The Hive_16 from Newbeedrone is a 16x16mm all-in-one stack including FC, RX, VTX and ESC. It’s probably the smallest complete package you can get for an FPV drone right now!

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Note: the sample I tested was only a prototype so there could be changes in the production version.

Buy: https://newbeedrone.com/products/hive-16-16x16mm-aio-fpv-stack

Hive_16 Stack Spec

The Hive_16 stack is an interesting idea and full of possibility for micro quads in the future. It’s pretty amazing how they manage to cram so many things into this compact form factor. And it was very easy to setup since there is no wiring and soldering.

• F4 flight controller with built-in OSD
• Built-in SPI Frsky diversity receiver (what is SPI RX)
• BeeSC20 12A 4in1 ESC
• 25mW/200mW VTX with VTX Control using IO, not SmartAudio or Tramp (what’s VTX Control?)
• Rated for 2S

A Closer Look at the Components

The boards are separated by 4mm M2 standoffs, the height of the 3-board stack is about 15mm.

The boards are connected via small header pins and no soldering is required. This is convenient for the users, solder up the motors to the ESC, bind the RX to your Taranis and you are all good to go!

You might wonder if the header pin connections would break easily in crashes. It’s a valid concern, but I don’t think it’s a problem, because the standoffs are actually made of metal (aluminium alloy I think). I have flown this stack for a while now and had numerous crashes, it’s holding up so far.

The whole stack is soft-mounted on rubber bobbins under the 4in1 ESC.

The top board is the VTX. It has a 3-pin connector for your FPV camera, and a U.FL connector for your antenna or extension pigtail.

The VTX has integrated OSD, allows you to change Betaflight settings and VTX settings using your transmitter. Very handy!

The next board is the flight controller. At the time of writing, the Hive_16 FC uses Betaflight but the firmware file isn’t available yet. Hopefully the target will be added soon.

The receiver is built into the FC, which works on D8 protocol on the Taranis. NewBeeDrone will make a DSMX version too for Spektrum users in the future. The receiver binding can be done via CLI – type in “frsky_bind” and the receiver will go into bind mode. I’ve been told a dedicated bind button will be added later on.

The ESC’s are good for 110X motors with 2.5″ or even 3″ propellers! Voltage rating is 1S-2S LiPo and it supports DShot600.

The Spec of the quad I am testing

Newbeedrone kindly sent me a pre-built model with the stack. Here is the spec of the quad:

• Motors – Rotor Riot HyperTrain DAB 1104 7500KV Motors (https://amzn.to/2RYwBGA)
• Gemfan 3025 dual-blade propellers (https://amzn.to/2CogZHb)
• Some prototype frame with TPU canopy
• Some unknown FPV camera with really wide FOV (NTSC)

This thing is SO FAST! Feels almost as fast as my 5″ it’s insane :D

The Downsides

There is still no manual or pin-out diagram for this stack yet, so I am not sure if it has other capability that i failed to mention in the review.

So far the Hive_16 has been enjoyable to use, but there are still things that can be done better.

The first thing is the lack of buzzer! And there doesn’t seem to be buzzer pads on the FC either. This is huge because if you lose this little thing in the grass, you are not going to find it without a buzzer! For now I am using ESC beacon as a work around but it’s not quite loud enough.

At the moment i can only find 1 UART, which is for Crossfire or DSMX serial receivers as I was told. I wish there are more UART, so we can hook up more stuff to it, like FPV camera control (The Split?), or even GPS! Long range micro anyone?

Update (19 Oct 2018) – Pin-out diagram!

Finally I was given the pinout diagram for the Hive16 FC. It turns out there are actually buzzer pads as well as LED pads. And there is only one UART you can solder to.

Testing in Car Park

This might be the perfect quad for indoor racing :D It’s so fast, nimble and easy to control! It’s so much fun to fly!