PROGRESS

[helihathnofury]

Despite what I said, I have rebuilt the little beast, and all looks well. The head appears well setup now, and when I power up, there is good balance and tracking. However, all the heli does is spin wildly counter-clockwise,as if there is nothing coming from the tail rotor. The latter though looks fine. On closer inspection, the teeth of the driven gear are not completely meshing with the tail motor pinion, despite being firmly fixed on the shaft. There is too much play in the system, and I have no way of correcting it, and yes, I have replaced the tail rotor parts............
Interestingly, when I run the rotors up to a decent speed, I can just pinch the tail rotors easily and stop them

Mike :arggg:

[Dusty1000]

The only problems I have had with the tail not holding has either been down to too much or too little pitch on the blades, depending on which blades.

With the stock blades and too little pitch it wagged about which I think is due to there being not enough torque coming from the main shaft to stabilise the heli. Then with too much pitch using stock or wooden blades the heli would spin when I applied full power, probably too much torque for the tail to cope with!

Haven't had any problems (yet) with the tail components themselves though

[helihathnofury]

This thing is impossible !!!! I can hover it beautifully at a metre or so. Shame it is spinning like hell anticlockwise !!! I am using the stock blades and tail rotor blades.
Mike

[Ber60]

Hi Mike
Is it possible to post a close-up pic of the tail gears, I can't find any good pics nor can I find a detailed parts list of the tail setup :thumbdown:

[helihathnofury]

Will see what i can do. There is no exploded diagram/schematic in the manual either.....

Mike

[helihathnofury]

Here goes - all tail rotor components new.

[Dusty1000]

I think I can see the problem, looks like your tail motor needs pushed in another 0.5mm or so into it's holder. Looking at your 4th pic, I can see the motor pinion is further back than mine.

The fp 4#3 tail motors kind of 'click' into place, I wonder if the 4G3 is the same?
Also, the caps are easy to accidentally push in. If this happens, just take the motor back out and push the shaft down on a hard surface, the cap should pop back out into place.
Dusty

[helihathnofury]

But surely the teeth would then mesh even less??

Mike

[Dusty1000]

When I say 'into' it's holder, I mean push it towards the tail.
I take it when you fit the tail motor it goes in from the front, i.e. pinion first? I don't see how it can go in any other way

[helihathnofury]

I have just had a fiddle with the tail motor and heard a click as I pushed it out a little. The meshing is better and it seems ok. Will have to adjust the MIX though to get it balanced. Ta for your input Dusty.

Mike

[helihathnofury]

Good news in that the little fella is up and flying again, but needs a bit of TLC with the set-up!! Got the tail "MIX" sorted, just need to get the swash perfect - or as perfect as any Walkera could be!! Have put in a bit of expo too to "cool it down".

Ta for your help guys. Would be interested in how you other chaps are doing with these little creatures; your settings and tests etc.

Mike

[Dusty1000]

Pleased to hear it. Weather forecast here is high winds till next Tuesday, so it will be a few days at least before I get back out with this heli.

What difference did you find the MIX adjustment makes?

Thanks
Dusty

[helihathnofury]

All it did was change the power to the tail rotor and so I got it just about steady. Bit of trim needed here and there in flight as the batt goes down.

Mike

[helihathnofury]

Have reset the DIP switch settings to those suggested by Dusty on another thread, and have to say she is flying better now. Minor tweaks needed to the swash but I can hover and manoeuvre for a full batt without a spill. Looking forward to getting the wooden blades as the stock ones are just terrible. Cheers Dusty for your TX settings.
:thumbup:

Mike

[Dusty1000]

Pleased to hear it's made a difference, I'm still working on the settings, think I've made some more improvement, though weather doesn't permit an outdoor test just now, and hovering and continually punching then throttle indoors today was enough to kill the motor, at least it lost a lot of power after only a few minutes and was roasting hot, lipo was warmest I've ever seen too! I'll update the settings thread once I know a bit more.

