E-Sky Belt CP Blade Pitch Angle

[dumbass]

OK, I have watched a lot of great videos showing how to setup the pitch angle of the main rotor blades and read a lot of threads on the subject. But for the E-Sky Belt CP I can't find any information on what degree the pitch should actually be and at what setting on the throttle. And what about the blade paddles, what angle should they be set at when all controls are set in the center (neutral) position? Maybe I've been over looking all this information but I now subscribe to two or three heli sites and I can't find any exact information for the E-Sky Belt CP.


So if anyone has the actual setup information please pass it alone to us less fortunates. And please remember that I (like most) am using the standard radio that came with the E-Sky. I have seen videos showing how to setup other helis with computerized radios but that's not where I'm at yet. Nor are most of us.


Thanks, :noteworthy


Dumbass

[EASYKILL]

As with all helis your flybar paddles should be paralel with eachother and the flybar carrier or arms, in other words looking down the flybar everything should look flat. With your left stick at mid point the main blades should be at 0 pitch. Of course you need a pitch gauge for this.
When this is done hover it and check your blade tracking. I try to adjust one side only, that way you don't chase it too much. I go a half turn of the ball links at a time. Hope this helps.

[dumbass]

Thanks a lot Easykill. Actually it helps more then you know. When you say the left stick I assume you are refering to the throttle stick. Correct? I ask this because the manual implies that the throttle stick could be on ether riht or left sided and they tend to give most of the informatiion with a right hand throttle. However, I have 2 of the beasts and both are lft hand throttles (thank God!) and I have not heard of anyone actually having the right hand throttle radio.

[DierWolf]

HI again...

Mode 1 (Right hand throttle) is usually used buy guys in Europe, Mode 2 is for us USA and western people.

To set up your pitch properly... you need to firstly unplug the motor wires, turn on your radio put everyting to the center (12 o clock) on the 2 knobs at the top, and center your throttle stick (aka Collective Stick).

From there you then plug in your heli, let it initialize and then flip your Idle Up switch (3d switch).

With everything centered at the radio as i said above you need to take your pitch guage and make sure at that point you have Zero Pitch, if pitch is not zero you have to adjust the links on the head until its Zero pitch on both blades.

Then move the stick all the way down and check what your maximum negative pitch is and do the same for the Positive, you should get minimum -9 at low stick 0 at mid stick and +9 at full collective.

but whatever you get the max and min should be the same.

After you have all that done, switch back to regular mode (Turn off the Idle up 3d switch) And check the maximum Pitch your getting.

if you can get me all those numbers i can stear you in the right direction if need be.

[dumbass]

OK, I set everyhting up the way you said and the numbers are -6, 0 &+9. Based on what you said -9, 0 & +9 this isn't correct. But honestly I think I have a bigger problem. Allow me to explain; 1) when I do a normal power up my heli vibrates starts to vibrate at about 25% power then smooths out again at 40% power. At about 60 or 70% it starts to lift off the ground. The problem is it leans badly to the left and acts tail heavy. I have verified that it is perfectly balanced so I don't understand the problem.

Please understand that this heli had a boo-boo crash and I have mad afew repairs to restore it back to new. I think everything is correct but I was confused with how to reset the blades (rotor and paddle). I set the rotor blades as you indicated but what about the paddle blades. And what could be causing it to pull to the levt and rear so badly. I am talking badly. It gets 2 inches off the ground and I have to drop power because it wants to hit the blades and tail on the ground.

[dumbass]

I forgot to mention that I made a swatch plate leveling tool and leveled the swatch plate as well. But who knows if I did that exactly correctly. Please help!!

[another_finn]

Have you checked the servo on the left side of the frame? With minor gear damage they may seem fine when you're setting it up, but the gears may skip under load. If that servo doesn't quite keep up with the others, the helicopter would pull left and rearwards in the way you describe.

Did you check that the main shaft is totally straight when you repaired it? That 25% spool-up boogie is a classic symptom of a slightly bent shaft. Many Esky shafts arrive pre-bent, so you can get that even on a totally new helicopter. The vibrations seem to settle down when you move past the resonant frequency, but they are still there making the thing harder to fly.

