Raptor 30V2 to Stretched E-Raptor Conversion

[fitenfyr]

Mark,
That aluminum plate affair with the standoffs under the frame maybe your source of the "wobble".
Think if it like trying to stand on a pop can and balance kind of affair.
You can balance, but you maybe a bit wobblie at first. :D

What in the world do you have going on those isolators on the camera head though?
Are those magnets????

[MLaBoyteaux]

No, they're stainless steel isolators from http://www.isolator.com They sent me 3 different sizes for evaluation. They really work. Seems they absorb vibration and convert it to heat instead of storing it as kinetic energy and releasing it like rubber or silicone.

When I spooled the heli up without mains (only for a minute or less for testing) the vibrations in the main frame were transferred into the carbon tubes that support the mount, but the arch frames on the gimbal were nearly vibration free, so they're doing a great job of isolating the high frequency energy from the motor.

After I pick up a couple more paying jobs, I'm going to buy a mount from DJ.

I need the extra ground clearance, so what would you suggest? I've seen DJ is using the Vario gear which are taller. I guess I could also put some pool noodles around the skids which will add a little more height.

[askman]

wow, I am impressed with amount of isolation you have. :) good job.

[fitenfyr]

That isolation is really cool.
I would love to see some video of those.
Reading their website I wonder if you could use one of the tray types to mount the camera too instead of the gymbal setup?
Might make things easier and actually dampen the camera from vibration.
Very cool stuff.

I would go with taller gear like the Vario. I even have an extra set here if you want them.
Then just use a solid carbon plate between the skids and the frame to attach your battery tray.
Or just use taller aluminum channels, but I think that would add unessary weight to the helicopter.

Give me a buzz and we will work something out.
Going to be in PHX tomorrow for most of the day, but I should have my phone.

[MLaBoyteaux]

After inspecting the heli, I noticed the new TT metal head block has some play in it and it wiggles on the main shaft. Since all of the torque is centered on the 3mm Jesus bolt, I've decided not to fly the heli until I get a new Kasama head installed. It would really suck to have the head fly off.

Fortunately, they are shipped from right here in Fort Worth so I'm going to see if I can pick it up today!

[AeroMattics]

Mark,

What is the length of that tail boom you got from DJ? Is it a TT boom?

Matt

[MLaBoyteaux]

It’s the Ergo carbon fiber boom. I think DJ cut it down by about 1.5”?

I got a couple of flights on the Raptor this weekend in spite of the winds. I put my Sony HDR-HC1 on it with the .7x wide angle adapter. Using an 11S1P 5000 FlightPower pack I managed to get an 11 minute flight using 3900ma according to the E-Flight power meter (when I charged the batteries later, they only took 3600ma, the E-Flight meter reads a little high).

All up weight is 13 lbs 10 ounces. After reading through several posts by Gary and Scott I finally understood how to set up the ESC. With a fresh pack, I’m getting a 1720 headspeed. So I dialed it down for 1650, but then the ESC started surging. Arrrgh. I’m going to have to get the USB connector so I can make some changes to the programming on the ESC. I ran it back up to 100% and the surging stopped. After a couple of minutes, the headspeed dropped to around 1650 anyway, so I think I’m going to leave it alone.

After 11 minutes of flying, the Hacker A50-16s was 140. The FlightPower batteries measured 98 and the ESC was 90. I was surprised the ESC wasn’t any warmer. I scanned all over it with my IR temp probe, but that was it. The ambient temp was 80.

I shot video with the Sony HC1. On the second flight, I was about 6 minutes in, and I noticed something fell from the heli. Uh oh. Turns out it was the .7x wide angle lens adapter. Crap. Fortunately, it rained early in the morning and the ground was soft. It looked like the lens hit the ground on its side. No scratches or cracks!

After reviewing the video, it was obvious I’ve got some vibes related to the head. I pulled the blades off and re-balanced them. We had a photo shoot scheduled with the gassers on Saturday afternoon so I haven’t had a chance to get back out and work on tuning the head up.

[Teej]

The ergo boom fits as-is if you get the 385 tooth belt - no cutting needed. If all you want is to run 660-680, then taking off a chunk isn't a bad idea.

T

[LoopBaCK]

Better the lens than the camera! I'll let you borrow a roll of duct tape next time... :arggg:

Just joshin ya! Sounds like you're doing very well with the new eRaptor - definitely way ahead of me. I haven't even got started on mine and can only drop my wide adapter from shoulder height!

[MLaBoyteaux]

I purchased a 368 tooth belt from spd-si.com (PN# A 6R 3-368025) and it fit the boom I got from DJ perfectyly, but I'm not sure exactly how much DJ cut it down. I'll have to measure it and see. I'm using the 660mm blades I bought from DJ, I need to practice a few autos with 'em, they feel like even at the weight I'm flying, an auto should be manageable.

[GGoodrum]

The surging is definitely the governor gain setting. I have some if the USB cables. PM/email me and I'll send you one.

