BigTb17

I purchased a Blade mSR BNF at my LHS a couple days ago. I bound it to my DX7 and hovered it in my living room to get a feel for it and set the trims.

It seemed to work fine, but I noticed a strange humming/whining noise (high pitched, strange noise) coming from it. I grabbed it and checked it out and it's coming from the tail motor. I unplugged the battery and the tail motor was noticeably warm. The Li-Po battery was also noticeably warm. I may not have thought anything of it if I had been pushing it hard for 5-10 minutes. If that was the case I could somewhat understand the battery and tail motor getting a bit warm. However, I had only been hovering it, and only for a minute or so.

The tail rotor seems to spin fine, with no noticeable binding or anything, and it seems to hover straight and stable. If I had noticed the battery or motor being warm I may not have thought much of it. If I had heard the motor making a noise I may not have given it much thought. But since I found the motor and battery warm, and the motor was making noise, I thought it better to play it safe.

I put in an e-mail to Horizon product support and haven't flown it since just in case. I was just wondering if anybody else has noticed this with an mSR. If the general concensus is that this is normal I may continue flying it until I hear back from Horizon. But I didn't want to take a chance running it and burning out a motor or battery.

speedy72vega

I know my battery is warm after flying mine, but I haven't checked the motors. My battery is warm after running it for several minutes though, not just after 1 minute. Mine does make some noise while it's running too, but it's just from the gears meshing, not the tail motor.
Keep us posted on what HH has to say, i'm curious.

Aircraftfreak15

this is why iam wating till x-mas or after to get this new heli

jdubdub

Yes the tail rotor makes alot of noise- Kind of reminds me of a giant mosquito! These coreless motors spin very fast and are able to change speeds in an instant. This is part of the reason this heli is so successful, unlike alot of other tail motor style fixed pitch birds. One thing I noticed is when I did the heatshrink mod to the tail, it quieted down ALOT! If you haven't heard of this mod, it's simply a piece of shrink tube (I used 1/2 " dia.) placed over the wired end of the tail motor to prevent the end cap from coming off in a crash. Just do a search for msr tail rotor mod to see pics. of what I mean. Seems to serve double duty, and well worth doing even before you have problems.

BigTb17

Does anybody elses tail motor get warm after even a brief flight?

I suppose if other people's tail rotor gets warm I won't worry about it since it seems to fly ok. If something fails I'll deal with it. I'm sick of not flying my new helicopter, haha.

jwroot

on my second flight the damn thing started to spin in circles so fast then veered to the right and hit the wall before I could react. Apparently the tail rotor quit. Before that happened it was very stable.

Anyone know of issue?

speedy72vega

I flew mine about 10 times yesterday, and the tail motor was barely warm, even after 6 or 7 min of flying. Sounds like something might be wrong with yours.

BigTb17

Yeah, I flew it for a bit longer last night (still didn't even run it for a full battery) and the tail motor was much warmer than the first time. Still not super hot, but it was obviously getting warmer the longer I flew, so I would guess there is an issue.

Still waiting to hear back from Horizon. I sent the e-mail on Saturday and got an automated response telling me that it may take 3-4 buisness days for a proper response. I guess I'll wait to hear back from them, if they aren't any help, I may look into an exchange from the LHS, or maybe see if they have replacement tail motors.

It's a shame.

speedy72vega

The replacement tail motor is available, it comes in one piece with the tail boom for about 15 bucks.

BigTb17

I got a reply from Horizon today. As I figured, they said it's normal for the motor to get warm during use, and to let them know if I have any further problems. Since I freely admit that it seems to fly ok, there really isn't anything more they could say.

I have a tail motor on order at my LHS just in case. I'm going to just fly and enjoy and if it fails so be it, I'll deal with it then. At least I'll already have a new one coming if that happens. If it doesn't fail, great. Never hurts to have spare parts.

Thanks for the replies. I'll update this if it does fail.

jwroot

but if your tail rotor went out on you during your second flight what would you do then?

BigTb17

Where did you buy it? If you purchased it at a local hobby shop, you could try taking it there and showing them the problem. They may be able to help you with a replacement part or possibly an exchange (depending on their policy). If they can't provide you with a solution to your satisfaction then the next step would be to call or e-mail Horizon Product Support.

z24nemesis

My Feedback: (1)

Mine suffered a motor failure after the first 5 min fllight tonight. The end cap or the "brush" end had come loose and she spun out of control to the scene. I will have to go down to hobbytown to see what they can do for me. This is only the 5th flight and it happened in flight. Oh well.....fun little chopper.

BigTb17

I flew my mSR for 3 batteries outside (twice in way too much wind ) and so far it's holding up ok. I'll be flying it more this weekend hopefully, so I'll report back if I have any issues.

I had the tail motor on my Blade CP Pro do that same thing once (the end cap came off the motor). I was able to carefully re-assemble it and glue it, it worked fine after that. Don't know if you'd have the same luck with such a tiny motor.

flyermark

My Feedback: (19)

I haven't heard of the shrink tube modification. Is there a thread on it? I picked one of these up this week and want to do the mod before I start to fly it. It is my first non-coaxial heli so I will be practicing my hovering first.

BigTb17

Alright, new issue. The upper and lower parts of my swashplate have seperated (don't know why). I can push them back together, but they come apart again in flight very quickly. Basically, the upper part slips into the bearing in the lower part. There is no evidence of what held them together originally, and I may try gluing them before buying another.

Anybody else have this problem? I don't know what caused it to seperate, but when it does it causes virtually total loss of pitch and roll control.

jwroot

Horizon took great care of me and I thank them for it.

This little bird is a joy to fly.