? on new AXE CP crash

[sailmfast]

Hello...First Post....But this seems to be the place to be. I've been lurking without registering and it seems there's a huge amount of knowledge here and people willing to help out.

Just received my AXE CP today and having flown fixed wing rc for several years I figured I could put together a RTF Heli and at least spin the rotor. How wrong was I??? Spun a discarded plastic bag into the rotor and needless to say it will be 3 days until I receive the repair parts. LESSON LEARNED.

My question.... the eCCPM seems to have been pulled and twisted slightly from its original position. I am considering removing the zip ties and squaring it up. Will this cause me any problems? I know it's test flown at the factory and the gyro is tweked. Is this related to the final position that the gyro sits at or does it reconfigure itself each time? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
Mark

[JJP9398]

I won't matter if you square it up. The gyro initilizes (spelling?) :dontknow itself everytime you plug in you battery just don't move it while the green light is blinking.

[sailmfast]

Thanks a lot. I've made sure it's in line with the center of the heli and squared it up. Glad to know it should still work.

[Lowcountrydave]

sailmfast,

Let me guess what you broke..... one of the blade grips? Thats usually the first thing to pop on the Axe, atleast its been on mine. I have 6 pairs of them on order. You have any luck with hovering?

Dave

[sailmfast]

You guessed it...the blade grip. Ordered a new set and while I was at it some other spare parts. I also found an interesting thread about cutting off the plastic ball link and screwing in a metal 3.8 mm link. May try that next.

Not hovering yet, but hope to soon.

Mark

[fireman0000009]

well, youve figured out the weakest part quicker than i did. it took me a couple hours. but i got my AXE CP about 2 weeks ago, a week before i should have gotten the simulator. but since then, ive broken 8 blade grips and 2 sets of blades. my advice, even though im still new, is to get the hop-up blade grips. since ive practiced on the sim now for about 3 hours, im hoovering and leading my AXE around....take it slow and buy the simulator.........just my 2 cents

[Lowcountrydave]

Hey fireman0000009,

Which sim did you use? Online purchase?


Dave

[VBDave]

Keep in mind that upgrading to CNC'd Blade Grips just moves any crash damage down the food chain. <$3.00 for replacing the blade grips beats $13.00 for a swash, $7.00 for main shaft, etc... every time...

You'll also probably splinter more blades if you stop using the plastic blade grips. Just my two cents.

Dave

[scubasteve83]

IS THE AXE CP A GOOD HELI FOR A FIRST TIMER I HAVE THE G3 SIM AND I CANT GET A HOLD OF HOVERING YET IS IT EASYER ON THE REAL THING. HELP ME OUT FELLAS

[VBDave]

By 'First Timer' I'm assuming you mean with Heli's in general. I'd suggest starting with either a Fixed Pitch or Coaxial (Dual Rotor) to get the hang of directional controls, etc.. If you can't hover on the SIM, any Collective Pitch bird is going to cost you a LOT in repairs.

The Coaxial (Like the Blade CX2) Heli's are almost IMPOSSIBLE to flip and are a good training point for Non-Sim directional control. Collective Pitch birds can flip over at the touch of the cyclic and require a tremendous amount of fine tweaking to keep level and under control -vs- the coaxials. Another positive point to keep in mind for starting out with a coaxial is that you can usually fly them INDOORS without worry of taking out your TV, Stero, Pets, Children, Spouse... I'd NEVER try flying a collective pitch in the living room! lol

( Some people do, but some people poke sticks at snakes too... )

I'd suggest:

a) Start with a Coaxial Helicopter to learn the overall controls and tail system.

or

b) Go ahead and start with a Collective Pitch BUT... BUT..... Don't even try to Hover it until you can at LEAST get a stable Tail-In hover on the SIM!

I'm new to the hobby myself and can tell you I wish I had spent more time on the SIM and saved a few hundred dollars in repair parts... ( At least now I'm a pro at installing replacement parts on my AXE CP! lol )

I've got a brand new HDX450 that's tuned and ready to go, but even with successful hovering in all directions on the SIM, I've decided to hold off flying her in favor of abusing my AXE instead. :)

-Dave

[Gunner]

Scuba, I've had the AXE for a couple of weeks now. It's probably the most reasonable heli to start with cost-wise. But all the small electric helis are difficult to fly. I have a 50 sized nitro that I fly and would recommend one of those to really learn on. The reason I bought the AXE was so I could fly it in my backyard where there's not enough room for the 50. But it is very unstable and takes a lot of concentration to learn how to fly it. And don't fly it with any breeze if you fly outside, at least not until you're accomplished at hovering. Try to find an inside place to fly, i.e. garage (2 car) or the auditorium at your school or church, etc. If you have a sim, that's fantastic. You will save a lot of money in the long run by practicing on it. If you have Realflight G3, you can download an AXE CP which is pretty much like flying the real thing. It is very twitchy. Here's a suggestion that has really helped me - add small weights to the end of the flybar, just in the inside of the paddles. Dubro makes collars that work very well. Get the 1/16 size. They come 4 to a package. Add one to each end right beside the paddle as far out on the flybar as you can. This really helps you to control the AXE. I haven't tried adding 2 weights to each end. That may be too heavy. But it might be perfect for learning to hover. Then you can take them off when you get ready to 3d. I'm sure they would be too heavy to 3D.

[Steve_O]

Gunner, are you referring to Dubro's 1/16" wheel collars?

