For this build I wanted something designed purely for racing. For that I needed powerful motors, durability and the option for high camera tilt angles, and I didn't want to restrict myself to something that can carry a HD camera. After seeing some of the Shendrones pod-style frames I really liked the look of them and decided to take this approach for my new racer. Although I specified that this quad didn't need to carry a HD camera, the Orca actually enables you to do this by attaching a mount like this to the top of the pod, so I have the option to do this in future if I feel the need for it.

The build process for this quad was actually a lot more straightforward than I thought it was going to be. I've heard that some people find the similar Mako to be a tricky build, but the Orca has some extra room due to the stretched-X design. The only thing I had to be careful of was routing the ESC wires to the PDB properly.

As with my previous EpiQuad build, here I went for a PDB that features ESC signal pads alongside the power and ground connectors at the corners of the board. I really like doing builds this way as I find it much cleaner than routing wires directly from the ESCs to the FC. As with all my builds, I've discarded the ESC signal grounds.

The way the Orca pod holds the angle of the camera is by the pressure of the edges of the camera opening on the lens. With the 2.5mm lens that came with the Swift I found that I was having trouble getting the camera to keep its angle, but after replacing it with a GoPro lens which has a wider diameter, it sit snugly and kept the angle it was left at. I usually replace my lenses with GoPro ones anyway, but this is something to be aware of if you're planning on building an Orca.

I will be updating this post with some more internal wiring photos soon and some details about how it flies once I've given it a proper maiden.