Like Easykill said, the paddle blades should be at a zero degree angle to the paddle control arms (part 006 in your manual on page 17), and to each other. If they are crooked, that could also give you vibration and poor control.

[dumbass]

Hi Another_finn, and thanks for the help. Yeah, as soon as I finished the first repair I decided to order a bunch of part ($250 worth) and included a new servo and main shafts. I knew that the servo on the left side was damaged and thought the main shaft was bent because of the vibration. But I have now replaced both and have done all the algnments per the manual and as directed on this site. But the results are always the same. Vibration and as soon as it lifts off it starts to dive left and backward. This happens before it gets even 1 inch from the ground. And if I allow it to continue it will hit the main rotor and tail rotors into the ground so I kill the power to avoid more costly damages.

When I received this heli the paddles were tilted about 5 degrees. But per instructions here I have reset them to "0" pitch. The result are always the same (I need more help !!)

[another_finn]

OK, so let's get back to square one and make sure we're not missing anything obvious. Am I correct in thinking this is a fairly recent purchase, and you are just starting out? The Belt CP is known to be quite tail heavy, and will often act a little like it even if the balance seems to be fine. Because the tail rotor also pushes the helicopter, all single-rotor helicopters will lean slightly in a hover. When you're taking off, they will always try to tip over if you don't compensate with cyclic. So the first question is... are you flying it from the moment the blades spool up, or are you just lifting off with the throttle and watching what happens? The helicopter will always require constant corrections to remain in a stable hover, and hovering is actually one of the hardest things to do - it has been quite aptly compared to balancing a ball bearing on a convex surface. With time, these corrections will become second nature, but certainly not within the first days or even weeks.

If you are on the cyclic stick the moment you start running up the motor, just how bad is this left and backward tilt? Does it require extreme movement on the cyclic stick to correct, or are you even able to counter this motion? The reason I ask is that with the turbulent backwash from the ground, an altitude of one inch is actually the very worst place to be. If you can keep it under control and rise to at least four feet, does it still display the same tendencies?

If you haven't really learned to hover yet, the standard place to point people is Radd's School of Rotary Flight at http://www.dream-models.com/eco/flying-index.html. This program takes a little discipline and perseverance, but it has saved more than a few people quite a lot of money in spare parts.

Assuming you are already fairly comfortable with hovering, did you check the whole throttle range when you leveled the swashplate? With Esky servos, some are often a little "slower" than others, so even if you are level at any particular throttle setting, your swashplate can actually be tilted at another. A computer radio allows you to correct for this problem, but with the standard transmitter all you can do is try to find matching servos. Speaking of servos, the next time you break more than one you might want to consider replacing them all with Towerpro SG90s. They are much better quality and even a little cheaper than the Eskys.

What battery are you using, by the way? The EK1-0187 2100 mAh balances the Belt out quite nicely, but the 1800 mAh batteries need to be mounted further forward than the canopy really allows. You did mention you checked the balance, but it's very easy to be a bit off, even with experience. Have you tried to add blu-tack or similar to the nose to see if the backward tilt could be cured by altering the balance? The left tilt might be as simple as adjusting the servo rods a little - as the tail rotor throws the whole thing a bit off, a perfectly level swashplate is not really the ideal to strive for but rather a reasonable starting point. If it's not a mechanical problem somewhere, you can get a long way towards controlled flight by finding a smooth floor (as big as you can find!) and seeing which way the helicopter wants to drift before lifting off high enough to do damage.

Going back to the vibration issue, have you also checked that the flybar is straight and the blades are balanced? And, for that matter, are the blades even straight? I shouldn't have to ask, but if you're using the standard Esky woodies I have seen more than one set that was worthless straight out of the bag. As I mentioned, being new is also no guarantee that a main shaft is straight. Rolling it on a glass surface should show any slight bends it may have.

[DierWolf]

1. Check Blade Balance
2. Check Tracking
3. Check/Change Feathering shaft.
4. Check for play between the Plastic Head and the Main Shaft
5. Check for play in the main shaft itself by the bearings.
6. Check Paddles ( With No stick movements they should be Zero Degrees on each
7. Check Distance between the paddles and head they should be the same (This also goes for with the paddles off, the flybar should be equal length on each side or will cause out of balance head.

