cwharper

I have the Futaba T4EXA (that's what it says on the transmitter) and the Futaba R168DF receiver. It came with the Electristar RTF package already connected on channel 44. I live in a remote area with no one else around for miles flying anything. When I checked out the servo and throttle response all the channels except for ailerons seemed to need reversing. So I did reverse all channels except for ailerons and it solved the problem. But is this normal to have to do this and does it affect the trim functions?

DMcQuinn

My Feedback: (13)

It is odd that a ready-to-fly system would need any servos reversed from the factory settings. was this purchased completely ready-to-fly from an original reseller. or was it purchased used? If you bought the radio system separately from the airplane, then it is normal to have to reverse some servo travel directions. Trimming can be affected. But you must get the servo direction correct first, and then trim afterwards.

davewallace

My Feedback: (29)

McQuinn,
No, it won't effect the trim. It is always a good idea to check the flight controls for proper direction and functionallity. Check them on or before taxi out to fly. This way you won't crash because of a unconnected aileron etc.

Dave

Bob Pastorello

My Feedback: (198)

Put the airplane in front of you on the ground. Stand behind it with the antenna extended, pointing straight ahead. Pull the elevator stick toward you... the trailing edge of the elevator should go UP. Push the rudder stick LEFT, the rudder trailing edge should go LEFT. Push the AILERON RIGHT, and the RIGHT wing aileron trailing edge should go UP.

I've been in this game for many, many years, and I STILL do that simple control check, standing behind my 30% gassers, before each and every flight. Simple check to save a disaster.

heli_Rod

If you are in the least unsure about the controls, DO NOT try to fly it until you KNOW they are correct.You can't imagine over the years how many models I've seen people destroy on the first flight because of reversed controls.

If this is a new ARF, I don't understand why they would be reversed either. aerobob gave you sound advise to check the controls.

Reversing the controls won't affect the trim unless the radio has electronic SUB TRIMS and they have already been adjusted.

If you have more questions, please don't hesitste to ask.

If you're new to R/C and there is no one around to help you, you might consider buying a good flight simulator. While they are somewhat pricey, one crash can easily cover the cost.

Rod

cwharper

Thanks everyone. I've been playing with the Realflight G3.5 for quite a while before I got this plane. I do have some knowledge of air flow physics and believe me I played with the controls for at least half an hour to make sure that what the plane was doing was correct to what I was doing with the transmitter. The only other flight experience I have is about four years playing the Microsoft Flight Simulator and that has taught me a great deal about how a plane reponds in air. I made one short flight circled around and landed. The plane survived without a scratch. I was a nervous wreck though. I'm going to meet up with a friend who has a trainer cord that can talk to my box before I do anymore flying and maybe that will get me past the nervous stage.

Rodney

A lot depends on the servos you are using, different brands turn in different directions with the identical input. For instance, Hitec and Futaba turn in the opposite directions.

Rempshaker

Hi CW. I recently purchased an Electristar. Put it together in about an hour and all control surfaces functioned properly with no reversing needed. For some unexplained reason, two days later all of the servos reversed during the night (except ailerons) and the brake function was activated. I still don't know why it happened. In fact, I started to question my sanity until I saw your post. I've had no problems since. In fact, today I flew the plane for the first time. The only training I had was about 200 hours on RealFlight 3.5. I know this is not recommended but I'm not close to an R/C club. The simulator does a great job as I was able to confidently pilot the plane with no problems. In fact, I think landing is easier "in real life" than on the simulator. I will say that the controls are more 3D than the simulator leads you to believe - very little stick travel is needed to make the plane turn and climb. I would recommend setting the exponential between -25 and -50 to smooth it out. The plane is a joy to fly and whisper quiet. You're gonna love it! Good Luck!!!

Zeeb

My Feedback: (41)

Couple of thoughts here for you to consider...

While I don't have any experience with the Electristar, I did start out with the Nexstar so this may or may not be directly applicable.

I had to reverse three of the four servos on the tx of the Nexstar. The tx that came with the Nexstar was not capable of exponential. While it is not usual for the neutrals to change if you reverse the servos, if you've set a trim before reversing them the trim will be reversed as well. This has to do with not only the fact that the default direction of travel on different brand servos can be reversed, but also depends on what side of the servo the arm is located on.

