It wasn’t long after Siccario was created that requests for a 10” version came along. I didn’t want to just scale up Siccario, so I thought about ways that a 10” version should be different.

With a bigger wheelbase the camera would have to move forward to keep props out of view, and then the battery would have to move back for balance. I didn’t want the mass to spread out like a barbell – after all, the very concept of the Siccario was perfectly centralized mass. So I got the crazy idea of overlapping the props so that the wheelbase would be no longer than the Siccario. I have no idea how inefficient all that dirty air would make it, but it was worth a try.

One of the cool things about Siccario is that it’s an X8 that doesn’t need landing gear. But with the taller 31xx stators that would go on this frame, the prop would get closer to the ground. It would need some short little legs. Ages ago, when I first started making my own frames, I had an idea for a vertical arm pusher frame with arms shaped like this:

There was no reason for the design except I wanted to make something that looked like a tarantula. I never actually made it, but that arm shape would be perfect here.

I whipped up something with 12mm arms. The overlapping props looked like a Venn diagram so we called it Venn or Vengeance.

The rear arms are taller than the front arms so the props can overlap.

Looka those wacky staggered arms. Yes, all those holes had to go.

I sent the parts to Clint to build up. This was our first experience with 8s and APD esc’s, and I’m so glad I asked Clint to build it. I would’ve lost my mind dealing with those esc’s. Clint noted how the motors were Brotherhobby 3115’s were way more massive than anything we’ve used before, almost frighteningly so. We couldn’t find many options in 10” so Clint found some Master Airscrew bi blades.

Justin and I took it out, loaded it up with batteries for dummy weight, and it flew fine. Right about this time was when people started putting bigger motors on Siccario and finding that the arms needed bracing. so we suspected that these arms wouldn’t be stiff enough. Sure enough, after a few flights we could feel that the arms felt flexier, as if the motors were slowly de-lamming them.

With the motor mounts at different heights there wasn’t an easy way to brace the arms. Luckily for me, people were starting to add live video transmission to their rigs, so a little space between the cam and the battery became a good thing. So for the next revision I evened up the arms, increased their thickness to 14mm, removed all the weight saving holes and double braced them.

The outer braces eventually moved to the middle of the motor mounts. The inner braces double as a spot for GPS.

We moved the parts over to the new frame, and Troy Naquin built up a 12s version. Just for fun I gave it paws.

People heard about the frame before it was released, and quite a few got out in the world and went to work. Alex Johnston was the first to put a Ronin on it. Check out these builds by Sergi Ros for Base Films.