Build finished...Run-up results

[Whirly-Girl]

As soon as UPS got here this afternoon, I finished loading and ran to the flying field.

First off, let me commend Ricko's Place for a SUPERB paint job on all of my components! It looks HOT!!!

Next, thank you Bergen and all others who have supplied me with a TON of advice, BUT you're not out of the woods yet! :twisted:

I bolted on my fins, looked over a few more items...forgot to adjust my flybar paddles at home...so I just eyeballed them close enough. Range check came out rock solid and I tested my fail safe setting too...good to go. The engine came to life with little effort. I started with both needles at 1 3/8" turn since I am close to sea level. Thanks Gary! The exhaust was pouring out smoke.

I eased up the throttle, got some big wobbles...and chickened out. Repeat this about 5 times and you would have gotten bored watching me at the field. :oops: I figured I had my blades too tight. I loosened them just a smidge and slowly worked my throttle up. Just a hint of wobble...chickened out. Repeat. :arggg: This time my husband egged me on and just told me to do what I know to do. Okay...easier said than done for some reason! Slow, easy...spooled up to half stick now...and sat there at 1310. Brought her back down, adjusted my throttle curve...now I spooled up to half again and reached 1410. I burned less than half a tank doing this only a couple of times and then I noticed a "sqeak".

Okay, time to quit and check nuts and bolts...good thing too because I found what else I forgot: to loctite the 3 bolts going into the motor mount bracket (the one attaching to the engine head). Two dropped into the grass where I was running up...found one. Muffler bolts were a tad bit loose...but some lock washers would help there greatly. Can't wait to get that new, quiet muffler. *Cough...Chris*

Back to that "sqeak"...sounds like it is coming from the tail transmission area...maybe bearing block. Is this something that normally occurs and "wears" in? Or did I really mess something up???

Well, I didn't get to officially fly it, but I'm making good steady progress and it is more important to take my time and get things right!

Here's some shots of today atleast to show Rick's masterfull work.

[cbergen]

For the "dance", try running it up in the grass, not on the concrete.

As far as the "sqeak", Need more info, like when it occurs. Spool down? At flying RPM? Spool up?

Drop some light oil on the tail transmission shaft, in front of and behind, the tail drive pinion gear, and work it in by spinning the main gear.

Going to the Birmingham field now, back later :twisted: !

[Tom Fiddler]

Very nice!
Good work on finding the bolts
It will all come together soon I'm sure.

[rkeith2]

Very nice Jeanette -

Almost screamin across the sky.

[rkeith2]

Very nice Jeanette -

Almost screamin across the sky.

[Greg Alderman]

Jeanette! Looks Awesome!!! Love the painted fan shroud!!! Now I know how it will look! :D

Ricko does GREAT work!

[Whirly-Girl]

Greg, it was definitely a good idea for dressing that area of the heli up. Thanks! I have your shroud boxed up and ready to ship down to Rick tomorrow morning.

Now I can't wait to finish "the look" with V-paddles and tail blades...the stock ones just don't fit in now. :glasses2:

Jeanette

[Whirly-Girl]

Well, the day has come where I conquered my gasser fears! I burned one tank today and managed to get my HS to 1440. I started out with 1 3/8 on both needles and smoke was pouring on day one's run-up. Today, (after fixing the throttle curve) spooling up was ALOT easier - no wobbles, shakes, or anything SCARY... Now I was able to spool up to 1/4-stick and tach and adjust. Then I got this fine machine picked up into a hover. :twisted: Set down, shut down, and checked the big picture on some nuts and bolts. Fired back up and hovered high enough to check the tracking. 1.5 turns on one blade grip got me spot-on!

I finished up running the motor on this tank of gas just hovering and feeling where the nose wanted to drift...I believe the nose wants to go to the right, but at times it sat there without moving...or maybe I was so high on gas exhaust that I couldn't tell that I had a control input in. :twisted: :lol: :twisted: There was also a vibes in the vertical tail fin while hovering...but that has to be b/c I'm still too rich. I can hear it four-cycling still and had only leaned the low end about 2 widths of a screwdriver from 1 3/8.

Man, I can't wait til tomorrow! I'm heading out with my HCS mount and my friends Predator Gasser/Broadcast 360/downlink and we're going to get some pictures of the local area. Too bad I didn't have more time on my own heli by now!!!

[Gary Travis]

Glad the throttle curve thing worked for you, your fin shakes is more than likely from the rich condition. Fly it like it is for now and break it in, after that we will get the fin thing solved. I'll give you a call in a day or so and talk it over.
Gary

[cbergen]

Look into the tail blade tracking, for the vibes, and going into normal mode on the gyro to trim out the tail.

In my Turbine build thread, it shows how to track the tail blades, for reference.

Way to go Whirly Girl, Love to see that thing in the air!!

[Whirly-Girl]

YEAH BABY. We're devoting today - ALL day - to helis...

I hovered yesterday completely in normal mode - no HH - to get a feel for the drift. We'll try and sort the blade tracking out today and maybe lean out a little more after a few more tanks of hovering.

OH BABY! :glasses2: :glasses: :mrgreen: :smokin: :cool: :D

[Whirly-Girl]

Just to clarify: the difference between my run up on day 1 and my hovering on day 2 was adjusting my throttle curve in order to obtain 1450 at 1/4 stick position.

