15s Ion-x on the way!

[TomC]

Dawg,

I think a lot of these gear-strips were due to high (and often jerky) pitch pumping (up to +/-17 deg) with 10-12s packs. I'm hoping that on 15s the power delivery should be much smoother and easier on gears than 10-12s. Also, I do not intend to take my pitch much higher than +/-11 deg.

Certainly my initial 15s tests seem to verify this as I was not getting ANY gear wear/dust from my 50-54t gears. This only happened when I changed over to a 56t gear. Maybe my pinion/56t meshings were a little too tight. Also, I went from 690 to 700mm blades without lowering my pitch. Both of these may have contributed a bit or, it could just be that the Neu motor bearings were on their way out and the extra motor temps got the pinion pretty hot which started the gear to wear faster.

You are right, the Ion-x2 gives you the option to stack 2 main gears together and this is probably a good idea for really hard 3D guys. I don't think it's necessary for most of us sport/lght 3D flyers. Think I'd stick with the single stack initially myself.

Cheers,

Tom C

[DebianDog]

I would run 710 blades myself with the added weight but then again I just like 710 blades. I run 690s on the Raptor 60.

[Chachin]

Yeah I'm also planning on trying 710's in my mostly finished 12S Ion-X2. Will see how it does with the 690's first though. The weather has cleared up a lot now so I should be able to get some flying done soon.

Tom, 185deg F would be way too much temp for my likes too. I try to keep my motors running at 145deg F or less. That's probably what was killing both the secondary gear and the motor. You should consider lowering your flight time a bit if it helps keep the motor cool. Maybe drop your timing too if you have it at the +10deg setting. A double stacked secondary gear may also come in handy (if MA still makes them).

My 1.5Y Neumotor on 10S was seeing 135deg F in temps after 6.5min flights which it seemed to like. On hotter summer days it would go up to +140degF or so. I'm hoping it will stay below 145deg F with the new 12S setup and higher headspeeds... we'll see. If it gets too hot then I may consider trying an Actro 32-3. The 32-3 requires a much lower gear ratio which would save some weight in gears/pulleys anyways.

I think the X2's drive train would be better suited to handle the power of 15S. I think someone said they were able to fit the packs by placing two 5S packs up front and one in front of the motor. Either way please keep us posted!

Chachin..

[TomC]

Chachin,

I think there might be some merit in 700-710mm blades for a heavier 12-15s Ion but 690's will draw a little less power so I'm not really sure if there is a positive trade-off or not.

I agree, the 185 deg F motor temps are too high. I added a 50mm 12v PC fan powered by a 11.1v 3s 800 mahr lipo to blow over the motor and this helped keep the motor temps below 160 deg F.

My old Neu 1521/1.5f never got more than 150 deg F on 10s, even on hot summer days, but I think yours on 12s are going to get a bit hotter. I'm sure you'll let us know how it works out. I will probably go to X2 belt/pullies in the near future, once I have fine-tuned the right 15s ratio. I'll keep you all posted once I get my 15s Ion-x up and running again.

Cheers,

Tom C

[misskimo]

Dang , bearing out so quickly , you should tell Steve to slap in some ceramic bearing , the outer bearing race being steal. balls are ceramic. supose to be the Sheets

[TomC]

Ya Tony, Steve has the motor now and I hope he looks at installing better bearings. I have never had any problems with my old 10s Neu 1521/1.5f motor after he put new bearings in it last year. If not, next time I'll probably just install my own. like Mel.

He is also going to give me a quote on installing an internal fan but this sounds like it might be a big $ job to do. Guess I'll find out soon.

In all fairness to all motor manufacturers, we do put these motors to the test on our 90 sized heli's so it should not be a big surprise if they do not last long initially, and often need a bit of fine-tuning.

Cheers,

Tom C

[TomC]

G'day guys,

Just a short update on my 15s Ion-x project.

My Neu 1521/2Y motor has been sitting in the Neu repair shop for 4 months now. The items that needed to be replaced were bearings and the stator. The bearings are covered under warranty, but the stator is not. So this is going to end up costing me 50% of new price to fix.

Since I wanted the stator upgraded to the heli version (w/fan) anyway, this is no big deal $'s wise but Neu has been waiting months for overseas replacement stator parts for this motor (heli version) and they are still waiting for these. I could have gotten the stock stator rebuilt by now but I thought it was better to wait and get the heli version before I give it another go on 15s.

Hopefully this motor will be worth waiting for. I'll let you all know. Fortunately my 10s single staged Ion w/Actro 32-3 has continued to run very well so at least I'm still getting my Ion-x flying fix!

