I'm hopeless

[djtommyboy]

I bought a CP pro and had little success with it. I then got my hands on a CX and flew that around well for a while. I then switched back to my cp pro and crashed it real good and needed alot of replacement parts. I tried to fly it tonight and its crazy all over the place...I trashed 3 sets of blades and 1 spindle tonight alone.

Im giving thought to selling the pro...or should i be patient?

The hummingbird V3 maybe?


Im getting really frustrated~~~~ :(

[kama1]

welcome to helifreak
keep at it...it will just click for you and youll be hovering.
remember use small stick movements.
youll get it just be patient and do try to do to much to fast

[HeliDan]

Are you also using a simulator? I was not able to hover my V4 at all until a week or two on the G3. It really does help ALOT!

Good luck

[SteveTTL]

Just hang in there. I too went through the same feeling you are having. Matter of fact, I'm still learning all aspects of hovering. You just have to keep at it until you begin to get the "feel" of it. Like the experienced pilots say, it will suddenly click and you'll be off and flying. For me, the sim was a "big" help (and it's cheaper to crash!).

[Danyboy]

Some thoughts you need to keep in mind when learning heli-flying...

Smaller does mean tynier, but is not easier to fly.
Smaller ones are harder to fly, hands down.
That guy at my place, who's kind of heli-guru, was almost flipping out when he had the hands on the controls of my Blade once: "man, is that thing unstable...!".
He's into aerobatic at the moment, moving a Logo 10 3D-Monster all over the place...
So, coming back to the first statement:
The smaller the heli, the more difficult to fly.

Which is why we come to the second argument now:
Buy cheap, buy twice...
I know, I know, paying 400 bucks (I'm talking about swiss-franks, might be about 200$ at your place) for a - so called - factory-pre-flown helicopter including battery'n'charger'n'TX'n'everything, that *is* cheap indeed.
Only problem: It does not fly by its own (remember statement one? ;) ). It has to be flown by a pilot.
There is no "very easy to fly helicopter which does not make any compromise to a bigger helicopter", hands down.
Those are marketing-slogans that even I have fallen into... (I just discovered that this afternoon... ;) ).
A *real* model helicopter *does* cost you 500$ upward for a complete flying machine excluding transmitter, there is no going around that...
Everything cheaper has some draw-back by design which are not always enhancing the pilot's expirience.

In other words: If you want to learn to fly on your own on a 300-size heli, you need luck to get a product that really does fly out of the box without any tweaking and you need to be able to learn fast. Otherwise you're going to spend money and - if you do not have a tree in the backyard that is sprucing some nice coloured-paper aka money - you will grow frustrated eventually.

Back to topic:
Step one: Get a mentor!
Reach out and find a flying field at your place! They're always nearer than you'd expect!
Though I know some people that find it some kind of embarassing to have someone giving practical tips to achieve something, you can only win of such a situation:
Someone helps you (to save money... ;) ), safety of the flying field, frequency controlling, maybe even insurance (I don't know at your place, but over here it starts to be an advantage...).
On the more social side: Freaks tend to go to places where freaks of the same kind are... So why don't you go to a flying field... ;)

Step two: Get a training-gear.
Yes, it will cost you some bucks *now*, but that will save you money in the long run. I put those things on whenever I'm in doubt the "thing" will fly as expected, ie like after changes of TX-settings and such...

Step three: Find a flying school (maybe even online) and learn in accordance to their propositions and lessons, right after the motto: "learn from the faults of others, life's too short to do all the faults by yourself...". There is a reason why somebody would have you train something in a certain way... It's mostly based on expirience. Why do you still want to crash your heli when somebody tells you how not-to? ;)

Step four: Keep strict discipline.
For to fly a helicopter you need to take a lot of steps, some some of them smaller, some are bigger. As long as you have not completed a step, you should always avoid to take the next one. *Always* remain in the envelope of what you can do. Only when you are willing and mentally prepared to learn further, you should cross the line "a bit", don't go too far or it will crash!

And if you combine all those four together, you have the reason why there are many people getting frustrated:
They have the idea, that once they were able to keep the heli stable and controlled for about 2 seconds, "it" means that they should try aerobatics (which are sometimes not even possible due to system's design...)...

"it's been crazy allover the place" --> step four applied on top of step three.
Most online-flying-schools advice to learn to hover within a drawn rectangle on the ground. First not really hovering, only getting it "light on the skids". Whenever the heli gets out of the rectangle, shut it down and move it to the center by hand. Only when you're able to remain within the rectangle, you should redo the whole process a second time while hovering at about one feet.
Why this? Why move the heli back by hand? Wasn't it built to fly?
Because first you need to learn to keep the heli in the place, only then can you start to move it in a certain direction.