After doing all of that....

1. Unplug the motor wires and turn on the radio and heli
2. Move the throttle stick upwards and watch it to see if all servo's are moving at the same time and the swash is staying level as it goes up (sounds like one of your servo's, namely the one on the left side of the heli is lagging behind, this is of coz assuming your CG is correct as you say)

As Another Finn said... All single rotor helis when taking off will drift to the left, give a little right cyclic stick ( not much is needed) until its off the ground then it will level out on its own if your swash was set properly.

Rear drift could be..

1. Swash not level
2. CG To far back (move battery more forward)
3. Rear servo's traveling at a slower place or Less throw than the forward servo.

[DierWolf]

For your pitch settings... did you make sure both of the knobs on the top were at 12 o clock position when you started?

If all else fails, take the heli to your LHS and ask them to set it up for you, if they give you crap about they never seen that heli and dont know what to do tell them its no damn different than a Trex when it comes to setup.

Remember this is not a Co-Axial heli, you cant simply push throttle and expect it to sail straight up, yu must give some right cyclic as your taking off.

Perhaps a small video of what its doing as its taking off will help us out as well, and maybe a picture of your head with the bird turned on so we can see.

[dumbass]

Guys you have both been great with all the help. I worked on the beast all day and still no improvement. I am so pissed right now I'm considering just selling everything on Ebay. So tomorrow I'm going to just relax and forget about this thing. But on Monday I'm going to re-read everything you wrote and start again. Then I'll write detailed info on everything I see or find.

And by the way this is a new bird that has not actually flown unless you count 6 inches for 2 feet when I flipped the 3D switch in error (Opps). That was when it crashed and did all the damage (main rotors, tail fin, front servo, main shaft, cross shaft for main rotor blade and upper main drive gear).

[another_finn]

Ah... The good old self destruct switch. You're not the only one who has accidentally flicked it. I would automatically hold all Esky servos suspect after a prang like that. Next time you're going over the helicopter, also check the flybar case for hidden fractures.

Don't give up - some problems can be far from obvious, but they can all be fixed. I think we've all been there at one point or another, and sometimes the best thing you can do is take a short break and another look later, with fresh eyes and a less frustrated brain.

[merlin703]

Guys you have both been great with all the help. I worked on the beast all day and still no improvement. I am so pissed right now I'm considering just selling everything on Ebay. So tomorrow I'm going to just relax and forget about this thing. But on Monday I'm going to re-read everything you wrote and start again. Then I'll write detailed info on everything I see or find.

And by the way this is a new bird that has not actually flown unless you count 6 inches for 2 feet when I flipped the 3D switch in error (Opps). That was when it crashed and did all the damage (main rotors, tail fin, front servo, main shaft, cross shaft for main rotor blade and upper main drive gear).
Ha ha ha... sorry I laugh dumbass but... ha ha ha.... the same thing happened to me and the even funnier part is the exact same thing is still happening to me right now. Weird... I wonder if you (dumbass) are just me talking (typing) in my sleep.

I don't want to give you a long story but my heli hasn't been off the ground for more than a couple of feet and for not more than 3 seconds. My LHS didn't know how to work on this heli and changes of letting it work on that could be up to hundreds of dollars. Out of frustration and determination, I bought a TREX 500 to learn basics of heli set up and hovering. Things are good there and I'm able to hover. The always pulling to the left part got me twice but I can finally hover with no problem.

After that I decided to go back to my Belt-CP and guess what.... after having everything looking GOOD in paper the dawm thing pulls hard to the left AND backwards. This is REALLY HARD to fly. I only hovered it for a few seconds and thanks to the training gear, I didn't crash it.evreything seem to be just perfect... it pulls way to the left and backward. This is REALLY hard to fly.

Since I'm on the same boat as you are... this is what I will suggest:

1) Take it to your LHS for they to tak a look at it. I'm not sure if leaving it there for they to work on it will be a good idea because it might require hours of work. I guess the basic goal is to take a look at your heli to see the links, swash plate etc. That shouldn't take them more than 15 minutes.

2) If you want to do it yourself.... put on training gear so it doesn't tilt when testing it and break more parts.

