the downed drone in he bushes, it is a race against time to find the drone before it overheats and shuts down.