-- Gary

[WillJames]

In this thread DJ mentions how much he cut your boom down Mark.

http://www.helifreak.com/viewtopic.php?t=13715

[AeroMattics]

Thanks for the comments on the boom!

Now I am undecided on whether to stretch to the 680s or stick with the 620s.
My AP gear only weighs in at around 4lbs with the HCS mount so I probably don't need to stretch it until I get some heavy gear.

The Autos with the AP gear would be nice though!

[dreslism]

I just wanted to give an update on my "problems".

The vibes seem to be gone after tearing down the head and lubing the dampers and feathering shaft.

The tail kick was still there. I tried lots of stuff, grounding the boom for static, shielding/moving the gyro for interference from a servo or anything else....

I read on raptortechnique, that if your tail kicks right it could be from inconsitent rpm's. Couldn't be my problem, I have an electric with governor mode.

The next day trying to find this tail kick I was about 20 feet in front of me about 25 feet up. Tail kicking away, then poof, smoke starts coming out of the motor. I land and the motor is at 200 degrees. I tried spooling up again and hear bearing noises. I checked the eagle tree recorder and it showed the motor surging all over the place, so I then thought maybe this is my tail kick.

This was the A50-12s that I got earlier in the spring. I think it was one of the first ones out there. And I had seen many people had issues with this model of motor.

I called around to find a replacement and wanted to get the A50-16s which is better suited for AP. Hacker had one so I bought it. It came last night and took it for a flight this morning. It was very windy, almost windy enough to not fly, but I had to put it up to test it out.

smoooth.... No more tail kick, no more vibes....

So it was the motor going bad causing the tail kicks.
I sent the motor into hacker this week and I hope they will just credit my card for the motor I purchased as I could not wait for them to repair the old one.

I like this motor much better than the A50-12s. The A50-12s used to hover at about 22 amps and would peak at about 38 amps if I punched it.
And it would run about 160-180 degrees depending on outside temp.

The A50-16s hovered at 12 amps for 6 minutes this morning. Again it was VERY windy, and I forgot to check the temp on this motor, but with the wind blowing I think it would be very low.

I should get some better runtimes out of this motor.

Winter is a coming. temp this morning was 45 degrees. After the 6 minute flight, I think my hands think the windchill was about 20.


Almost time to break out the Tx mitt. :(

Just wanted to say thanks for all the help and suggestions.

--Scott

The woofing issues usually were found after unloading the head in flight.

What where your results with it flying?
Did you get the same vibrations?

Have you checked the balance on all the blades in question?

I took it for a flight this evening.

Spool up vibes are the same still, but once I put it in the air, it *seemed* OK.

The tail keeps screeching and kicking about 4-5 inches every 5 seconds or so which is a new thing, so I did not do much more than hover 10 feet up. If I did not know better, it almost seems like it is skipping every so often. I'll have to check the gyro setting with the new blades on, but did not have time to play with that while out. Gyro just might need a little more sensitivity with the new blades on.

Yeah, I checked the blades twice. They are dead nuts, and actually came that way. I was amazed that CG was dead on, and balance was dead on.

I pulled a blade and put a hex in that blade grip bolt and spun it and watched the other blade, and it never moved, so feathering shaft seems to be fine.

I don't think I could strap the mount on the bottom as is right now as it would just vibrate like crazy even more on spool up and maybe tip over.

This ship used to be real smooth. I put a kasama head on last week in anticipation of the stretching for the new longer blades.

Flew it after the kasama head with 600's and it seemed fine.

Stretched it Friday with new boom and belt, put the new blades on and you see where I am at. I did not expect anything like this, especially since the blades were balanced perfectly out of the box.

Oh well, off to do some more :arggg: as this is my only camera ship right now. :(

[MLaBoyteaux]

My EagleTree data logger showed up on Friday. I got it in and did a test flight Friday before it got dark. Neat gadget, I discovered I wasn't pulling as much current in a good vertical climb as I had thought. 19 ~ 20 amps in a hover and only 32 when close to my max collective at around +10 degrees. I think I can increase the pitch another degree or so to give me a little more lift, when required.

I've been using the soft spool up mode on the ESC, but it really ramps up pretty hard, pulling a 40 amp spike. It also really slams the rudder around as the gyro tries to compensate for the sudden torque. I think I'm going to go back to the super soft spool up mode.

We're planning on putting it into service and shooting some photos with it on Tuesday.

[GGoodrum]

My EagleTree data logger showed up on Friday. I got it in and did a test flight Friday before it got dark. Neat gadget, I discovered I wasn't pulling as much current in a good vertical climb as I had thought. 19 ~ 20 amps in a hover and only 32 when close to my max collective at around +10 degrees. I think I can increase the pitch another degree or so to give me a little more lift, when required.

I've been using the soft spool up mode on the ESC, but it really ramps up pretty hard, pulling a 40 amp spike. It also really slams the rudder around as the gyro tries to compensate for the sudden torque. I think I'm going to go back to the super soft spool up mode.