3) have someone experienced hover it for you UNTIL it's well leveled and ready to be flawn.

I will read the posts on this thread again and test things myself since I have the same problems you have. I will probably not be able to work on this heli and test it outside until the weekend but if you want, we both could work on this since we both have the same heli with the same problems. PM me if you want to do that. I also think it's a good idea to take a break. Slow servo on the left MIGHT be the problem.... I mean helis pull to the left but mine is BAD left.

It's frustrating but at least I have my TREX 500 to practice with now and I WILL NOT let this Belt-CP kick my butt. I WILL conquer!!! :nanabobo

[dumbass]

Guys, I can not tell you how much I appreciate all the information, time and help you have given me. But like the little boy on the street once you gave me a pennies worth of candy I now want a dollars worth. So I hope you can appreciate my situation and continue to help this poor old dummy learn to repair, setup and fly this thing. Hell maybe you were in a similar situation at one point too. I wish I could find someone in the Chicago burbs that has a heli that wouldn't mind doing a little training.


OK, here's my story from the beginning. It's a little on the long side but to some degree a little funny too. About a month ago I ordered 2 complete E-Sky Belt CPs (1 for my son-in-law and 1 for me) from a site on the internet ($189 ea.) along with 2 flight simulators for $19.98 ea. (a waste of money in my opinion). Within a few days they arrived. As you can guess I was excited to try it all out ASAP. But I remembered all the information on the site recommending to learn the flight simulator first . So I set that up on my PC to practice while I changed one of the batteries. Honestly I just don't see a lot of value investing the time in the flight simulator. In my opinion it nothing more then a kids game and does not simulate the real thing very well. That being said it could be the equipment that I bought.


Later that day I setup one copter and because there was still snow on the ground I took it to the basement for it's first flight. Believe it or not I actually didn't do to badly. I was just wanted to try hovering about 4 to 6 inches off the floor....but then I made a boo boo. About 2 minutes into my hover I accidentally flipped the 3D switch on the top of the radio. Opps.....Ouch. OK, I picked up all the peaces I could find (never found any part of the horizontal tail) set it up on the table and proceeded to check the damages. All in all it wasn't to bad. Bent main shaft, bent feather shaft, missing horizontal tail blade and one damaged main blade. I ordered the parts from X-Heli thinking I could be back in the air by the weekend. WRONG! First off X-heli screwed up the order and it took almost 2 weeks to get a return call from them. And another week for the correct parts to arrive. By the way I ordered a lot of parts ($226 worth..I was expecting a lot more crashes).


I eventually made all the repairs but and tried another test flight. Before it even lifted off the ground it started tilt to the left and backward so badly that I had to kill the power. I checked everything that was recommended but no improvement. What I did find was 4 ball ends were not free turning so I freed them up and oiled them and tested again. This time it seemed a lot better but at 80% power it didn't want to lift off. So I reset the main blade and paddle angles and tried again. OK, now it lifts off but it's back to the tilting problem again. I also found the the front servo (in front of the bat.) had a bad gear so I replaced it. Actually, I had to replace it twice for the same problem. I found another ball end that wasn't turning freely and I thought that was the problem but the same servo is out again now with the same damaged gear. So today I am going to recheck what could be causing this problem. Then go back to the actual setup.


Here is an idea what I have done to check things out;



verified the weight of my new blades (E-Flight blades 325mm). They are within 1.5 grs of each other
checked th balance point of each blade (right on with each other)
tried to set the main blade angle with 3D switched on; A) set the hov/pit at mid point, B) set all other trim controls at mid point (including the throttle. Is this correct?). C) Installed pitch gage and adjusted throttle to center point (blade angle is set to “0), throttle up to max (blade angle is +8), throttle to zero (blade angle is -6). Both blades are about the same. I think I have another bad front servo and this maybe causing the funny numbers. I have 3 more on order.
The paddles were pitched when check while in 3D mode. So I straightened them to “0” angle. Is this correct?
That's where I am now. This afternoon I am going to recheck for binding in the linkage. And check the front servo to verify that it is bad. If it is bad there is little I can do until I receive my parts order.


