Dumping the Phantom?

I am going to remove the Phantom's gimbal and eventually place it on the F550. The F550 is a much better platform for aerial photography. The F330 frame that the Phantom is based on is very cool in that it can do some amazing things but it is not much more than a toy when it comes down to it. Maybe toy is too harsh of a word. The Phantom is more training wheels for the larger multirotors. It is great for FPV, learning how to fly and for experimentation with a soldering iron but I can no longer take it seriously as a stable photography platform.

Mulitrotors are a balancing act; there can only be so much weight piled onto one before it reaches the limits. The Phantom is a perfect example of what the limits are when it comes to weight and performance degradation. The F330 frame is small and cannot be pushed much beyond it's design limits. Anything over 1100 grams is going to dramatically shorten flight times. Adding anything after market can easily push the Phantom into and over the 1100 grams range. Most people do not take weight into account when they buy their shiny new set of landing gear or a gimbal.

Even thought the Phantom is a lot of fun to fly, I may end up selling the it and flying the F550 exclusively. The F550 is a much easier platform to modify and maintain. It also has a lot more redundancy in that if a motor fails the whole thing will not fall out of the sky.