Above all, keep in mind:
IF YOU WANT TO REACH YOUR GOAL QUICKLY, THEN DO NOT RUSH!
It's gotta be in the wrist...
Only when you can do "by heart", kind of unconscience, what was the goal of the step you just took, only then is the time to take the next step.
If you're stepping ahead when you were "just able" to perform a certain task, then you're rushing.

If you can fly a heli, all the planks are the same and booooooooring...
But then again, flying a heli is a learning-process that does not take days or months, but years...

So, keep at it, get a training gear, do not rush, and train, and train, and train...

And all of a sudden it will *click* and you will hover in front of you in four feet's height: That's when you need to apply again the lesson of discipline and not to rush, because at that very moment, all you will want to do is run away from your hovering heli and hug everyone that's in vicinity... :)

NO HURRY!

I am now flying helos since early spring, about 20hrs of flighttime and am ready to take the step for the first aerobatic-"maneuvers".

Cheers from Switzerland,

Daniel

[futura]

Well said Dannyboy.....very well said!

[spork]

It's entirely possible that your heli is particularly difficult to fly. Even if you don't join a club, you should get an experienced pilot to check it out and maybe make some adjustments.

I flew R/C helis for years when I got a Honey Bee CP2 (very similar to your CP). It was just crazy twitchy out of the box. I moved the pushrods one hole in on each of the swashplate servos and it made a world of difference.

Trying to learn to fly on a heli that's not trimmed out nicely is a tall order.

[djtommyboy]

Thanksguys!!

I got the G3.5sim today and its def gonna be a help

[spork]

I got the G3.5sim today and its def gonna be a help

One word of caution (in case you don't already know)... lots of us could win the nationals on the sim, but still fly like newbs on the real thing. No one seems to know how much of that is difference between sim and real, and how much is the zero-liability of the sim.

The sim will be a great help though.

[carlo_the_wonder_frog]

I found the biggest help in flying the CP is confidence, and the sim will help alot with that.

[Rick Rotorhead]

I wouldn't bother with the honeybee, period. With all the repair costs adding up you'd be better off with a bigger, more stable heli. The much vaunted Trex 450 would at least give you a sporting chance to learn - especially with sim practice as well. I got a Twister CP, (a Blade CP clone) and its as bad as all the guys above are saying of the Blade. Corrections have to be quick, fairly precise and in the right directions of course, CONSTANTLY. 10 mins of hovering gives me a headache with all the 110% concentration. The tail is wayward, the cyclic is twitchy and she climbs and dives for no apparent reason - 10 times worse in any wind. So, no, don't waste your hard earned on a honeybee.
Afterthought: Well trimmed and fully upgraded HBs and Blades probably do have much better flying manners and could be fun for an experienced flyer, but at a cost that is way out of proportion to the size and seriousness of the littler helis.

[jediwannabe]

I can't tell you to stick with it or not, but if you do this might help.
http://www.runryder.com/helicopter/t244675p1/ These video's are very informative on how to set up a Blade CP. I was having some trouble with mine after some crashes and it was not flying like it did when I bought it. I calmed down, and took a serious look at setting it up(up until then I was trying to slap blades on and fly it).
If you do watch the video's try and adopt some of cyclicpitcher's patience and appreciation of the helicopter. After I balanced and tracked the blades, leveled the squashplate, adjusted the pitch, set the proportional and gyro the heli actually hovered very nicely with little input. If you crash it, take the time to set it back up and trim it out its worth it.

[Rodan]

I'm about 8 weeks into a Blade CP Pro, and had never flown any RC before buying it. At this point I'm solid on anything tail-in and side-in, and am working on nose in hover, circles and figure 8s.

Two things made the biggest difference for me:

1 - getting the heli set up properly, balance head, blades and tail, set pitch, and CG. They say RTF, and it will, but it'll fly much better if you make sure the basics are spot on.

2. GWS DD tail mod - one of the biggest issues with the stock BCPP is having to constantly fly the weak stock tail. For about $15, you will be amazed at the difference this mod makes.

I also wrangle some sim time at the LHS on the G3.5 demo, which helps, but it's not the same as flying the real thing. It was mostly about stick movements for me, having never done RC before.

Stick with it, you'll get there! :wink: