ORIGINAL: dooleyje
ORIGINAL: Magic Hook
Night flying sounds like great fun. That is on my must try list for sure.
I have a question about my 450 v2. I just put it back together after putting in a new swash, Microheli pitch slider, tail tail shaft, new links & ball links, belt, and went through setting up the head setup. I p & r all the screws with new thread loc, & CA. I also adjusted the gyro limit to 90%. It was at 110. I found the travel was to much. Its got about 250 flights with two hard wrecks. I decided it was time for some TLC. The tail had a unpleasent twitch with a fresh lipo at lift off until I started ff then it would go away. The Align pitch slider gets some slop pretty quick where the ball attaches that's why the upgrade there, the swash had lot of slop, and the links were cheap so I did that as well while I was checking all the wear points. I run the white Align CF blades. Twitch is now gone, and the heli is very stable EXCEPT, when I go idle up1, Heli turns pretty hard left. I have to hold right rudder or it will go 3/4 turn side in. Any input would be appreciated.
The tail on the Trex is a funny animal and a sticking point for more than one person. It simply does not hold that well will banging hard on power. In order to get a better holding the headspeed needs to come up but you have to limit that to the blades used and your flying skills. You can weight counterbalance the tail rotor blade grips as mentioned in earlier post and that works really well. First lets look at your tail set up. What tail servo are you using also what gyro are you using. The servo must match the frame rate of the gyro and be digital with a speed of at least .10 sec, If you are using the 401 then you need a JR3400, Futaba 9257, 3154 and if you are using 6V bec the9650. Spend the money here for sure. The other thing is that the programming may not be correct. It really sounds like you still have the heli in rate mode. What radio system are you using and how do you have the gyro programmed? Remember that 90 and 110 sounds like you are adjusting your travel limit and not your gyro rates. Gyro adjustment is a seperate program on some radios and with some you need to adjust the gear channel travel plus or minus 100. You 90 my be -90 so try switching your gear switch the other way. 90 in rate mode only equates to about 60%-75% gyro gain. With the arms I have my gyros are set at 73-75. The shorter the sevo are the more accurate the tail and your tail reaction will be better. My 9257 sevos are set at 6mm and my 3154 servos are set to 8mm. The arm selection is slim pickings when it come to using the 3154 and thats the shortest I could get. The 6mm lenght actually holds alot better than the longer arm and the left hand swing is minimum when banging the throttle.
Jay is in the woods again have fun my buddy. We are planning to vacation at the end of Aug through the first week in Sept.
Chris: As with any HH type gyro you must not program in any trim what so ever. You adjust the tail rod by moving the tail servo on the boom for tail boom mounted servo and adjust the linkage for frame mounted. The tail must be centered. The gyro will adjust as it needs to. The guys here do night flying with about anything you can think of. They use night blades and tiny string lites. The wait till is is absoluty pitch black before they start. Its the cooliest thing I have seen with the string lights.
Later,
Jim
Hey Jim,
When I mentioned "trimming right" I do it mechanically with about 7-9 degrees pitch right. I also remember reading about not using end point or travel on your radio as it will slow the piro rate down on a HH. Not quite sure which one as I don't mess with mine. I believe it was travel and when I tweaked it down the servo movement slowed down so I just left it alone. I'm in the process of making a rotating beacon out of an ole Lama servo motors. The one with the planetary gearbox on the end. I priced one at about $30 and figured I could make one instead. I am wrapping it in electrical tape and running two starnds of stripped wire around the can. Then I hope to glue the LED to the cog on the servo and run the leads so they run on the wires. I let you know if it works out. BP Hobbies finally got in there blinking LED circuit for 12 bucks! I will be using it for some flashing NAV lights on the canopy and upper and lower red lights. I was a radio shack last night and they had some jumbo 10MM red LEDs for like $2 which I might use. flightlights.net has some nice light kits but they are a little pricey. I love their strobing white tail light though. I have been researching how to fabricate my own strobe circuit as well. When I can afford it, I want to scale out my Hawk with a Augusta 109 fuse or Long Ranger. Century makes some very nice fuses but they cost as much as the helo. [&:]
Chris