Hello

I have been using my new Walkera 4#3B for about 5 days now ...


General impression ... I like it !!!

About me: I consider myself an advanced beginner (can handle a coax reasonably well now).

After unpacking I trimmed the flybar (was about 0.5mm off center), and after ~2days I improved the flybar paddles, when I learned how they are mounted.

Flight behaviour is still a challenge for me, but very stable if trimmed well, and I was excited that I was able to handle the heli with only my coax experience.

It took me only about 3x10min of flight time to hover more than just a view seconds and keep it in place within a range of <1x1m.

So here are my general remarks, and experiences ...

Pro:
- good manufacturing:ws:
- stable flight:ws:
- silent, but still a nice realistic rotor sound:ws::ws:
- quite crash resistant:ws::ws:
- 2.4G RC works very well without any disturbances:ws:
- flight time very well (9+min):ws::ws:


Not so nice:
- the fixing of the shaft, tends to come loose quite easily, which
then causes the gear to drop below engine and the swash plate
to loose control. (hard to fix the screw !!):sad::sad:
- tail rotor comes loose almost after every landing:sad:
- screw of 1 rotor blade fix lost hold after only 2 blade changes:mad:
--> used a screw of a 5#6 blade holder as replacement,
which is a bit bigger and longer
- manual has errors, wrong pictures, :confused: ...
- desription of necessary trimming too short :(
(check on the web for better How To)
e.g. how to align flybar paddles ?
- useless screwdriver in package :confused:


Wishlist for packaging:
- at least 2 sets of spare rotor blades
- screw driver which fits the screws used
- improved fixing of shaft


Tips and tricks:
- The tendency for left-shift at takeoff (caused by tail rotor) can easily be compansated by a little right tip on the cyclic control

- It is easier to hover if you move cyclic always a bit, kind of randomly, instead of waiting for the heli to move and react on that

- power down situations are less stable than power up situations. It does a good job for me to increase throttle (not too much) whenever I tend to loose control in a hover


Hardware situation after 5 days (~15 accu charges):

- ~20-30 crashes, out of which 5 quite hard
- 3 broken rotor blades, (fixed all with tape and super glue, works perfectly!!)
- 1 rotor blade holder screw replaced (lost grip in holder !!!) the worst problem !!!
- landing gear bent, and fixed
- canopy broken at front (fixed with tape)
- tip of carbon stick below tail rotor is soft now (much better than new)

So still flying almost without spare parts (blade mounting screw)

Michael

Well, as the title says, it has been about 2 weeks since I flew my T-rex 450SE V2. I flew it 2 days in a row with short bouts of being inverted (on purpose). Well, I completed my repairs right away but I've been busy doing other things. I finally decided to get Rex in the air and I can't believe how nervous I was. My hands were shaking. I didn't have any confidence. Truly unbelievable! Even flying figure 8s was nerve racking.

I don't think I was a great pilot but I was making progress. Now I feel like I'm back at step one. I think there is a lesson here; don't wait so long between flights.

I bought a Honeybee King II. I am newbe and need a lot of stick time to learn. Following Radd I am not going very far. The battery only lasts a few minutes and takes 3 hours to charge. So this is going to take for ever. I can't buy more batteries just yet.
Question 1: The directions say to charge for only 2 hours. Do I have to charge for 2 hours, unplug and let it sit, and then charge the last hour?
Question 2: If no, then can I leave it on the charger over night? In other words when the light changes from blinking charge to steady green is it still charging?
Question 3: The Lipo pack is 11.1 volts. Can I run the helicopter off of 12 volt car battery so I can get more stick time?

thanks
Lee

I am new to helis and may not be able to locate an instructor until the fall.
I would like to purchase an entry level micro-heli that I could try teaching myself to fly. I have experience with fixed wing aircraft but have never flown a helicoptor.
Any suggestions about a good starter?
Is it true that a dual rotor (counter-rotating) model might be very easy to fly initially but make to transition to single rotor/tail rotor more difficult?
Thanks in advance.
Any help is appreciated.
Chuck

Just wanted to share some pics.
Standard King II with Darth MD500 fuselage and Nav lights.
Inflight vid done using a Flycam.

Video here
Click here to watch RC-Helicopter-MD500E-King-II

Ok, so, more dumb questions...

My gyro is setup on the aux2 channel, I have 0 set to 72% and 1 set to 28%. F-Mode on all is 0. Now, since its on the gear channel, if I hit the aux switch and change it to 1. will that change the gyro sensitivity to 28% ? or since its set to auto, will it jsut use the F-Mode for the mode i'm in ?

Ok, so, I've heard expo can be a good thing for a newbie aswell. So, I went through the menus and looked. The guy that set this thing up has +20% expo setup, but its set to off on the curves.. Does that mean its not using expo on the cyclic at all? or is that just throttle expo?

Ok, 1 more about expo, i see that it says in the section labeled auto d/r expo
norm is set to p0, st1/2 are both p-2 and hold is inhibited... what in the world is this referring to.. I just found the expo setting on the swash mix page too.. not sure what its for...

I dont have a manual for this thing, so, if someone could completly explain the the process of setting up expo. I would really appreciate it!!

Thanks !!!

-Tony

So, as described in my other posts, i purchased a used trex 450se v2. This is my first heli, and yes, I am going to spend 20+ hrs in the sim (already started on this and realize its going to be a month)+ do Radds before taking it off the ground.

But, before I even start Radds, what should I look for as far as build problems. As you can see from the other post here, I already found one. I also see that the flight bar is rusted, but I'm not too worried about that.. I'll probably be bending it soon enough.

Should I tear down the frame and look for thread lock? Or just take a few random connections out and double check? The guy that built it says he has built several, but I worry after finding the reversed banana plugs.


Thanks for the advice.

-Tony

So, I just bought a used Heli (it is my first) and the banana plug connection between the ESC and the Motor is done, in what I would consider a dangerous fashion.

The Male banana plugs are on the ESC side, and the female connectors are on the motor side. Would it be worth it to get a banana plug kit and re solder these connections? I know there are going to be times when I want to run the cyclic indoors and need to disconnect the motor.. so.. what do you guys recommend ? Tape? Or re solder ?

-T

Paddle wheel control flame, swash plate, and rotorhead/blade grip assembly...such as seen here: http://www.xtremecx2.com/servlet/the...tch/Categories

Will a stock HBFP with a stock 8.4v NiMH 650mAh be able to lift off with those? I'm wondering how effective these would be in a crash - it is less parts to break, though I'm not sure what it would taken to bend the aluminum parts, either. Does anyone have them?

Starting to wonder about this chopper in general, and I'm a little ticked cuz I payed too much for it. Anyway, it wobbles like crazy. Seems to be wobbling along a diagonal axis somehow. I recently replaced the spindle and the main shaft which were bent in a crash. What else could be out of shape?

As far as I can tell, the blades are tracking right, and everything is balanced. I don't see any vibration when the blades spin up - only this weird wobbling in the air. Back and forth, tail bobbing up and down too. If I put in a lot of cyclic it will stop as the helicopter starts moving, but when I slow down and hover, it starts bobbing all over the place.

Also, I think the pitch curve might be off somehow because the helicopter has a lot less lift than it did before.

I came across these setup video's for new HBK2 owners and there is a lot of useful info. Good view if you have a new heli ready to fly.

Setup One
YouTube Video ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.


Setup Two
YouTube Video ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.

Setup Three
YouTube Video ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.

Setup Four
YouTube Video ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.

Setup Five
YouTube Video ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.

Setup Six - Test Hover
YouTube Video ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.

At a fun fly in L A yesterday my 10 yr. old son didn't win a prize in the raffell but a kindly man saw his enthusiasim for R/C and asked me if it was alright to give him a ARF Zoom 400 micro helo.That he had won and knew better than to start a Helo hobby . I don't know what came over me I shoulda said no thank you I've been down this road before and I'm not going there again.But how can you do that with your kid standing there grinning ear to ear. I took up nitro helos in the 80's (Kalt baron 25 and UPC cCobra 50) after hundreds of hours of practice and hundreds of $ in parts I could hover and fly a simple figure 8 out in front of myself.Yeah .The memory of the effort to accomplish these amazing feats of piloting skill has not faded . Now I get to relearn myself and help teach a 10 yr old boy. Shucks anybody wanna buy a new ARF Zoom 400 lol? O K anybody try to learn or flown one? Anybody feel my apprehension and sympathise with me? Woe is me. There was a JR digital Ultra-Torque micro servo #DS368 in the box I am assuming thats for Gyro controlled rudder servo. I will say one thing my son has installed the servos ,connected the control rods (with E-z connectors ) and stuck on the stickers all by himself.
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Normally I don't do cross-posts but in this case ...
http://www.wattflyer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=35538

Vriendelijke groeten ;) Ron van Sommeren
• brushless motor building tips & tricks
• diy brushless motor discussion group
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Okay, I believe my heli might be possessed:p You see, it all started a few flights back, when I noticed alot of vibration in my vertical stabilizer, and the tips of my training gear. So, I asked around about possible causes, and it came down to me replacing the main shaft. Once I replaced the shaft, I left the whole assembly that goes on top of it off, and disconnected the tail motor. I then spun it up. The helicopter still vibrated, even worse than before! I tried it without the main shaft, and there was no vibration, so it isn't the main motor. And I just replaced the main gear, so it isn't that. Therefore, I have concluded that my helicopter is possessed by a demon who is afraid of heights, and starts to quake with fear whenever I spin up my heli. However, before I call an exorcist, I would like to know if any of you have a less drastic solution.
BTW. It is a an axe cp, and, even with the new main shaft, the main shaft appears to wobble.

