Originally posted by floridagyro
I'm setting the mast angle at 5.5 degrees. I found that to be about minimum. I found that with minimum angle the gyro flies better, less drag, but if reduced more, the gyro struggles to get off the ground.
Great! Thanks for the insight. I had mine set at 10 degrees; I think I'm going to go with around 7 for the test flight. I have my 'gyro setup with a direct control head plus standard H/stab/elevator and V/stab/rudder. The fore-aft rotor control is controlled through ch6 flap control. I'm using an old Futaba "Gold box" tx with the linear slide pot on the flap channel so I can trim the rotor incidence while in flight. All my flying hrs. on flap equipped aircraft is with this tx so I'm pretty comfortable with it.
Assuming it makes it through the test flight in one piece and I find that I don't have enough pitch authority to suit me, I can switch Tx's to a Futaba 6XA 'puter type so I can mix in the rotor fore-aft control to the elevator.
Nudder question: I'm balancing and finishing my rotor blades this weekend; do you do all the balancing things I've seen on the 'gyro website like spanwise CG checks? This is a small machine (30" rotor dia.) I have 1 light blade of 3, can I just glue in some weight at mid span or is it imperative to go through the whole 9 yds. as depicted on the website? What's your opinion of iron-on film covering for blades? Sorry 'bout all the dumb questions!