Last note..........My son-in-law tried flying his heli this weekend and he is now waiting for my parts order as well. But at least he can get his machine off the ground. And most of his current damage was caused by hitting another flying object (basketball). Is that another Opps or is that called “O'shit”? If all this wasn't so expensive it would be really funny.

[dumbass]

Merlin 703..I sent you a message but not sure how it all works so please let me know if you received it. Thanks, Bob

[DierWolf]

Think you need to change that servo(s).

As for the LHS they are a bunch of ****s, there is no difference what so ever in setting up the head on a Belt CP or a Rex.. only difference is the flybar is over the blades on the Belt, in fact there is LESS to do on the Belt CP as most of the links are not adjustable.

flybar cage has to be flat and parallel to eachother, jsut the trex is a single unit while the belt cp is separated
Paddles have to be at Zero degrees and centered with the flybar cage (same for both birds)
Setting Pitch... on Belt CP there is only one rod set of rods to touch while on the Rex there is 3 sets..

REally doesnt get any easier than the belt cp (only pain in the but is the flybar control arms being not one unit
so you have to make sure they are parrallel to eachother, unlike on the rex its one unit)



Grrr that gripes my ass, if i was in the US i'd visit them just so i could tell their ass off.

If you follow the setup instrcutions on the sticky and it looks like that when your done and its still not flying properly then its one of the following :

1. Servo bad
2. Wrong CG
3. You cant fly yet.

[merlin703]

Merlin 703..I sent you a message but not sure how it all works so please let me know if you received it. Thanks, Bob
I did not get any messages from you. You should use the "PM" option at the bottom of this message to send me a "PM" (private message). To check your "PM"s, you should click on the uppper left corner where it says "PM". It will be blinking if you have any messages from me or anyone else.

[merlin703]

Hey,
Go to the site below, and type on the upper left site your city and country and press enter. Then activate on the left side where is says "Flying fields". That will give you the name of fields in Chicago. I see a pilot in Chicago. He might be a good point of reference. You could send him an email directly to that site and ask him for places where heli guys meet. That would probably be the ideals situation to have someone to test fly it for you and quickly tell you what the heck is wrong with your heli. If the same servo keeps breaking.... something is stopping it from working properly. Here is the site.

http://usmap.rcheli.dk/

[dumbass]

DierWolf...Your right on one thing for sure............."I CAN"T FLY YET" But as soon as I fix this thing I will try again.

[DierWolf]

LOL well now that you mention that the problem could be you :)

Like i said, its not a lama and you have to control its ascent it dont go up straight on its own.

[merlin703]

Even if he can't find a physical problem with the heli doesn't mean that it's the pilot inability to fly a heli, is it? I say this because he said he was able to hover/fly it before so that makes me think that he does know what the heli does when it starts lifting. Based on that, if it's not the pilot it has to be something with the heli itself that he can't figure out. Also, because of the fact that he had to replace the same servo many times... makes me thing something is casing the same servo to go back... so I think there is the key of the problem. That's must my guess by looking at the thread.

My Belt-CP also goes to the left (tilts) but because of the training gear I have on gives me enough time to use the sticks and hover it.... no for long because it's just to hard but I'm still able to. I hope to be able to fix mine this week ;)

[DierWolf]

Helicopter will ALWAYS drift to the left on liftoff... Its a normal thing for all helicopters with single rotor..

Simply give a tad of right stick until it lifts off the ground... As you learn to fly this will become natural and you wount even know your doing it.

PS Sorry didnt see where he said he could hover will have to re-read the entire thread.

[dumbass]

OK guys I think I'm on the road to recovery now. I don't know what the problem was with the font servo but I damaged 3 of them in that same location. As I said I checked all the linkages and everything else that I could think of and everything was 100% free. I found that the gear that was being damaged in all those servos was the same gear. And it retates less then 180 degrees for full operation of the servo. So I repositioned the gear 190% in rotation from where it was damaged and the servo works fine again. This is a good thing to remember when you damage a servo.

I still need to do some fine tuning of the linkage rods but I did a little test flight in my garage just now and it lifted off almost as good as new. So as soon as I have the time I will reset all the blade angles and see whathappens. Wish me luck.

[merlin703]

Good think you can kind of hover already. It took me 3 - 4 attemps (batteries) to hover. :(