this post was submitted on 10 Oct 2026
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I don't know about the dji ban, but there are tons of kits and build guides out there. In fact there's probably a hobby store near you with exactly what you want. What are you looking for specifically?
5lb payload capacity. Cameras. Non-smartphone controlled. GPS is nice but optional. Easy to assemble. $1200 or less.
....
You've given me far too much budget to work with, let me put you on game. I'm going to use amazon links for examples, but there's lots of specialist sites for this too.
For a starting drone, we can look at something like this: https://a.co/d/01yJRlcD
And you'll want to pair it to a fpv camera like this: https://a.co/d/0deJbiIA But we'll talk about that later.
You can of course go bigger. Bigger motors, Bigger propellers, or a a hexacopter frame. (of course, bigger frame = more weight so you will need bigger motors/propellers/batteries, etc.) But the big thing you need is the flight controller. I have personally used the pixhawk, and it works wonderfully. Whatever you use you want to use the ardupilot firmware. Open source, works perfectly, and does everything you want and more.
Going to back to cameras, check out the ardupilot page on camera and gimbals to get a better look at your options.
And seriously, go check out a local hobby shop, they'll have more experience and more time to help than me.
First kit says "Maximum take-off weight: approx. 1.8 kg". I am looking for payload capacity of 5lbs: drone should be able to carry its own weight (including battery and cameras) plus 5lb. I expect that will have to be a hexacopter.
Unfortunately, hobby shops in my city seem to have either shut down or specialized into either only selling $20,000 enterprise drones or only selling drone photography services.
I did miss the weight, I apologize. Try this website and part it yourself https://www.ecalc.ch/xcoptercalc_mobile.php
To be fair, you missed the entire post honestly. I just restated the original posters requirements. I got them from the post.
Nothing is fair, especially not me. I was busy at the time and couldn't give my whole attention. I was also looking for details about size, usage besides carry capacity, if vtol was necessary, etc, since there are a lot of different r/c solutions.
I've seen this calculator but I am afraid of making expensive mistakes when picking everything myself. A kit or guide would be really helpful if they exist at this size.
I think that electric multicopters are going to have better community support and parts availability than helicopters. Gas RC stuff seems like it's on its way out, and the energy density of gasoline isn't that appealing to me since I don't need a long flight time while fully loaded.
I get what you're getting at, but electric stuff is going to be more expensive. Honestly, I really wouldn't suggest starting with a large diy drone. If you're not familiar with drones, you will probably break it. If you get a big drone and you're not familiar with it, it will cut you to ribbons (I've got a nice scar to prove it). You could also get two quadcopter kits and combine them. double up the rotors, facing opposite directions on each arm. It would be stronger but more unstable than a hexcopter.
Doing some more research, it looks like lowest cost solution to carry that much weight would be a gas helicopter, rather than a drone
That was my first thought when I say that payload. The phantom 4, djis big fat drone can’t even do 2 pounds. I found something that says the mavic 4 can lift almost 4 pounds. But that’s just lift it up, not fly with it.
5 pounds payload is too much for a consumer grade drone. If op wants to step up to pro stuff the matrice will do that for a cool 10x their max budget.