Tarantula X6 drone: The big flying flying spider

Tarantula X6

I got this new quadcopter last Friday, but only today I had the time and the proper mood to write about it and make my Tarantula X6 review.

Hearing the word “Tarantula”, my thoughts immediately go to a spooky hairy spider. The engineers from JJRC tried to imitate the face of a spider in the cockpit design, and I think they did it successfully.

Usually, big quadcopters that can lift Mobius or GoPro-like action cameras are very expensive. The Tarantula X6 (aka JJRC H16) is probably the only multi-rotor platform that can carry such cameras at a price under $60. If it’s enough to get a decent video quality, you can purchase this quadcopter together with the 5MP camera available from the quad’s producer for an extra $35. If you want better video quality, I recommend using it with only lightweight cameras because too much weight will rapidly kill your motors.

The first edition of the X6 quadcopter was released on a huge fancy box. Probably, in order to reduce the shipping costs, the new version of the Tarantula X6 gets a much smaller box.Tarantula X6 spider quadcopter

Availability of spare parts is a very important factor when I look for a new quad model as they must be inexpensive and easily possible to procure. Most often one of the engines can broke down and for this model it is easy to replace it as one set (2 CW and 2 CCW) costs only $10.

YiZhan Tarantula X6 review

Disclaimer: I have received the camera-less version of the Tarantula X6 quadcopter that GearBest offered for an honest review.

After I opened the box, I found that the package contained the X6 quad with preinstalled propellers, a Li-Po battery, a charger, 1 set of spare propellers, two landing skids, a remote controller, and other small accessories.

Before your first flight, you must install and secure screws the prop guards (including the LED caps), and the landing skids. Be careful when you do this, I dropped accidentally a screw inside, and I had to remove all the screws and open the quadcopter to find it. Trust me, it was a very boring process, but you should never leave it inside; metal parts can produce ugly things like short circuits that will damage your receiver board.

As I mentioned, the quadcopter’s design tries to copy a spider and is available in two colors: blue and black. The tall landing skids allow to installation of a Mobius cam or a higher-capacity battery underneath the battery door.

For better orientation, especially during night flights, the quad-copter has 7 LED lights, one under each arm, two in front of the cockpit that consolidate the spider look, and one on top of the quad. All the LED lights are blue except for the ones that are under the back arms.

According to the specs, the Tarantula X6 has 8 minutes of light time with a stock battery, but I have read it on the “RC Groups” forum about a successful 15 minutes of continuous flight. This record was achieved by installing a higher capacity 2200mAh LI-PO battery, which frankly is not bad for such an inexpensive quadcopter.

Tarantula X6: Remote controller

The transmitter is very small compared to the quadcopter’s size and looks a bit cheap. Unfortunately, I haven’t had the occasion yet to test if is compatible with other Tx protocols and if can be used in the X6 quad with Devo or Futaba transmitters.

With the top left button of the remote controller, you can set the flight speed between 3 values: 40%, 60%, and 100%. On the right of the LCD screen are two buttons, one for taking photos and one for videos, but they will work only with the stock camera.

Tarantula X6 RC controlls

The Tarantula X6’s motors are equipped with a tiny connector that is a very helpful feature when you have to replace them. It’s not required to disassembly the entire quadcopter just to replace a dead motor. The repair process will take only 5 minutes instead of one hour.

Yesterday, I was out for some test flights with the YiZhan X6, and I’m impressed by how fast, agile, and powerful it is, but I still not figured out how it can be set and how works the IOC mode.

The only negative thing I found on this quadcopter,is the lack of the On/Off button. Whenever you want to start or stop it, you must remove the battery cover and plug/unplug it.

Recommending a product to others is very easy, but the pros and cons of a product review will always be affected by the personal opinion of the writer. If I sparked your interest in this model, you can order it from GearBest. Before you click on the buy button, don’t forget to read more reviews about this quadcopter and watch some YouTube videos with it.