[onetrade]

Just became a member and the new owner of a brand new Axe CP. I was very big into R/C cars, i bought a lot and built a lot but raced none. every time i would build a car either electric or gas something would break, if it didn't crash into a wall then the wheels popped off, the longest running time for me on a car ever was like 2 min. and i had like 6 cars with electric going over 85 and gas about the same. So i decided to try a Helicopter, ohh boy... first time i took it out, horrible.. everytime i would throttle up to try and get it jsut slightly off the ground the heli would start tipping forward or left or right. im guessing that it was cuz of the wind. but the whole heli tipped over and didnt have enough time to kill the throttle before the blades mowed the cement floor. Today New blades... YAY anyone have any suggestions on hovering? maybe the controls arent set correct , what do i change? Thanks guys

[Iceman140]

Grips should come 12 to a pack. I love the expert at replacing grips quote. I understand completely. Hey for what it's worth, try threading the bearing onto the hex wrench and then poke the hex wrench through the grip hole and then manuver the bearing into place instead of dropping it on the floor and under the fridge. :dontknow Glad to see so many Axe Flyers out there. Guess we just love the challenge of flying a mini when we're not drooling over a Raptor 90 picture in Model Airplane news. :wink:

[Ray K.]

I learned to hover like this:

Take it S-L-O-W.

Run the throttle up (starting tail-in, of course) until the heli just barely tries to get up. You'll probably notice that the heli wants to drift to the left more than anything, so be ready for it. Very small stick movements are all that it takes, and don't actually leave the ground until you can hold it solid in one place easily. Then, just try to do little 10 or 20 second hops, and gently cut the throttle and set her back down. From there, go for longer duration. Hovering takes *constant* corrections on all controls, and I can just about guarantee you that your hover point is not going to be with the cyclic stick centered. You just have to find it, and ignore "center" stick. Just make very small corrections as necessary. As the saying goes- hovering is like balancing a ball bearing on a sheet of glass. Try to make your inputs as smooth as you can- jerking the sticks causes huge problems. Small, slow, and smooth is what it takes, and believe me, I learned that one the hard way!

I think it took me about 2 weeks to learn how to hover- and that's with 5 or 6 flights a day, every day. It just takes patience, that's all.

You could also try some flat-bottom plastic blades, which are more durable (invaluable when you're learning), heavier (better gyroscopic stability, like flybar weights), and being flat-bottom means that they'll make more predictable lift and make the controls feel a bit "softer". And use your training gear! Mine saved me easily 20 sets of blades.

Hang in there! You'll get it!

...and I'm also pleased to see so many Axe pilots! It's good to know that I'm not flying some bastard helicopter that no one else has. I've only been doing this (flying helis) since April, but I'm now confident that I made a great choice for my first bird.

-Ray

[Iceman140]

Hey Ray!

Hey thanks for posting all the separations info for us too. I may get a Futaba G190 gyro for the switch. It's only $59.00 and I won't have to break it down to put on another bigger heli later. I'll get a GY240 or 401 for the bigger one.

Keep flying..........

Ed

[Ray K.]

No problem with the separations thing!

I looked high and low for information on the subject, and found very little. So I decided to make my experience public, and help out other guys that are trying to do something similar. I think that your G190 should work fine. My only experience with a rate gyro is the with the stock ACP gyro, and that only lasted a couple weeks. So I can't really comment on how I think it'll go, but I can't see any reason that it won't be better than stock. Some people have used the E-Flite gyro (G90? I can't remember) with pretty good success too, and I know that it comes at a very attractive price also.

In case you missed it, I'm going to be doing some further mods and separations very soon- most of my parts arrived today, and the rest should be in tomorrow. I'm going to be converting to a brushless direct drive tail, and I'm going to be making some changes to my battery mount also, so be sure to check it out if you're interested.

Take it easy-

Ray

[tugg.]

ray you answered a question i've been pondering. doing away with my 3 in 1 controller. already installed 240 gyro & tail motor controller. all thats left is a controller for the main motor right? i have a esc. 35 laying around, so break out the solder gun. i too have the recomended (0815) lipos on back order, using lipo from t. hobbies for now. getting about 9 min. flyin(mostly hover) time. thanks for the gentle nudge forward. tugg.

[Ray K.]

tugg-

A 35A controller should definitely be more than adequate for the stock motor. Doesn't it feel good to use something that you once thought was useless crap?! And I'm happy to encourage enthusiasm for our hobby in other people. It's a challenge, it's good clean fun, and it keeps me out of trouble. As far as the LiPos, my 1250 mAh bricks are good for about 13 minutes of hovering. It's almost too much time... tunnel vision and fatigue set in after that long. I'll bet that once I start really flying it hard, I'll be down to about 9 or 10 minutes of duration on a full charge, which is still plenty. I've actually had to re-engineer the placement of my electronics in order to offset the weight of the battery, but it's all good. The added mass of the heli makes it more stable in the wind, and longer duration is difficult to argue with. It has presented some challenges, though.

The BL/DD tail project will soon be complete. Tonight, I finally got all of my wire trimming, soldering, and shrink-tubing done on all of my electronics. Tomorrow, I'm going to install everything and take ACP v3.0 on her maiden test flight. I even got a new blue canopy to celebrate the occasion.... I'm such a nerd!

Wish me luck!

Ray

[tugg.]

good mornin, ray. happy 4th of july been workin on my axe this morn hope to go fly in the early morning calm. went out yesterday evenin after work, too much wind, flew anyway. 1st batt. good, practice hoverin into wind. 2nd batt. got too brave, tried ff, gust blew me left. next thing i know its behind me. crashed it. well lets go try it again. tugg.