Tonystott
01-14-2007, 04:52 AM
At a heli fly-in today, one of the guys was looking over my Trex450 AP ship and said "Hey, that's cracked!"
I couldn't believe it when I looked at one of the blade grips... it was just about to let go! And to think that last week we had the Trex up at least 200 feet... I break out in a cold sweat thinking about what would have happened if the grip had broken at that height; the heli would have imploded, and it would have been just about confetti hitting the ground. A quick check on forces on the grips shows 46kg at 2200 rpm. Imagine a 48lb sledge hammer being smashed into one side of the mainshaft if a blade let go.
I guess it isn't surprising since the heli weighs over 50% more than stock, so the loads are beyond what the manufacturer would expect.
Ordered metal grips today, and now promise to inspect everythying using a 4" magnifying glass on a regular basis...
I couldn't believe it when I looked at one of the blade grips... it was just about to let go! And to think that last week we had the Trex up at least 200 feet... I break out in a cold sweat thinking about what would have happened if the grip had broken at that height; the heli would have imploded, and it would have been just about confetti hitting the ground. A quick check on forces on the grips shows 46kg at 2200 rpm. Imagine a 48lb sledge hammer being smashed into one side of the mainshaft if a blade let go.
I guess it isn't surprising since the heli weighs over 50% more than stock, so the loads are beyond what the manufacturer would expect.
Ordered metal grips today, and now promise to inspect everythying using a 4" magnifying glass on a regular basis...