THANK YOU GARY TRAVIS FOR YOUR AWESOME ADVICE. YOU DA MAN! You take the headache away from setting up a complicated machine. Now I can sit back, relax and FLY, FLY, FLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'll post more pictures tonight! :D :smokin:

Jeanette

[WillJames]

In my Turbine build thread, it shows how to track the tail blades, for reference.


Interesting how the Bergen is one of the few helis you can track the tail blades on anymore. Cool feature for ultra smooth tail.

[Whirly-Girl]

YEEEeeeeeeeeeeHaaaaaaaaawwwwwwwww!


Forward Flight ROCKED today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


:glasses2: :twisted: :cool: :D :!:

[cbergen]

Awesome news!! How's she feel to 'ya?

[Whirly-Girl]

All I can say is wow so far! I was scared...especially because Gary kept warning me how fast this baby goes. With that in mind I didn't let loose. I slowly progressed from easy figure 8's in front of me to large figure 8's with high transitions back to hover in front of me. I never over shot where I wanted to be...but you definitely have to plan ahead. These gassers have some MOMENTUM! :smokin:

I'm starting in with my 2nd gallon now. It is still mixed 6oz to one gallon, Pennzoil 100% synthetic Marine OB oil. Shall I start to tune the low end now? I have some Zeal tape on the way so I'm waiting to go into HH until it arrives. With the engine running rich I can see the nose jerk in HH when the engine misses. Oh, and man is the tail alert with 110 V-blades. :shock:

[cbergen]

Yup, go ahead and tune it for smoothness in the hover.

You're flying it in Non-HH? If you have the tail trimmed for no drift, then you should certainly be able to flip it into HH. You can turn down the piro rate by reducing the ATV or travel limits on RUDDER. You could also use Expo, but I don't recommend it.

Zeal is on the way.

[Whirly-Girl]

Got the Zeal today...right before going out to the field. I didn't get a chance to try HH today with it. Got one flight in and a cold front must have been on its way...it started howling with wind and my thumbs were going numb...but that Bergen sure is ROCK STEADY in the wind!

The only thing I need to tweak (besides the motor) is some slop I caused in the head with how I sized some ball links...hence the reason I ordered 20 new ball links. I can hold the swash still and jiggle the flybar a couple of mm's. :oops: I ered a little too much on the frictionless side. They won't pop off easily, but all the little bits of slop add up to one big slop. :roll:

The weather looks iffy for this week so who knows when I'll get the motor fine-tuned.

Anyone care to elaborate about the idle-up throttle curve for when I want to do some looping and rolling? Is 1450 just my A/P HS? Is the gasser curve also a "V" curve?

Jeaentte

[Gary Travis]

Gasser is more of a U curve.
Gary

[cbergen]

For aerobatics you can take the headspeed up to, say 1650. So at the bottom of your "U" curve set it for appx 1600 in a hover in idle up and work from there.

The 1450 is also just a starting point to use when finding the best headspeed for YOUR environment and application. Try different headspeeds from 1400 to 1650 to find the smoothest envelope WITH your AP rig underneath it.

Just make sure that you have the headspeed up BEFORE lifting off, especially if you try the 1400 headspeed. This ensures that the clutch is fully engaged before adding a load to it.

[FlyinTiger]

We got some more advice from Gary and went at it again with Whirly Girl's Bergen Intrepid EB.

After mixing some fuel with only 5 oz. of Penzoil 100% synthetic per gallon and resetting the needles at 1-3/8 turns out we took the heli out to the field. Tweaking the low end, then the high end today resulted in 1-1/4 (+ a screwdriver width) on the low end and 1-1/4 (+ two screwdriver widths) on the high end needle.

WG and I still aren't sure how to tell if the high end it too rich...I don't want to lean it out until it bogs in the climb and risk the engine quitting...she told me "no autos yet." Please advise here. I'm not afraid, but have a healthy respect for fine equipment.

After the change in fuel mixture there is NO VIBRATION in the tail fin! Yay, we're excited about that! The head speeds were adjusted after we tweaked the needles to get 1450 at 1/4 stick and 1520 in a hover.

The Blue Marble Oil comes in the mail tomorrow, and due to the smoothness of the stock Zenoah running on 5 oz. of Blue Marble per gallon (as reported by Gary Travis) we can't settle for using Penzoil. More updates to come on the "re-breaking-in" process and how it went. :arggg: The good news is that we are confident running and adjusting the gasser heli now and won't second guess ourselves while getting her to sing! :glasses2:

[Malorie]

I prefer to test the high needle with some extended FFF. If you are rich, you will hear it four-stroke every now and then just like the low needle. If you don't hear it four-stroking, richen it until you do and then lean it again until it is just out of the four-stroking.

The G26 will bog down before it will quit wheather you are too lean or too rich, so there isn't any real worry about it quiting on you. If you are worried about it quiting, you can sneek up on the FFF until you are confident that the engine isn't too lean. Usually you can do a quick check on the ground in idle-up with some negative pitch to load the engine and get it onto the high needle. I don't like doing it this way usually because it scares me (long non-heli related story). :)

Malorie

[FlyinTiger]

Thanks Malorie! The FFF trick and richening then re-attacking the high needle sounds like a good way to make sure it doesn't get too lean by mistake.

Whirly-Girl and I will work on it...supposed to be some good weather today. Work is almost finished for the night...

[03mach1]

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[Whirly-Girl]

I don't have an answer for you on that one...but, I had that same thought about a year ago when I first thought about getting a nitro Bergen. I now love the shape and design after having had a custom paint job on my fun fly canopy. It looks sweet!