Tarantula X6 features and specs:

  • Big-sized powerful quadcopters, with good payload capacity can easily lift small action cameras;
  • High landing gears;
  • Anti-vibration camera mount;
  • Adjustable flight speed (40%, 60% and 100%);
  • 6-axis gyroscope;
  • Hyper IOC orientation mode;
  • LVC battery alarm;
  • In outstanding flip mode, the Tarantula X6 can flip perfectly at a height of only 1 meter;
  • LED lights for night flights (blue ones in the front and red ones in the back of the quad);
  • Flight time: around 8 minutes;
  • Control range: around 100-300 meters.

Unboxing video

To improve the control range and flight performances of my Tarantula X6 quad, I’m planning to do some hacks and mods like:

  • Adding some real ball bearings;
  • Adding a real Wi-Fi antenna instead of that tiny wire;
  • Prop balancing, I already ordered an inexpensive magnetic propeller balancer;
  • Installing a EKOO S090 camera for aerial videos;
  • FPV mod for first-person view flights.
Tarantula X6 package includes:
  • 2.4GHz remote controller;
  • 2 type of camera mounts (optional);
  • 5MP HD camera (optional);
  • 1 set of prop guards;
  • 4pcs of LED caps (2pcs red and 2pcs blue);
  • 1set of spare propellers;
  • 2bags of screws (size 1 and size 3);
  • Screwdriver;
  • 2s 1200mAh 7.4v Li-Po battery with 30c high discharge rate;
  • Balanced battery charger (2s);
  • Tarantula X6 user guide.

p.s. Just ordered a Syma X8W is another interesting big-sized quadcopter, so a side-by-side comparison between Syma X8 and Tarantula X6 will probably come next month.

REVIEW OVERVIEW
Price/performance ratio
Design and build quality
Transmitter / Range
Battery life
Features
Senior editor and co-founder of FirstQuadcopter.com. Everything started about 4 years ago when I purchased my first drone. I still own that Syma X5C . Since then I have had the luck to review and test more than 100 drones.
tarantula-x6-quadcopter-reviewThe YiZhan Tarantula X6 is big-size drone with unique spider look design. It has blue LEDs for night flights. It can carry a small size camera for video recoding. Unfortunately, equipped with brushed motors and plastic gears it is very noisy. <br> Pros<br> +Good wind resistance<br> +Visible in the dark<br> +Can carry a camera<br> <br> Cons<br> -Brushed motors;<br> -Noisy<br> -No camera<br>

25 COMMENTS

    • Sorry, does not come with any camera mount. You need to purchase it separately or improvise something.
      Anyway, I don not recommend to use the Tarantula X6 with a expensive camera like the GoPro Hero 5!. It can crashed any time and your camera is gone…

  1. I have one tx from wl toys v262 unused.
    CanIi use that transmitter for my Tarantula x6 ? I wish to rebuild tx quadcopter with this and with the existing quadcopter headless mode feature

  2. Stay away from this Tarantula X6 it is a dangerous quad-copter.
    It is very unstable with its “new. #2 board” you don’t know where it will decide it wants to go next. It will not hover at all, when it want to go forward it will or it might decide to go left or right, you just don’t know. I almost hit people because of its erratic behavior.
    There upgrade to the new board was the worst thing for this X6 drone and they have not addressed the issue nor offered the original board. This may have been a great quadcopter at one time but it is a pile of garbage now.
    Do yourself a favor and DO NOT BUY the Tarantula X6. All reviews you will read that are good are of the older model with receiver board version 1.

  3. Hello,

    Has enyone the pinout of the Camera-Connector ?
    My Camera was not working – maybe defective — I like to take another one or do other things..

