She's gonna be big, she's gonna be stinky, she's a LOSer, but I still like her

So for starters I have been a fan of THuG Frames since my ZMR 250 days when they made some bolt on 5mm THuG Arms. I have been also been intrigued by the whole upswept arm idea since flight test did a video on it awhile back.

So when this frame came out with its upswept arms and unusual material choice. (Made of HDPE, a type of plastic that has a high strength to density ratio ) I just had to buy it. Boom Ordered!
https://www.instagram.com/p/BSAAYqvjn3W/?taken-by=thugframes

Then Life Happened

Then I never really got around to building it out... for various reasons, life family job, other projects.
Now as I am back on my LOS kick, and my git rid of it, or fly it. I was looking at this frame again and thinking it would look awesome in the air flying LOS.
So here is a workbench shot with my currently flying LOSer in the background, and some new battery purchases in the foreground. ( Going to experiment with props, n batteries to find a sweet-spot.

Here is what the-frame looks like on the workbench:

The goal of this build was to get the parts that I have, back in the air... so not all of these choices are the most logical ones. ( and not the parts I would choose if buying outright today. ) But non-the-less a nicely cabable machine.

Flight Controller: I am using the xracer F303 FC and its the version 3.1 flight controller it uses MPU 6000 gyro and the X_RACERSPI betaflight target. I mention this because I have several of there older V2.1 boards which use the older MPU6050 gyro and a different betaflight target.

PDB/OSD: I am using the RR OSD PRO V2 (rev 1.1 ) board. This is overkill as I am not flying fpv with this rig at the moment. But again, this was laying around and not being used.

Esc's: EMAX Bullet 35Amp esc's. These multishot ( not dshot compatable ) esc's were originally on my FlowRide 6" FPV rig and flew great there. But I wanted DSHOT compatible esc's for turtle mode. So here with a LOS rig I dont need turtle mode and thus using these great-flying esc's. Note: I do wish they were a bit smaller and lighter ( the 20Amp version would be just right for this build. )

RX: I actually built this wrig with a D4RII reciver using PPM. However for the life of me I could not get this to work with Betaflight 3.4 or Butterflight 3.5. I and I spent awhile trying to get this to go. After getting frustrated I pulled out the FrSky X4R-SB and had this working 10 min's later.

Here is a photo that reviels the upswet arms a bit better, and reviels how I just used the 30x30 stack size to be able to get 6" props on here with no problem.

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Props 6" you bet
I really wanted to go with 6" props on this build. Because... dugh they fit. However I am a bit worried about overproping the motors. This will play out over time and hopefully I can find a sweet spot.

The Firmware During my late hours trying to get the D4RII working on this build, I ended up trying Butterflight... for the hopes that maybe some configuration magic would be there and I would get this thing going. No such luck. But hey, butter is really just a fork of betaflight... so gonna kick-the-tires with butterflight for a bit. Running version Butterflight, version: 3.5.0 (March 29th 2018)

All Up Dry-Weight The total weight of the quad with 6x4x3 v1S props. 311.6 grams. I actually forgot to write down the weight of the frame itself.

Make it Fly Great ( work in progress )

The Maiden: July 13th 2018 I maidened this copter on July 13, 2018. Thats right Freddy Cruger and Jason. Eat your heart out.
I was very pleased at the way this looked and flew and sounded in the air. I ran several size/weights of batteries through this copter. From 4s - 3s. From 191g 4s battery to 86g 3s. Here is my current battery list and I am basically trying all of thos batteries with this copter to see how she handles loaded and unloaded. For those paying attention that gives me an all up weight ranging from 397g to 502g I did notice that the motors were running a bit HOT on the higher weigh 4s batteries. Note: I am pretty sure my Cobra Motors are only rated for 3s. But I am running 4s through this rig anyways. If I smoke an old motor... well thats on me. ( then I can buy more stuff ). I was also very happy about how this 'hotter' machine is going to push my LOS skills. I did have a few orientation issues and had a few rough hits. Note: I still don't have multicolored props on there just yet, and she is a True-X so who know's which way is forward anymore?

Post Maiden Hardware Modifications

1. going to lengthen battery lead
2. soft mount my motors
3. add 4th screw to each motor ( soft mounting made less screw threads go into motor )
4. soft mount flight controller
5. get my timer callout on my radio for this model working
6. set_small_angle=180 ( disable the arming angle check. Note cutting yourself with props hurt's )
   Note: softmounting fc, adding battery lead and 4 more screws made the final dry weight 320g adding 8 grams to my build. ( probably the battery lead is too long now. )
   I also considered putting a cap on the battery lead. But I decide to put this off for a bit. No point in doing this if I don't need too.

With those modifications in-place I went back out to the field to give it another whirl. Here is a little vido from that session. So you can see this thing in the air too. ( just in-case I break the darn thing )

07 / 15 2017 Flight
Ok so I droped the prop size to 5". Now using the HQ 5x4.3x5" v1s and the hot-motors all but whent away. I can fly 4S just fine up to 1000mAh if I go any larger. 1300mAh or 1500mAh then the motors start to get hot again.

Flight characteristics: Its hard to put a finger on. The quad was louder and I think I could feel a difference in the 'spin-up' time of the blades. Which equates to a more responsive feel on the throttle. I will post another video of what this looks like soon.

TODO: I also want to try some bi-blade 6" props on this rig.

10 / 27 2017 Flight
I have been off in the tubular world for awhile now and its time to give this frame some more love. I was getting frustrated with the lack of durability of my tubular builds. So I wanted to circle back and give some more robustness to my build.

Reflashed with Betaflight 3.5.2 ( X_RACERSPI)