* The drone in this review was provided free of charge by Radio Shack on a first-come-first serve basis to all attendees of the 2016 World Maker Faire in New York City. No extra consideration was given to reviewer for the purpose of this review.
My mom stood in line for a very long time to get me to this Booth, almost 4 hours, so I just want to thank my mom for waiting so i could build my drone
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Photos above by Ruth Anne Arnold
This Drone set is a great beginners kit. With few solders you can make something really cool and accomplishing, even now i still like it, mainly because I got a drone out of it, but also because it was a kit that did not only focus on soldering. Don’t get me wrong, I love just soldering kits, but some times I like kits with more than just soldering, say the useless box. It focused on building the box and soldering the machine, which in my opinion makes me feel more accomplished than just soldering, I get to do every thing.
One of the reasons this kit is a very good beginners kit is because It is simple and makes you feel like you have done a lot because, you get a fun toy. It is like a maker badge, but it flies. IT FLIES, and i bet you if you started engineering and this was your first project, you would be motivated to build even cooler stuff because you literally made a drone. Also it could be very appealing to the young market because every kid wants a drone.
It would probably be even cooler if they got to do it themselves, witch would probably result in many young builders. If you were nine years old and you built a drone, and it worked. I would imagine this would open a door of possibilities of what you can do. This kit is not on market yet unless you are reading it in the future you can’t buy it until around Halloween, but look for a product link below as soon as its available.
The Drone was very fun to build, of course like many other solder projects, but it had it’s fair share of flaws too. I’m not saying it is bad though. It has been about 2 days since i made the drone and i am already getting thecnical difficulties from it. Also the instructions aren’t that clear, if it wasn’t for the person arose from me i probably would have gotten confused, this is something I definitely want to see added when it hits market.
Another thing i want to see added is a low battery LED on the outside maybe because one of the problems I had had was it running out of battery and not noticing so some of my motors had stopped working. I just assumed that it was broken and almost fixed it but before i could set up my dad had suggested to me that it was a battery flaw.
In conclusion i would give this STEM soldering kit a 3.5 out of 5. Even though it is very confusing and not perfected, there are still many charms to it. It also seems that if radio shack fixed a couple of little flaws in it, it would probably be a top selling product. IT FLIES!!!!! 😀 :D:D:D:D
Review :
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Radio Shack DIY Drone Starter Kit
Summary
This Drone set is a great beginners kit. It is simple and makes you feel like you have done a lot because, you get a fun toy. It is like a maker badge, but it flies. The Drone was very fun to build, of course like many other solder projects, but it had it’s fair share of flaws too. Also the instructions aren’t that clear. IT FLIES!!!!!
how did you makes yours fly my daughter got the same one the charger cable has this red light that goes on then it goes off and this drone does not even want to take off I got a new charger cable for it
My dad made one at Maker Faire too and his NEVER flew. He tried replacing the motor, he tried replacing the wiring, but only one side would ever lift off. I am not really sure how to use a multimeter yet but I do know it’s the right tool for finding out what is wrong with wiring, and with resistors and other components. He’s going to get another kit and try again over vacation. A brittle solder or a single stripped-off solder pad can make it hard to fix if you can fix it at all. I have also had some success using jumper wire and using the wiring diagram in the instructions on some kits.
I am sorry that your daughters drone did not work. A lot of my project’s don’t work the first time, the majority of them i have to do 2-3 times over. You have to remember failing is not the end, it isn’t a stoping point it is a place where you can learn from your mistakes and keep going. In engineering it should be just the beginning. My suggestion to you is that you get another kit, and try again. Take tons of pictures and I can even put them up here on the blog as a guest! I’m redoing a project right now, the Velleman sound-star. I made one, and was just about to blog it when my DAD BROKE IT!! My point is you should really try again when it doesn’t work the first time.
I just put together one with my kid. One side did not lift up. Turns out I had mixed up a pair of rotors, make sure your A rotors are in an A socket and your B rotors are in a B socket
i have a good VMK172 sound star kit.
but the problem is velleman company have a own problem with design on the kit.
2 green LED lights on while all 8 green LED lights fade gone away.
3 in youtube video.
1 is here website.