Hey Guys,

Just wanted to poll all those out there that have fully tweaked their CX2's.
Is it just me or do you find your modded heli's are even more sensitive to balance than ever before. Mine is super sensitive now I find. I had to replace a blade tonight and was just happy to be flying so I didn't take the time to balance them out. The first bat she wasn't far off however I noticed she would creep around on me in a hover. Nothing I couldn't handle but when I'm flying precision in my garage a little off can feel like a totally unbalanced heli. Between bats 1 and 2 I took the time to balance a set of lower blades and install. Bat number 2 she was a whole different bird! She would hover in spot without any input from the tx zero creep....just hang there! And I could drop her on a dime....well the dime would blow away from rotor wash but you get the point Just wanted to know if everyone else is seeing the same type of performance curve? I'm still blown away at the difference in flight from the out of the box version to a modded version.

What have I done you ask? From the top down,
-Shortened the flybar & modified the weights
-cnc upper and lowers
-cnc swash plate
-cf tailboom
-motor heatsink
-ported canopy for cooling

Up next.... Xtreme 180 motors!

How do you balance the plastic blades?

The secret is packing tape I have two pieces of wood side to side and balance the blades from the pivots. I'll add packing tape to the underside of the lighter blade until they sit in perfect balance. I wish I could find the thread that has pictures on it that illustrates it very well. I'll do some searching and see what I can find.

Stump3r; That's the same way most of us 'static' balance the blades! I balance them on soupcans or wineglasses, but effect is identical . Personally, i do a check when spinning the blades at 'lift-speeds' too, just to be sure. Sometimes you'll see that you have to add or reduce weight again to get the centrifugal balance right too.

T9Dragon; [link]http://cx2.r-2.nl[/link] has Soloboss' blade balancing procedure

My current mods:
- Shortened the flybar & adjustable weights (still too heavy for my likings
- CNC upper and lowerheads
- Motor heatsink
- Vented 4-in-1 (several 3mm holes in top, front and bottom)

Upcoming:
- Xtreme 180 motors
- Xtreme CX2 kit (canopy (going with a carbonfinish), skids, cf boom)
- CNC swash plate
- 'Expanded' 4-in-1 (with heatsinks on FETs, or different FETs if i dare too... Too bad Mrasmm isn't in the neighbourhood )
- Modified batterytray (to fit larger LiPo's, not sure what's the best way to go, already messed up one tray...)

I have two CX2's. The first one is almost completely stock, with the exception of a heat sink and unbreakable skids. She flies great - very stable - but is way different than my modded CX2. The latter Heli has"

CF Tail boom
Unbreakable skids
X180 motors
Heat sink
E-Flite aluminum uppers, lowers and swash
Ventilated canopy

Hopefully I will receive my next upgrade in the mail today, which is the shortened flybar with LED light paddles!

If I don't sell the first CX2 soon, I think that I might go with the Xtreme core kit on that one, along with X180 motors.

Well I have alum. upper and lower, swash. Xtrem 180 motors and alum heat sink. Shortened flybar with adjustable weights.CF boom and unbreakable skids. Well vented 4in 1 case and vented canopy. Tried the plastic blade grips with Xtreme blades but didn't like the way it flew, lots of TBE, and liked to drift all over during hover. Also the blades not breaking cause the heli to take all the impact and started to break lots of other parts that cost more.

Yeah, I have read a lot about the Xtreme core with the Lama style blade grips. I don't think that is a direction I am going to go. I will probably end up with the longer inner/outer shaft upgrades, though.

You'll love those extreme motors; with a vented canopy, I can run battery to battery without too much heat build up.

Just got my LED flybar, shortened flybar links and ultr-flex skids from BoomTown! Here are pix of them in their packages. I will, of course, post more aafter I install them!

I love my Boomtown skids but my battery tray doesn't!

Islels, what do you mean the battery tray doesn't?

The stock skids will brake and take the impact of hitting the ground. The boomtown skids flex quite alot and transfer the extra energy into the battery tray that they are connected to. After a few hard landings I had destroyed my battery tray. I love the skids though.

BryFlyGuy67, Alright there guy, I know you got a video camera, seen your video's...Soooooo, how about another vid of them there LED flybar paddles eh ?! That's got to be a sight to see ! Maybe toy with the neighbors a little at night ?!

Just get some velcro and make a securing strap. See pix for how I did mine. I have flex skids and suffered from broken battery trays until I did this. Cost < $2.

Okay, okay.... Here is what I have so far concerning the LED flybar paddles and shortened flybar links.

#1: Looks.

Really cool. Just how I'd imagined it. See pix and video for more. Video link in 2nd post.

Here is a link to a very short video:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...83215799983835

Looks good BryFlyGuy! I wonder if blade clack is worse, better, or the same with those ? Curious...Hmmmm...Well, keeps us informed, I'am going to look them up and see what the weight is, if listed for those.. Alright, thanks a lot...Can't wait until you get your blade 400 (I think you ordered one if I remember right) So ya can put up a vid of that beast ! Take care...Jeff

Okay, now that the pictures and videos have been dispensed with, I have to say that the LED flybar mod was not easy to install.

Please understand that I do not mean that it was physically difficult to install the paddles and shortened flybar. That part was easy.

The part that was (and still is) hard is balancing the two sides of the flybar. When I first installed the paddles, I had a TERRIBLE TBE going on! [:-] I had to slowly alternate between screwing the paddles in and out in an ad-hoc effort to balance the flybar.

Let me make this clear: Initially - post mod - the Heli was not fly-able. I even broke the nose of one of my favorite red canopies because the Heli, all of a sudden, nosed-down in the middle of a TBE.

All this said, I do feel that I will be able to make this mod work because I have a digital caliper and have occasional access to a 0.1 gram sensitive scale. I was able to "dial in" the paddles to reasonable flight characteristics by hand over the course of several adjustments and subsequent flight attempts. However, at this time, I cannot recommend this modification to novices. If Jaime from BoomTown can provide any instructions, I would appreciate it. My guess is that there are no instructions and it is assumed that this is an advanced modification and the consumer is able to deal with these challenges.

I will post more tomorrow after I have had more chance to adjust the flybar.

By the way, I just wanted to say that in the video, I was alternately giving it full right, left and then center yaw. I don't want people to be confused that the shown blade rotation was "normal". This was done for informational purposes only.

Oh, be ASSURED that I will be working on a FULL (images and video) review of the Blade 400 when it comes out! I can't wait! [8D]

adding to the Poll...my fully tweaked/modded CX2 and fly mainly outdoors

Xtreme180 motor
all alum head/lower/swash
shorten/lightened flybar
homebrew tail and landing skids
velcro batt holder

Thanks for the tip!

That's a nice heli you've got there.