[Quadzimodo]

Question... I am missing something...

Quad flys fine, but when I do a roll I punch throttle, pull back, roll... and the thing falls out of the sky... no rolling... throttle back on level off... saved quad.

It wont roll with throttle zero, I need to keep some throttle... but then my roll becomes a corkscrew, is that normal behavior for quads, my previous 250 racer would still roll with zero throttle (I think)... what am I missing, is there a CF setting somewhere? Or am I imagining on the previous quad I zero'd the throttle??

When you put the throttle all the way down the props are still spinning, but the FC no longer sends commands to the ESCs. This feature is designed to provide you with a clear indication that the quad is armed (if the props are spinning, then it is armed), however in this state it will not throttle up in reaction to movement (if the quad changes angle it will ignore this and not attempt angle correction. Nor will it react to yaw, pitch or roll inputs from the user if throttle is at minimum position... hence why you are falling out of the sky).

Some pilots, even pro pilots, will fly in this configuration and have simply learnt not to drop the throttle all the way, in doing so maintaining stability in flight and only throttling all the way down upon landing. This is ultimately ideal, because it allows the quad to be controlled most safely (minimum throttle position = minimum power from motors).

Other pilots use a throttle up switch (like we used to use on Nitro planes) in order to keep minimum throttle above the non-reactive state whilst in flight. Perhaps the most common approach to eliminating the non-reactive state at the bottom of the throttle movement is to enable 'air mode'. Note - 'air mode' is awesome (gives more acrobatic flight characteristics) because it has the effect of allowing the motors to reach full output to achieve angle correction regardless of throttle position (whereas normally motor output is limited by throttle position), thus 'air mode' can be more dangerous if you do not understand how it works (if you crash with 'air mode' enabled the quad goes crazy trying to correct angle, even if the throttle is at the minimum position). Landing in 'air mode' will also likely cause the quad to react with full force to ground contact - usually resulting in severe bouncing after landing until disarmed if you do not disable 'air mode' (hence why having it on a switch rather than enabled permanently is such a good idea - you can turn it on after you arm and before you land).