We're planning on putting it into service and shooting some photos with it on Tuesday.

Mike, there is another setting that controls that startup "spike"you are seeing, which we have called the "Castle Kick" for years. I think it is called "Motor Start Power". Set that to low and it should be fine.

CC originally put this into their controller software in order to give some cheap, long-forgotten, motor the jolt it needed to turn over. It took us 3-1/2 years to get Castle to take out this "feature", but they didn't remove it. They just made it one more "controlable" setting. What ticks me off, still, is that the default is to leave the "kick" in there! lol! <sigh...> :arggg:

-- Gary

[Teej]

Whatever options I've got set (using castle link) seem to be OK...perhaps even too tame. I've got about a 20 second spoolup to 1400 right now (measured, not guessing).

One word of caution on the stretch jobs though. I made a bonehead mistake on my Hold curve that resulted in an auto where it dropped about 2 feet after all the speed had bled off the head...wasn't a hard hit...nothing I haven't seen hundreds of times before when people practice autos...but running the heavy blades (184g 700s) on the .30/.50 sized spindle resulted in the slight tweaking of the latter. Just enough to make the blades not track.

[Pepacut2]

If I put my 600 blades back on now, I don't get the same vibes I do with the 660's, but those 660's store a lot more energy than the 600's.

It could be related to servo's 'giving' under the extra weight.

Try moving your links much closer to center on your servo arms to reduce the load on them as a test. This will reduce the available throw, but will highlight if you are having issues with the extra weight onto your servo's.

Try running a lager mah battery pack for your servos and ensure that your servos can provide enough torque if this turns out to be it.

The extra strain on the servos will make them suck more amps, resulting it not enough being available to hold the servo still on smaller/less powerfull RX packs.

[LoopBaCK]

Mark - how's the A50-16s working for you? I should start ordering parts to build an eRaptor early next week and am getting a list together. Anything you'd change from your original list?

[MLaBoyteaux]

So far, I like it. The highest temp I've measured so far has been 155 on the motor. Most of the time it's around 145.

I still want to get out and do some test flights with a 10S setup and see how well that works. With the FlightPower 11S 5000 setup, I can get 11~12 minutes out of 3900 mah.

One reason for wanting to go to a 10S setup is that I could recharge both packs in series with the TP1010 charger and cut my recharge time in half.

For photos, it seems we always manage to get the shots done within a few minutes. If the 10S setup works out, I think it might be possible to use a 10S 3000 pack, which would get rid of a little weight and give 6 minute durations with a descent reserve. Those packs would be a little more affordable.

For shooting video though, I think I'll stick with the 5000's :D

[dreslism]

One reason for wanting to go to a 10S setup is that I could recharge both packs in series with the TP1010 charger and cut my recharge time in half.


I'd be interested to hear if anyone else does that right now. I fly 10s but just charge my 2 5s packs seperately.

I read somewhere ( I think Tabb posted) that it does not normally work out to charge the 2 5s packs in series.

I guess I should give it a go and see, I'll need to make up another series connector.

Right now I can't even charge my 5s5000 FP packs at 1C. My 1010 seems to cut out at 20V with charge end instead of 21v.

Anyone else see something like this before?

Thanks

[MLaBoyteaux]

Or I just need to break down and buy a second charger!

The only problem I ran into was the TP1010 doesn't like to run from the accessory plug in the cab of my truck. Our plan the other day was to do a shoot, then swap packs and while driving to the next shoot, top off the first set of packs. Our idea was this would allow us to have a fresh pack for each shoot and do mutiple shoots on the same day.

Well, the TP1010 would cut off for low input voltage even with the truck running. It's obvious the wiring and cigarette lighter connection have too much resistance. It would charge at a 2A rate, but the shoots weren't that far apart.

I either need to set up a dedicated powerport to run the charger, or invest in more packs and just charge them at the end of the day when I get home.

Although, in reality, this was the only time we've had multiple shoots set up on the same day.

How much time should you wait before recharging a pack? I've measured the temp on mine, and they usually average around 105 after flying. When charging at 1C, I've never noticed them even getting warm when recharging.

[Tonystott]

Mark, you could always (carefully) run thicker leads direct from the truck battery....

[Teej]

I charge 2 * 5s5000 Prodigy packs in series and usually with the balancer hooked up as well. 1010C / 210V combo.

The only problem is the strain on the power source (ie your car battery).

In a perfect world, 5 amps into 42 volts (1C @ peak 10s voltage) works out to 5 * (42/12) = 17.5 amps. With the less than perfect conversion, it's probably pulling over 20 amps which is why your accessory socket pukes.

[MLaBoyteaux]

Yeah, I think if I run an 8 guage wire through a large 60 amp fuse block to the back of the truck and set up a good connector it would work. I'd rather have them charging in the back and not in the cab anyway in case something goes wrong.

I've been wanting to do this anyway so I can run the winch on my 55' camera mast from the truck power instead of the small garden tractor battery I'm using now.