    The Antenna at the X6’s TX was a Plastic-Fake.. only a little Cable with 24mm (for 2,4GHz)

  4. My tarantula X6 flashing light come and stop in mid air, put battery on tester and read 60 percent left, what is going wrong?
    Put same battery in my other tarantulax6 and it goes for a futher 5min
    Could someone give me some advice, please

  5. I have two of the Tarantulas X6. I don’t don’t use the propeller guards, but I cut them so they can support the bottom of the ends of the arms. Screw on with one screw each. Break in motors. So far, I have had them and flown them quite a bit. The larger mah battery certainly helps.
    I fly usually at 60%, as it seems plenty. I have had a couple of hairline cracks in the frame, but superglue took care of them. I just removed battery cover, filled the space with round foam pieces and use velcro strap to hold battery against them. Easy to plug in that way, if you don’t want to cut up for switch. I use clear tape on bottom arms over the gears to prevent grass and stuff getting in.
    Put in bearings. No motor replacements yet, but I have 4 spares when it is time.
    Powerful low cost drone. Xiaomi Yi camera works pretty good on it. Landing gear is pretty cheesy, but I ordered a spare set. Good low cost powerful quadcopter.
    Haven’t done fpv mods, but I might try.

  6. Purchased second Tarantula X6
    after minor crash flew than unable to bind
    hit a branch motor died, replaced new tested motor and still doesn’t work
    These quads seem to be very fragile
    any ideas?

  7. Bought mine last week. Good quadcopter apart from the damper doesnt stop jello while recording.
    I have the 5mp 1080p version .. Oh yeah i was beeing stupid today and kinda broke one of the gear (stripd 4 or 5 theeth) off it but the small motor gear still drives the main gear prity good … Guys make sure you order the wifi antenna and the screw thing off BG you will get proper range then

  8. My Tarantula x6 has great range but sometimes will just drop out of the sky. Even at close range it will drop just as if the transmitter was turned off.
    The battery has plenty of power left so that is not the issue. Has anyone experienced this and has anyone discovered what the problem or cure might be?

  9. Hey, I’ve been having the same problems understanding the manual or what all the functions do, finally found out what IOC does. It’s basically a compass that I think it is sets at start up. So when you enable IOC you fly by compass and forward moves in the direction it was originally pointing.

  10. Whats is the max controls distance for this drone out of the box? is it really 300 meters?
    what are the improvements that you suggest? I have ordered one like this, but still looking for a good 5.8 fpv alternative, also would like to make sure the 300 meters is for real or if is not, what I can do to get a better range?
    I got a little bit confused with the Ball Bearing you were talking about, where is that located in the motors?

    • It has a good control range, but I can’t tell if is 300meter (I think is less).
      IT has enough lifting power to add a Mobius or Runcam camera with a tiny 200mw TX for FPV.
      Ball bearing on the main gear not in the motor.

  11. Ok I just got my tarantula x6 in and I have been trying to do video with it but it’s not showing up although it says there’s a video clip there any ideas how to fix that

  12. Hello,
    Just wondering if anyone can please help: I have recently purchased a Tarantula X6 for my sisters birthday and all worked perfectly until about 4 days after use.
    For some reason now when increasing the throttle to power off the aircraft moves backwards and attempts to flip itself over backwards. No amount of trimming or resetting the upward straight control as per instructions works!
    Please can someone help?

    • If it seems like the X6 won’t stabilize and flies in the fashion you mention.. It’s probably one or more of the rear motors going out and cannot provide enough lift in the back to level out. When the motors are new, they require a ‘burn in’ period (these are brushed motors) at very low RPM for around 5 minutes and dust them out afterward using canned air. At least they are easy to change out and are inexpensive.
      A Google search for “X6 Tarantula motors” gives you many options for replacing these.
      Hope this helps.

  13. I added a push-button switch from Radio Shack towards the front of the X6 Quad. What a difference. Now I can easily turn ON/OFF the flying spider.

    • The X6 Flying spider needs bearings with size: 3mmx6mmx2mm. Exactly the same size that are using the WLToys V262, V333 and V666 or MJX F47 and F647.
      Look for MR63-ZZ radial bearings, the price is around $1/pcs.

    • You can get the bearings from MJX F47 F-47 F647 Helicopter Spare Parts: 023 Bearing 6x3x2.
      You will need 8, two for each motor!

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