Best cheers,
TomC

[Chachin]

Man, sorry to hear about the long wait Tom. Looking forward to your 15S experience with the repaired motor.

My 12S Ion-X2 also continues to fly strong. It has turned out to be a very reliable setup. I'm starting to see a little bit of wear on the 100t double-stacked main gear, but it still has lots of life left. Today I am planning on installing the open tail box that I purchased for it a few months ago. I'm also going to re-program its PowerJazz to see if it will take care of some minor governor variation that I don't see in the Razor.

I'm now flying the 690mm TST's in the Ion as well. Not sure if it's due to some less blade noise, but they seem to have less pop than my previous V2's. The maneuverability is definitely there though. I'm going to try increasing the pitch range some more.

Chachin..

[TomC]

FINALLY, got my Neu 1521/2y motor back from the Neu repair shop. It took just over 6 months to get back, plus $US167.50 (incl. $20 shipping), but at least it got here, and looks great. The Neu guys were good to me and converted it to the new heli-version w/internal fan. The heli conversion adds ~2/3 inch to the motor length, so forget about using the stock Ion-x landing gear, or you will end up dragging a bit of dirt into the motor imop. The Razor landing gear is ~2/3 inch higher (and ~80-100g lighter) and is the way to go. This is the landing gear that is included with the new Ion-x2's anyway. I've been using it on my 10s SS Ion-x for a while and it seems to work fine.

The main mods I've done this time is to double-up the bottom motor plate (this adds a lot of frame stiffness) and split the round bottom motor plate (and rubber) so that I can fully brace the Neu motor to avoid it jerking back or forward, almost like another motor bearing support. I'll try to get some pictures of this later.

All's ready to go, just waiting on a break in the weather (rainy and windy for the next 3-4 days). If it works out as well as I suspect it will, I'll have to try it Flybarless!

Cheers,
Tom C

[prototype3a]

I realize this is kinda late in the thread but I though you might be amused that the first "flight" on my lepton EX I did the same thing you did. Full throttle/ 0 pitch then hit the throttle hold and shot it into the air. Luckily, I managed to auto it back down just fine. Since then I've been terrified to auto the bird since the headspeed drops off so quickly. But then again at the time 100% throttle was ~3400rpm ( I normally fly around 2750rpm).

[TomC]

Thanks for reminding me. Hope to avoid doing that move again!

Cheers,
Tom C

[TomC]

The weather finally improved and I got in 3 x ~6min 15s flights in today. With a 54t secondary gear (21.6:1 overall ratio) I got~1860 rpm at 75% gov. Pretty well what I expected of this Neu 1521/2y 780kv motor. The only hiccup was that my new Eagletree V3 (supposed to be good for 70v) monitor burnt itself out the first time I hooked it up to 15s ( 63v max). I had tried it before on10s (42v max) and it worked ok so I will send it back and try again.

I used my trusty old Wattsup meter (only rated to 60v) and it worked ok but it seems to have recallibrated itself to ~3% lower voltage (~61v max). The amps readout is fine (tested it with a clamp-on ampmeter), so the max watts are probably about 3% higher than the readout as well.

My last 6 min run was very good, @ +/- 11.5 deg pitch, and Radix 690 blades; 50 amps peak, 2500 watts peak, 2200 mahrs out of 2x5s1p Evo25 3700 packs (so ~7.5 min should be doable). The motor temps were ~140 deg F and battery temps were ~125 deg F (a little hotter than I thought they would be). The heli had lots of no-bogging power. I noticed the odd motor hesitation when I really gunned it. I'm using auto timing and will try +5 deg next time to see if this helps. You only have 4 timing options on the powerjazz prog card; -5 deg, auto, +5deg, +10 deg.

The gears seemed to run very smooth and there was no noticable wear (or white dust).

So far so good! I hope to get a few more runs in later this week.

Cheers,
TomC

[TomC]

I got 3x 7 min runs in today with 3x5s1p Evo25 3700 packs. I changed the PowerJazz esc timing to +5 deg and I think it helped fix the motor surging I got the other day with an auto timing setting. While I was doing this I also reset the fixed lo/hi throttle settings. I had to re-adjust the Tx throttle settings a bit. I now found that 84% gave me a nice solid ~1880 rpm headspeed with these Evo25 packs.

The Mahrs used (after charging) indicate that ~7-8 min runtimes should be possible with this set-up. Battery, motor, and esc temps were barely warm (less than 110 deg F). Thanks to the PowerJazz's smooth spoolup and delivery of power, there was no gear wear. Also, I had applied a bit of silicon spray to the pinion/gears as MrMel had advised.