These are minor difficulties if you remember as has already been said, that you verify servo and control surface direction of travel, neutrals and travel endpoints per the manual before flight. The other thing we found on my Nexstar (I had a friend who helped me get started) is that the nylon rod ends on the surfaces are not very, shall we say, reliable? My friend replaced all those ends with the Sullivan metal clevis's before we flew it.

I spent about 12 hours with the included sim before we flew the model and then soloed on my third flight with the model. I still use my G3.5 sim all the time and I would recommend that you continue to do so as well. Since the price of the full G3.5 sim program is about the price of one saved entry level model and it will allow you to practice new maneuvers I think it's a really good investment. Just remember when you get to the real model you can't fix a crash with a press of the red reset button...

Welcome to the forum and I hope you have fun with the hobby!

itchycods

Hi, I'm new to these forums and also new to the RC sport, but I figure maybe what I went through might help someone else out. After assembling my Electristar, I powered up to check all the control surfaces, and my elevator immediately went all the way down. I scratched my head, recentered everything, and turned it back on, and the same thing happened again. This time I left it on longer and you could hear the servo buzzing like it was all the way maxxed out. I repositioned everything I could think of, thinking I had some sort of RFI going on, but nothing worked. I swapped the rudder servo to the elevator channel, and lo and behold, the rudder went all the way over and buzzed as well. So, I'm thinking I had a bad reciever. A buddy had a different reciever handy, so we swapped my crystal and connected his reciever and the same thing happened. All of a sudden, it donned on us the transmitter was doing it. We tried his TX/Xtal, and my Rx and everything worked fine. I emailed Hobbico, and found out that my saviour's name was Adam. Guess what, the transmitter was in stick mode 1 right out of the box!! I simply swapped to mode 2 and everything was fine, or so I thought...

During all my headscratching and direction reading, I tried resetting the Tx memory, so the first time I powered up, the left stick was all the way down (read WOT). About the time the ESC beeped a couple of times, I realized the motor was being powered up. Luckily I was able to grab the tail as it rocketed across the table!! The only thing that got chewed up was my styrofoam Tx box. After catching my breath, and realizing what happened, I reversed the throttle channel and everything was fine again, or so I thought...

I found that I, too, had to reverse the rudder and elevator channels, but not the ailerons. I attributed it to me resetting the Tx memory, but who knows?? Anyway, I hope maybe I can save someone else some hairpulling (or a finger) by telling my nightmare.

BTW, my maiden today went well, except for the ESC shutting off the motor after about 3 minutes.... I'm still trying to figure that one out. I got a heck of a confidence boost when I landed my first dead-stick, though!!

Regards all, Mike.

cwharper

Rempshaker, yes that's exactly what happened to my Electristar. It worked fine brand new out of the box. Then the next week when I went to power it up I wound up with the brake function on and everything except ailerons were reversed. It took me a while to figure out that because the throttle had reversed (at the plane) the ESC was seeing left stick up even though transmitter left stick was down and that caused it to go into programming mode then my stick movements after that somehow turned on the brake and armed the ESC. Luckily I had put bricks in front of the wheel so the plane didn't go anywhere. Then somehow I got the notion to reverse the throttle channel so I could follow the directions from the manual to get the brake off. Even now though all channels except ailerons are still reversed, but it has had no effect as far as I can see on it's ability to fly. Rempshaker, are you channels still reversed?

Rempshaker

Hi CW. Pretty weird, huh? My channels are still reversed, but I've seen no ill-affects after 3 flights. I'm sure there is a logical explanation. FYI, I posted a video of my first flight on the member video post section. I think it helps to watch the plane you bought actually flown by normal people - not experts doing product reviews. Center and check the control surfaces, verify the CG, and this plane will fly if you let it.

cwharper

Well, I've upgraded the radio in my Electristar to the Futaba 6 channel FASST 2.4 ghz system which also means a new receiver (didn't want to get shot down by someone turning on their transmitter from across town which I can't see). The channels are still reversed with the new system except ailerons. I've just about come to the conclusion that Hobbico had prepgrammed the radio so it would work correctly out of the box and somehow I managed to reset the radio back to default.