Looking for Help Tweaking Esky Honey Bee FP

[EPBDDSB]

Hey guys. Looking for help tweaking Honey Bee FP . I know they tend to be squirrely and hard to control, but a buddy in the club has one he flies real well. I have ordered upgraded landing skid/battery holder and training gear. Just fishing for any other suggestions from others' experiences. I am pretty sure the CG needs to be forward from the stock battery holder. The new landing gear/skids are supposed to take care of this. Appreciate any other suggestions that anybody else has got.....:)

[skydude]

Thunder power has a 1300 7.4 volt that works excellently with this heli. Gives twenty minutes of flight time which is really helpful learning. With the smaller battery it seemed I would just be getting the hang of something and I would have to bring it in. 20 minutes a crack really accelerated my learning. It needs to be shoved forward past the front gear stiffener but that may be a moot point with the new gear. Just get it to balance to level hanging from the flybar.

Squirrely really has nothing to do with it. They all respond to 'twitching' but this heli will not kill you. The idea is to get the 'twitch' out of your sticks. Smooth, steady control. Don't overreact. Anticipate.

Think rhythm. And don't push yourself. Get completely comfortable with every inch that you make it travel. You will know when it is time to try something new. Once you master one basic it just seems natural to move to the next one.

Make sure set-up is good.
Good Luck. I flew the snot out of my HB fp for the last year and a half until I let the tx batteries go too low and it hit the dirt in a high speed dive. But learning how to fly on it made the other heli's a piece of cake.

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[dezflyer]

Make sure you balance both main and tail blades. Also, advance the main blades about 10 degrees foward before you fly. Dunno why exactly but it makes the HBFP alot more stable when you do this. WIth any motor driven tail heli you really have to fly the tail alot, but this will help you when you do finally get a trex or similar with a real HH gyro. Have fun! Boy that lil heli opened up the doors for this freak.

[Mike SVOR]

I was just going to write a thread in the mini electric section about my mods.

I went to the hobby store and bought a 3-4 foot length of the proper size carbon fiber rod for 4 bucks. I removed the landing gear struts and made new ones that were one inch longer than the factory. Glued them back in.

Then I made a new flybar that is 2 inches longer than the stock one.
It flies sweet now.
oh yea, no fly bar weights now.

[outhouse]

man you guys hit it on the head.

lipo if you dont have one moved to front for proper CG
superskids are great
metal flybar works great and last a long time
move the swash linkage to the outer arms [2 are longer]

this little heli is a blast to fly and really helps your progress, i fly the trex much more clean now. im learning wide fast circles with the bee and nose in and just having more fun with it lately.

rcgroups have a great FBFP section youll get lost in. theres some great vids too of a guy flying a bone stock one doing some sweet tricks. dont get caught up in all the mods they fly great stock.

[EPBDDSB]

Thanks guys. I will let you know once I've put the upgraded landing gear on and moved the CG. What size wire is that you use for the flybar?

[Mike SVOR]

Thanks guys. I will let you know once I've put the upgraded landing gear on and moved the CG. What size wire is that you use for the flybar?

.080 for flybar and skids.

One thing I notice is, carbon fiber rod has a lot of torsional flex. The flybar could possibly be better if made from hollow brass tube, but could add additional stress to the swash.

For now, I'm sticking with the carbon fiber rod.

[EPBDDSB]

Ok Thanks- I think I'll do the same. The fellow club member who helped me out flew it just fine. As soon as I get the upgrade on I will report back!:)

[dDavid]

The Blade CP landing skids work great. Are there new eSky skids available?

I'd keep everything stock and go with a LiPo battery. When you break something, buy 3 replacements to have on hand. I've found that as you progress, you'll break different stuff. At first I broke a lot of flybars and ring like collars, now I break blade holders and heads.

[wibble]

I'm really not too sure if this is relevant as I don't know exactly what you mean by "tweaking" and there's not very much adjusting necessary to the HBFP apart from the tracking and the 4 in 1.

I have an HBFP that's down right now because of the stupid snapped sticks that they call undercarriage, but I had already prepared my wish-list, after much consultation with experts and deliberation, which looks like this;

1/ Super Skids or the Xtreme skids (these are apparently stronger than telegraph poles and resolve the problem of 'C of G' as you can sit your lipo waaaay forward on the skid unit)

2/ Heat sinks on both motors (an obvious and cheap improvement)

3/ Upgraded head stiffener (again for obvious reasons)

4/ Slomax motors (they are supposed to last much, much longer than the stock ones)

5/ Xtreme blades all round (just about indestructible?)

6/ Aluminium flybar frame (at least something's got to be ally on the poor little thing)

7/ Direct drive tail motor/rotor (this is open to sometimes heated debate)

Hope this helps.

[skydude]

I have an HBFP that's down right now because of the stupid snapped sticks that they call undercarriage

I have many, many hours of fixing the little broken carbon struts. Could never bring myself to buy new. Well maybe once. I would put them back together with heavy threads of fiberglass and glue. Could be back in the air in an hour rather than days for new parts.

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[wibble]

Skydude, I agree wholeheartedly man. I do everything I can for zero bucks if possible, but the last crash took the little fitting from the top of the legs, where it's attached to the frame, with it, and I can't figure anything out for that particular part.

edit - you know, just your comment has inspired me. I'm gonna find a way to get her back in the air on my own. Just fyi, I live in Tahiti and packages take anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 years to arrive from abroad!!! I'm soooooo thankful to be blessed with these two hands of ours and a brain to use them! Thanks bro'.