Cheers
Dusty

[helihathnofury]

Am looking forward to having some decent blades on the little fella, as the stock ones are bad. Anyone tried the carbons available on Ebay?

Mike

[helihathnofury]

Little fella up and flying again. The wooden blades do make it more stable, shame I bust the landing skids!!!!!!!!! But was flying well before that. The woodies seem to transfer any snag/energy to the head - no surprises there then - and off pop the odd plastic balls. Wonder if the metal head will improve that?

Mike

[helihathnofury]

Have to say that I am losing my will to live at the moment. Have been spending an age trying to rebuild this little thing, and I cannot get the setup correct. Far too much vibration at the head, despite balanced blades, flybar and paddles, just about new everything and decent lube. When I get close, something else breaks.

I am not happy with this machine, and cannot say I would recommend it to anyone, no matter how "good" they thought they were.

Mike:thumbdown:

[Dusty1000]

Sorry to hear it, I fly mine at every opportunity, which isn't often at the moment given the weather, but still I think it's a brilliant heli. Apart from test hovering I never fly it indoors though, fly it over grass and it's 'almost' as indestructible as a 4#3b is indoors!

The biggest issue I've had turned out to be a too tight gear mesh, this needs to be really loose. I've never had the flybar off though, always just straightened it out by hand while still on the heli. I've been through a few sets of blades, 3 feathering shafts and 1 main shaft, 2 sets of blade control arms and 1 motor. I don't consider myself to be a particularly 'good' pilot, I am still a novice compared to many, never flown inverted etc, but I get on with this heli really well.

When you spin up before fitting the blades is everything ok?

When you do fit the blades, when you have the first one fitted, insert a screwdriver onto the exposed screw on the end of the feathering shaft, then turn the screw and observe if the blade moves around at all. These feathering shafts are so small, that's the only sure way I've found to tell if it is bent or not. Even if it is new may still be worth checking.

If everything checks out, then you fit the blades and the vibration re-appears, you could try some tape on one blade, if the vibration is worse, take the tape off and put it on the other blade, if the vibration is better but still there, add more tape etc. Not exactly by the book set-up but may get your heli in the air again.

Good luck

[helihathnofury]

Thanks for the tips. I kn ow how to set up bigger helis, and I have adopted a similar procedure. There is just too much slack in the bearings of the main shaft - yes I have changed it too. Will go back to the plastic head and see where I stand.

..or buy a T-Rex 500 and forget the micros !!!!!!!!!!

Mike

[Dusty1000]

I hadn't realised you were using a metal head, I've heard that makes it more 'responsive' :shock:
To me the heli is responsive enough with the plastic head. Hope you have better luck going back to it.

Dusty

[helihathnofury]

I give myself 10 out of 10 for persistence here !!!!!! Reward - the little thing is back flying, albeit with metal head and old plastic swashplate. Still some oscillation, but it is a start.

Mike

[Dusty1000]

As long as it flies...:banana

Dusty :)

[helihathnofury]

It flies no longer !!!!!!!!

Was in barn, doing some setup, and then it just went wild. Completely uncontrollable. Wrapped itself around everything. Result: busted frame, batt holder, mainshaft blades, flybar, 2 servos, swashplate and feathering shaft, canopy etc
By the time I have forked out for all those parts, I could buy me a new heli. I don't think I will bother............:arggg:

Pissed off [ but sort of expected it with a Walkera ]

Mike

[Dusty1000]

That's unfortunate, sorry to hear the bad news. The only time I've ever experienced anything like that was when I crashed my 4#3B into a wall, instinctively cut the throttle yet it landed upside down with the blades spinning. Fortunately apart from scuffed blades there was no damage at all, turned out a dodgy battery wire was the culprit, it must have momentarily cut the power to the 4 in 1 when it hit the wall. I think this is the first time I've heard of a heli going wild all by itself. You must have been unlucky to say the least.

If anything I would say Walkera have improved immensely recently with their 2.4GHz models in terms of reliability and quality. When I started flying helis Esky was generally considered to be the better of the two, but it seems that now Walkera have overtaken them.