ORIGINAL: HelisRule
Q1: Stock battery; will it discharge over time even if not used
Yes, but its normal for NiMH. The best thing to do is charge before use. Li-Po's have a much slower self-discharge rate so they can be charged and used later.
do I need to keep it plugged into charger during long periods in hangar?
That's a bad idea. Batteries shouldn't be left on a charger for long periods of time especially unattended.
Could I have overdischarged it at some point and damaged it?
Unlikely since the ESC will cut power at a preset voltage. Overcharging is unliklely as well if using the stock charger since it's a peak charger.
Q2: Tail rotor; if I turn it with my finger it feels very notchy, not smooth at all. Almost as if the gear teeth are too big for the blade gear or the motor itself is not turning smoothly. Is that normal? Everything feels tight in the tail, i.e. motor mount screws tight. And tail spins up but I think it may sound different; not sure.
Though the spur gear and pinion don't seem to be exactly the same pitch they work OK. It's really the magnets in the tail motor causing the notchy feel. So yes it's normal.
Q3: Throttle; When I start to throttle up, the blades start turning, but not like they used to, and just past mid-stick power drops off. I've noticed a degradation in power at the top end of the stick from day one as the battery got weaker, but now it's almost like turning off a switch; once I start going past dead center with the throttle stick, power just drops off and everything pretty much stops. If I back the stick back down to bottom and then start up again the blades start turning but then stop after center stick.
Sounds like a battery issue. It doesn't have a good charge. As mentioned earlier the ESC has an LV cut-off that seems to be tripping causing your power to cut out. This can be caused by a faulty pack or charger. Or if you partially charged the pack or didn't run it out before recharging it may have developed memory. It doesn't take much.
Q4: E-board POTs; really need help here. I'm 99% sure I have the middle one back at factory position but not sure about the bottom one. Before I stupidly started messing with them, the middle one was at about 12:30. Turning it counter-clockwise I could only go to about 10:00 before it stopped, so I'm pretty certain I have that one where it was. Unfortunately, the bottom one is where I'm unsure. I know it was originally just a hair beyond the middle one, like the 1:00 position, but I don't know what the relative counter-clockwise dead stop position was. I don't think it was as close as 10:00 so perhaps that POT was closer to its mid range? Does anyone know where these POTs should be from factory? Would having these POTs off have anything to do with my power problem?
The pots are different on every heli. There is no standardized position for them. They only affect the tail rotor though so they have nothing to do with the power cutting off. You know what they all do from the manual so I'll only add that turning them CCW increases them. I replaced the board a long time ago with "seperates" because though it worked OK three adjustments for the tail is ridiculous and an HH gyro made the Axe easier to fly.
Q5: Head: shakes pretty good upon start-up. Used to do that when the blades first started spinning but would level off and track nicely by half-stick. Now doesn't seem to be enough power to come out of it, or is there something else going on here? Like I said, nothing looks bent or out of whack and my last crash didn't appear that severe.
Given you didn't bend anything when you crashed it could be the low power isn't giving the blades enough centrifugal force to straighten out. On the other hand a bent mainshaft or feathering spindle could cause the vibration. Either way I would wait until power issues are resolved before addressing this issue.