[Mike SVOR]

I have many, many hours of fixing the little broken carbon struts. Could never bring myself to buy new. Well maybe once. I would put them back together with heavy threads of fiberglass and glue. Could be back in the air in an hour rather than days for new parts.

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Hey man,
Go to your LHS and buy some .080 carbon fiber rod. It's like 4 bucks.
That should be enough to redo all the landing gear sticks 1 inch longer and have enough to make a 2 inch longer flybar.
I still have some left over to fix stuff in the future. all for 4 bucks.

I'm very happy with my new flybar. I gota get video of how stable it is now.
But when you give it input to roll or pitch, it really does it quickly. :thumbup:

[kodak_jack]

man you guys hit it on the head.

lipo if you dont have one moved to front for proper CG
superskids are great
metal flybar works great and last a long time
move the swash linkage to the outer arms [2 are longer]

this little heli is a blast to fly and really helps your progress, i fly the trex much more clean now. im learning wide fast circles with the bee and nose in and just having more fun with it lately.

rcgroups have a great FBFP section youll get lost in. theres some great vids too of a guy flying a bone stock one doing some sweet tricks. dont get caught up in all the mods they fly great stock.
I recently broke a flybar and went to a metal one - a coat hanger. It was about .015" larger in diameter, so, I put a .093" (#42) drill in a pin vise and opened up all the holes where the flybar passes through.
Even though the Super Skids are heavier, the regular battery needs to go under the 4-in-1. With the Lipo, it needs to go even further forward and the rubber bands will be slack. You will probably need to add a shim of some kind. I used a piece of 1/8" wood.

[nuttcaze]

one thing nobody has said is that it really all comes down to the pilot, even with a unbalanced heli you should be able to maintain good control over it and have no problems flying it, I fly all my helis stock, unbalanced (the E-Smart is still being built), I went a kind of different route with learning on the HBFP. I told myself I would fly it no matter what, no matter how unbalanced or how much it vibrated or twitchy tail problems, just fly (was usually waiting for parts anyways), and now I never notice the twitchyness of the heli, I'm so used to it I just react for whatever it does to keep it under my control, not let "it" take control and crash. Now granted a properly setup heli is alot easier to fly, but I like my approach with unbalanced for now, now when I finish my E-Smart that'll be a whole other story.

[Mike SVOR]

one thing nobody has said is that it really all comes down to the pilot, even with a unbalanced heli you should be able to maintain good control over it and have no problems flying it, I fly all my helis stock, unbalanced (the E-Smart is still being built), I went a kind of different route with learning on the HBFP. I told myself I would fly it no matter what, no matter how unbalanced or how much it vibrated or twitchy tail problems, just fly (was usually waiting for parts anyways), and now I never notice the twitchyness of the heli, I'm so used to it I just react for whatever it does to keep it under my control, not let "it" take control and crash. Now granted a properly setup heli is alot easier to fly, but I like my approach with unbalanced for now, now when I finish my E-Smart that'll be a whole other story.

The more unbalanced a heli is, the more the swash becomes unlevel. This takes more power away from motor and battery to fly level.
All the people having hovering problems and who can't break ground effect, need to check their balance.

[nuttcaze]

oh I know, but I'm still a beginner myself so no reason to get to wrapped up it setup on helis that will eventually kiss the ground anyways, now when I'm a really good pilot sure, they'll all be set up right, but as far as why the heli can't leave the ground, even in my HBFP's worst shape they will take off unless the motor is bad or the battery, never anything else, even vibrating like a mother it will still fly, more my point.

[EPBDDSB]

Yeah I agree. I've moved the lipo forward and got superskids. I've got 'er hovering pretty good now. Thanks for all the replies.

[Efliernz]

I have had to move everything forward since putting a 2.4G AR6100 rx in. It is just too light!!! The c of g balance point has a huge effect on controlablilty...

[nuttcaze]

did you guys see the bi-weekly deal
http://www.heli-fever.com/
frame for our HBFP's $19 with DD fin set, $17 without, bought 2 w\ fins for myself, and $11 shipping

[kodak_jack]

did you guys see the bi-weekly deal
http://www.heli-fever.com/
frame for our HBFP's $19 with DD fin set, $17 without, bought 2 w\ fins for myself, and $11 shipping
The skids are the equivalent of Super Skids and they alone are $25!!! The nicer battery holder is nice to have too.

[Mike SVOR]

I wonder how much heavier that frame is than stock.

I personally wouldn't buy it due to it probably being heavier than what comes stock.
I'm trying to reduce stock weight, and it seems some peeps are trying to increase weight with these heavy skids and un-needed frames for a simple FP heli.

[nuttcaze]

thats cause I'm putting a brushless motor on it :fly

[Mike SVOR]

you're upping the power so you can spin the head faster to carry the extra weight, which in-turn, puts extra strain on the tail motor to compensate.... :confused:

Instead of a stronger frame and landing gear, how about using one of those blow up pool floatie things and mounting it around the body. It'd be like an air bag for crashes. :YeaBaby:

[nuttcaze]

I know it'll be extra strain on the tail motors, I've been researching this since I got my HBFP in Jan. I've got some plans :smokin: