Geelang Wasp 85X Review
• Chris
When I first saw the Geelang Wasp85 on Banggood I thought: “Ah something different” - I want to take a look at that. Bangood was kind enough to send me one to check it out.
I was hoping that it is a bit of a sleeper and surprises by just being plain awesome, unfortunately that was not completely the case.
The total weight is 46.5g without batteries and 63g including two 300mAh, 1S batteries. I like to fly it with GNB 2s, 450mAh batteries and with those it weighs in at 75.2g.
- Batteries
- FPV Cam
- Motors and Props
- Flight controller
- Receiver
- Frame
- Video Transmitter
- Accessories
- Conclusion
Batteries
The Wasp 85 comes with four, 1s 300mAh Geelang branded batteries. Two of them are shrink wrapped to a “2S pack”, I put 2S in quotes since they still are only two 1S batteries with a PH2.0 connector each.
Included is an adapter wire allowing you to charge two 1S batteries on a real charger where you plug in a XT60 connector. Instead of this wire I would have preferred them to add one of those USB chargers that come with the EMAX copters.
The included batteries are one of the worst 1S batteries I have ever used. They have an internal resistance of 100m Ohm - a number that my GNB’s don’t even reach after a couple of hundred charging cycles.
And the batteries really are a dis-service to this quadcopter, I flew the first 2 packs and was really shocked: I did barely got one and a half minutes of flight time.
The copter comes with two different options to mount the batteries, both are 3d printed. One is designed to take two, 1S batteries and the other one is designed to take 2S batteries of various sizes - really a clever design.
Do yourself a favor and get 2S GNB, 450mAh batteries.
Connectors
This copter comes with two, PH2.0 battery connectors and you can technically fly it on 1S, but that is no fun at all, so I would recommend you swap the PH2.0 connectors for a XT30 and simply use real 2S batteries, like for example the 450mAh GNB batteries, that I really like.
With proper batteries (the mentioned 450mAh with XT30) the Wasp85 flies a solid five to six minutes.
FPV Cam
The cam is a no-name cam, mounted in a 3D printed mount. The quality of the 3D printed parts on this copter is really sub-par, but they all get the job done.
The specs of the cam are 800TVL, NTSC, 4:3. Not the worst cam I have ever seen, but I would have preferred them to run a Nano sized cam instead.
The cam has problems when transitioning from shadow to brightness and the low light sensitivity is not the greatest. The angle of the cam is adjustable, but since the screws screw into the 3D printed part, the cam tends to change angle after a crash.
Motors and Props
The motors are Geelang 1202, 8700KV motors. They feel rater smooth, and held up rather well in crashes, so nothing to complain about here. The motors have a 1.5mm shaft and a three hole mounting pattern.
The included 2025 props also seem to be Geelang branded props, the balance is not too bad. Any other 2” T-Mount styled prop will fit here too. Like for example the Avan Blur.
The motors are configured to run props out (“Motor direction inverted” in the Configuration tab) - keep that in mind when flashing a new Betaflight version.
One thing that I absolutely not like about the motors is, that they use M1.5 screws for mounting instead of M2 which are the de-facto standard for motors of this size. Also every other screw on this quadcopter is M2, so I reallly can not understand this decision.
Flight controller
The flight controller is the JHEMCU F4 AIO. It is a 1-2S rated flight controller capable of pushing 5A continuously.
The flight controller comes flashed with an RC of Betaflight 4.0. The stock tune is flyable, but nothing to write home about. After the first couple of packs I flashed 4.2 and the default tune there is way better. I would recommend you upgrade to 4.2 immediately and do not waste your time with the old Betaflight version:
You can actually run JESC on this flight controller, in case you are interested in RPM filtering.
A nice touch is, that a low ESR capacitor has been soldered to the board. Attached is also a buzzer. On the bigger quads I really like to have a buzzer since you can more easily find the quadcopter after a crash, but on the smaller ones I always enable the ESC beacon instead of the buzzer, just to save weight. That being said, I do not think that the buzzer ads so much weight, that it would really make a difference.
The flight-controller is mounted with two metal screws and two plastic ones. I wish they would have used metal screws for all four mounting points. The rubber grommets allow for enough flex, so the plastic screws are not such a big problem, but you will be swapping them at some point for sure.
Receiver
The copter comes with a couple of different receivers options: Frsky XM+, Crossfire, some generic D8 receiver, DSMX and Flysky AFHDS 2A, or even without one, if you prefer to run your own.
in case of the XM+ that I got, the antennas come out on the top of the canopy. They definitely are not aligned perfectly, but at least they were far enough away from the props to not be chewed up. Still I added some zip ties to mount them properly.
Frame
The frame is super solid, 2.5mm thick carbon, I think you will have a hard time breaking that. I crashed a couple of times into metal poles and concrete and there are only a couple of scratches on the end of the arms.
The canopy is made of plastic and is also on the sturdy side, a bit scratched up after lots of crashes, but nothing broke yet. They also give you a second canopy as a spare.
Video Transmitter
The video transmitter is mounted to the canopy and is adjustable via IRC Tramp protocol up to 200mW (25, 100, 200mW). The antenna is a linear antenna which is mounted to a zip tie as to not get chewed up by the props.
Accessories
The copter comes with a spare set of props, a spare canopy and lots of stickers to put on the canopy. I don’t really know who would actually do that, since they really look a bit cringe.
You will also receive a second battery mount, allowing you to mount 2S packs. Other than that you will also receive a small screw driver and a nice carrying case.
I really like the carrying case since it fits the assembled quadcopter and provides enough space for all the spare parts and a couple of batteries.
Conclusion
This one is really interesting and I would most likely compare it to the Tinyhawk 2 Race. The big difference to the TInyhawk is, that the Wasp 85x comes with dedicated components for everything, so you can easily swap the flight controller for a different whoop styled flight controller.
After initially beieng disappointed by the included batteries, the copter really grew on me with proper 2S batteries and an XT30 connector. I have put a good amount of packs through it and I might even like it a tad more than the Tinyhawk 2 Race just because I think it is a bit faster.
A big plus is also the dedicated receiver. This might not matter too much if you can only fly with 25mW video anyways, but if you can go higher, a proper receiver is the way to go instead of the integrated SPI receiver of the Tinyhawk 2 Race.
With a price of around $120.00 on bangood it is also very close to what you would pay for the Tinyhawk 2 Race.
If you want a flawless out of the box experience, or are new to the hobby, I would go with the Tinyhawk 2 Race.
If you are willing to tinker a bit and it is important for you to have dedicated, easily swappable components, go with the Wasp 85x.
Chris is a Vienna based software developer. In his spare time he enjoys reviewing tech gear, ripping quads of all sizes and making stuff.
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