Hello,
Please share your experience with "Extreme 380X brushed motor w/ 9T pinion" ? ($17). Carbon Brush for 380 motor are also sold separately.
How does it compare with Slo-Max 300 Brushed Motor ? ($11)

Unlike Brushless, both do not require any modification to 4in1. True ?

Thank You.

No one seems to have the Blade 400 feather shafts in stock, does anyone know if the trex sa not the v2 feather shafts will fit (AGNHS1003) it seems I read somewhere that they do, just want to make sure they do, before I order.
Regards Fred

Which is the lightest among 'Super Landing Gear Kit V2', 'Super Skids', 'SuperSkids 3D' ?
I want the lightest (quicker response, longer flight time & motor life), durable option.
Please recommend.

Thank You.

Like the subject says, I'm wondering if it's possible. I'm getting REALLY tired of the glitching from my NR2. It's a great heli to fly, until it starts glitching. I know it's probably not worth it to go separates, but I still want to.

Here's the list of what I'd like to put into the NR2:

Castle Creations Pixie 20 (main) Pixie 7 (tail) ESCs
Futaba GY240 Head Holding Gyro
Futaba 4YF Radio
Futaba R114F Receiver
Team Orion Baron 330 Main Motor

The main thing I wanna know is if I can put a good head holding gyro into a FP heli. I can only imagine how well it would fly compared to the shotty electronics that came with the NR2. If I'm missing anything, or if I'm just way off base here let me know. Thanks in advance, looking forward to hearing back.

I finished my Radd training the day before, Just in time for our flight club last night. Arrived at the hall with my Robins 22 and my Belt CP.

The hall was packed, the tensions where high. Two helicopters already went down by the time I desided to take my robins up for a spin to calm the nerves. Bit of helicopter littered the floor (only a bit of blade here and there) a reminder to focus on what you are doing.

Flew with my Robins and did a couple maneuvers (figure of eights and nose in) also did a couple pirouettes and cleaned the ceiling a bit. I then had to wait in the que again.

All too soon it was my turn again, this time with my belt. I put my training gear on and nervously walked on to the floor. I sped the blades up to speed, got it light on the skids then popped it up to eye level. I could not believe how easy I managed to keep it in a hover with the tail in. Not jus a short hop but a hover of about 2 minutes.

There was a bit of a draught coming through the one door that pushed the heli around a bit. Had to land it once or twice when it did not feel comfortable.
On my second battery I deliberately flew near the door to get use to the wind.

I also practiced flying side to side and my instructor told me not to fly just tail in, need to fly it at 45 degrees (not side in) I managed to pull this off without a hitch.
I did have a heart stopping moment though. Someone started a big heli on the other side of the hall. Don’t know what it was but the amount of wind it produced almost put my heli into the wall. :eek:

I later found out that that helicopter uses 8000mah lipo batteries and is three times the size of by Belt CP. Suffice to say I went home with a smile that went from ear to ear. :D

Okay, I got my Honeybee FP in the mail today. I'm trying to charge the stock battery (I'll charge the others later on). It's an ESky 8.4v 650mAh NI-MH (Ek1-0100).

It doesn't say how long to charge the battery for. The manual literally says "During the charging process, you can determine whether the battery is fully charged as follows:

1. Voltage measurement:
Use a voltage indicator. This is the best way.

2. Temperature:
When charging, examine the temperature of the battery all the time. When the temperature of the battery is rising, it shows that the charging is close to finish. Please turn off the charger.

3. Calculation of the charging time.:
charging time = capacity of the battery/charging current."


Why does this poor English translation not surprise me? I guess I should have known they would give me a charger that doesn't even have a stupid indicator light on it to tell me when the battery is charged. :rolleyes:

Is there a specific amount of time anyone charges their battery for?

I'm dividing the capacity of the battery (volts or mAh's?) by the charging current.

The charger output is: 12VDC 300mA. The charger itself gets very hot after being plugged in for just a few minutes...but I don't feel the battery warming. Can something give me a time estimate...how long do you charge yours for? I can see that this is going to get annoying, and I'm going to have to get a charger that will actually give me some sort of indication that the battery is fully charged.