Performance-wise, the heli was very good. But, I hate to admit, not as good as my previous light-weight 10s Ion-x flybarless, or my current flybarless 10s Trex6000e.

Looks like I'll have to take the HC Rigid off my 10s Trex600e again and try it on this 15s Ion-x flybarless. Stay tuned.

Cheers,
TomC

[TRAMTRAN]

Does an Ion-X2 with 12s setup give you kind of power like any other 90 nitro. I had an Ion X single stage with 10s setup Evo 4350mah (bought it used) and I had only two minutes of flying it before I crashed it, It's seem like it had less power than my 600N. It's really discourge me to finish building my Ion-X2.

[nicco]

A ION-X with 12 cell setup gives you MORE power than a nitro with 30% fuel. If you use good packs and a proper gearing.

My friends ION peaked 4400w = 5,98 HP.

He is using Desirepower 12s and a Neu 1915H 1.5Y. I have a 15 cell setup and peaks 5000W, but then the belt start to slipper (ION-X2)...

/N

[TomC]

Nicco,

I don't even think about 5000 watts, just what I need (~2500-3000 watts peaks, +90 sized nitro equivalent).

I put the Helicommand Rigid on this heli earlier this week. After a few runs over the last few days, I managed to get it flying very well today.

I tried a number of different servo arm lengths (12.5, 15,19.5mm) but came back to the stock Fut 19.5mm as best.

Played around with a few HC variables (PM me and I'll send you my latest HC data file). Overall, this 15s flybarless heli rocks! Flips and rolls are very fast and the heli just goes where you point it. My 3x 5s1p Evo25 3700 packs look to be able to do ~ 7-8 min runtimes.

Still a bit fine-tunning to do but this heli rocks, so far! Secondary gear wear has been nil-to-date. Motor and batteries are barely warm (less than 120 deg F). What's not to like? Charging all those battteries is a bit of a pain though.

Cheers,
TomC

[nicco]

Tom,

Everyone need 5000W, you just don't know it yet :-)

I do agree that charging all the packs is a hassle. I have made a charge-box. I have three Hyperion 1210i charger and a computer supply capable of 60A. It is easy to carry allong and makes the charge go fast.

/N

[Wyvern]

So Tom when are we going to see a video? :)

[TomC]

So Tom when are we going to see a video? :)


Sorry Warrick, I'm not into video's yet. I'll try to post a few pics though. I'd sure like to see what Nic's looks like on 5000 watts!

Cheers,
Tom C

[r2160]

Tom,

Everyone need 5000W, you just don't know it yet :-)

I do agree that charging all the packs is a hassle. I have made a charge-box. I have three Hyperion 1210i charger and a computer supply capable of 60A. It is easy to carry allong and makes the charge go fast.

/N

LOL, you are SO RIGHT nicco

cheers
Glenn

[TomC]

Just a quick update Mates,

I've really got this 15s flybarless (Helicommand Rigid; 3 axis gyro system, similar to the V-bar) heli dialed-in great now. I'm now using +/- 14 deg collective and +/- 11 deg cyclic. This heli is sooo powerful and agile, it scares me!

I demo'd this heli at an electric fun-fly today and even in 30-35 knot winds (grounded most of the wimpy E-planks, including one of mine!), it was rock solid. I got tossed up and down a bit due to wind gusts when landing, but in FFF I hardly noticed the wind.

Today I recorded 3500 watts peak on one run (I've got a long way to go to get to Nic's 5000 watts, I know!). After 7 min runs all temps were barely warm (less than 120 deg F). Most importantly, there has been NO secondary (54t) gear (or 95t main gear) wear, not a speck of white dust anywhere.

I think the secret here is the doubling up of the bottom motor plate and clamping the base of the longish Neu motor to it. I really think that these 2 things would have solved the secondary gear wear problem with the original 10s double staged setups. This really stiffens up the frames and provides an extra bearing support for the motor. I think (hope) that this will help reduce motor bearing wear as well. Ion-x2 belts are not required in this case imop.

Also, I admit, I'm applying a very small amount of silicon spray to these gears every ~5-10 flights as per MrMel's recommendation.

If you were using one of these Neu motors on a 12-15s Ion-x2 (w/belts) I would recommend you double-up a bottom motor plate and fabicate a way to clamp the motor to it.

It took just over 6 months and 50% of the original purchase price to get this Neu motor re-built, but imop, it has been worth it. This new and improved Neu 1521/2Y/F/H 780 kv motor rocks on 15s. The built-in bottom fan really seems to help keep this motor cool and performance up. On 10-12s, I think that a Neu 1521/1.5/F/H motor would be a good option.

The only drawback with this motor is that the fan unit adds ~150mm (~2/3 inch) length to the motor which means that the stock Ion-x X-cell tuff landing gear struts do not provide quite enough ground clearance. Simply using the new Ion-x2 landing struts (same as Razor ones) or the CF 60-90 upgrade ones from Esprit Model;
http://www.espritmodel.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=5053
will do the trick.

Right now, I cannot think of any way to improve this 15s heli (I know, DesirePower packs Nic, but I cannot seem to find them here yet!). This heli is now officially the pride of my heli fleet!

My next 15s experiment will be using an Actro 32-4 max on a single-staged set-up. I bought this motor a while ago when I thought my Neu Motor would never arrive! I'm just waiting for MA to release their new 111t maingear for the Bandit 50 (or whatever it will eventually be called). Stay tunned!

Best cheers,

Tom C

[Mr. Ben]

Hi Tom,
Sounds like you have the 15s all sorted out, good job. I think the best thing one can do to handle this kind of power is to support the pinion top and bottom with a bearing.
I have a 700 scratchbuilt powered with a Neu 1915H/1Y geared 12:1 that nips at 4000watts on FP EVO 20s on 10s. It weighs 10.2 lbs with 200 gm blades and a PJ. I have a similar heli running an Actro 32-3 on 12s. The Neu will pull the wheels off it, but it weighs 10.8 lbs.

Ben

[TomC]

Thanks Ben,

Is that an Align 700 conversion?

My 15s flybarless set-up weighs 4.95kg all up (10.9 lb). Not too bad considering 1.5kg (3.3 lb) of this are 15s batteries (3x5s1p Evo25 3700's). The single-staged 15s actro set-up should weigh about 0.25 kg (~0.6 lb) less.

I agree, a top bearing support, like the single staged Ion-x would be best, but there is no room to do ths on the old double-staged Ion-x. Clamping the bottom of the motor to the motor base is the next best thing though imop.

It's too bad that MA did not think to do an upper motor bearing support on their Ion-x2 belt drive. This would have helped things a bit and allowed you to tighten the belts a bit more, esp. with the Neu 5mm motor shaft. Maybe they will do this on their Ion-x3 version?

Cheers,
TomC

[Mr. Ben]

Tom,
Sent you a PM.

Ben

[TomC]

Thanks Ben. Good talking to you and please keep in touch. Thanks.

This 15s heli continues to impress me, as does the Neu 1521/2Y/F/H 780kv motor. As I've already said, I think the current set-up suits my style of flying for now (acrobatic and soft/med 3D). The 1850-1900 hs is probably a bit low for hard 3D junkies but with flybarless and +/- 14 deg collective and +/- 11 deg cyclic, it probably is more like what you would expect on ~2050 hs with a flybar and say +/-11 deg collective and +/- 8 deg cyclic imop.

At this point I think it would be a good idea to re-cap the main specs of my current favorite set-up;

-Flybarless w/ Helicommand Rigid in extreme mode (PM me for my HC files if yo need them)
-Quick UK Raptor 60/90 metal grips (direct drop-in for MA grips)
-Mikado V-bar swash driver (very nice and slop-free)
-Fut 9252's on cyclic with 19.5mm wheels
-Fut 9254 on tail w/14mm servo arm
-Align 6 amp 5.8v regulator w/ 5.1v stepdown on tail w/ FP Evolite 2s 2100 pack
-Neu 1521/2Y/f/H 780kv motor. This is a very nice 15s motor imop.
-Kontonik PowerJazz 120/200 amp esc, governed to 1850-1900 hs (~80% throttle setting)
-90t maingear, 15t drive pinion, 54t secondary gear, 15t motor pinion = 21.6:1 ratio (stock Ion-x original double staged gear sets). I might try a 50-52t secondary later for a bit more hs.
-3x FP 5s1p Evo25 3700 flight packs
-Radix 690mm 12/5 main blades, 105mm V-blades on tail
-Dx7 w/AR7000 rx

The only mods I did to the original Ion-x frameset was to;

-doubled up the bottom motor plate (the one the landing gear mounts to)
-split the round bottom motor plate/rubber. Removed ~ 2mm from each side and used these to clamp the bottom of the Neu motor to the bottom motor plate (provides ~ an extra bearing support)
-used Espirit 60-90 CG landing gear. This was necessary to give more ground-room for the longer fanned Neu motor and also saved ~100g weight. The Razor LG or the new Ion-x2 LG (same) would work fine too, and save ~ the same weight.

All up flying weight = 4.95 kg (10.9 lb).

I'll try to add a few pictures (which I'm not very good at doing) below.