Little plastic balls on tail pitch arms not smooth. What do I do?

[bladebreaker]

The little plastic balls on the tail rotor pitch arms don't really move smoothly. Is there a way to adjust or sand them? This is for a L500DX

Thx,
Tip

[LITHIUMSTATIC]

Hummmm........ Well try taking a small dab of toothpaste and a wet cloth and work it a bit. It may help, I've never tried it but it's what comes to mind.

[WayneBrown]

hehehe, Bob has smooth hands, get him to polish your balls. :)

I guess you COULD take that out of context, but I'm sticking with it anyway.

[LITHIUMSTATIC]

hehehe, Bob has smooth hands, get him to polish your balls. :)


That's just wrong.......:rolling

[OICU812]

If you are talking about the plastic balls that are molded onto the tail rotor blade grips, leave them alone. They will be smooth after a dozen flights tops, trust me. Absolutely do "NOT" sand them or put any lube etc on them.

[bladebreaker]

Thanks Shawn. As for the other advise...I think I'll pass!

Tip

[Al P]

Bladebreaker,

Any news ? Have the parts worn-in acceptably ? I have a Logo 10 with the same problem, and the new spare parts I have on hand have the same problem.

[Mercuriell]

The little plastic balls on the tail rotor pitch arms don't really move smoothly. Is there a way to adjust or sand them? This is for a L500DX

Thx,
Tip

Mine were offset - sort of wedge shaped hinge rather than parallel and they went in better one way round than the other so just check the hinge surface are parallel with each other.

[rscamp]

I haven't found the excessive friction in the Logo tail goes away as quickly with use as described above.

This binding can be kinda hard on the tail servo even if it does get a bit better with time. I'm sure some tail servos fail early because of excessive friction. For starters, I would use a ball link tool to help free things up - but there are sometimes other things to look at before going too far with this tool. For example, opening up the link may not fully address the situation where the mechanism moves freely near the centre but binds near the ends.

The pinned joints are a potential source of friction in the tail and elsewhere. This friction is most apparent at the ends of travel where the geometry requires the joints to rotate. Sometimes the holes in which the pin is supposed to turn actually have negative clearance making them stiff. This can be (carefully!) reworked. Also, this is hard to describe but sometimes there is friction between the faces of the plastic bits with the pin holes. This can sometimes be easily addressed just by separating them using the sharp edge of a knife blade as a wedge.

Back to the ball joints... Generally, the link should be worked and not the ball. But a molded ball is a bit different situation because it can have flaws. There isn't much flash but there is usually a mismatch in the molded halves of the plastic balls on these Logo parts. I have had some success reducing the friction in the pitch mechanism through the entire stroke by smoothing out the step with very fine sandpaper block (say, 1000 grit) ONLY on this mismatch and nowhere else. It has to be done lightly, only along the seam and with a constant rotation motion to avoid grinding in a flat spot.

Anywho, I think a bit of extra fiddling here is worth it. If nothing else, it will make the hard-working tail servo happier.

[MrMel]

I use an exacto knife to take away the "ridge" that is normally present on those balls, dont sand the whole ball, just that ridge.

Done that on all my logos.

[OICU812]

For the record I never touched my balls.

[rscamp]

Hey Shawn.

Psychologists now think suppression of this as a child can lead to behavioral problems later in life. I hope your helis don't get rebellious when they get older! ;)

Sorry. Couldn't resist... :)

[OICU812]

LMAO! Its ok I was looking for a dig! :rolling