Finally time to get rid of the vibe

[toonttm]

Sorry - very long post, proverbial wall-of-text ahead.

After many months I decided that now that winter has set in, it is time to finally sort the vibe problem in my 500E. For months the 500E has been sitting on the shelf, taunting me to sort it out. New motor and a heap of new parts sitting right beside it. I just decided that I needed to fly so have been working the mCP X and lately a 250.

So tonight in went a new motor and a new tail rotor shaft. (The swash is still on but the rest of the head is not). Nothing attached to the rotor shaft.

Spooled it up - no problems, or should I say no vibes anywhere.

Next I added the tail rotor hub, still no vibes, anywhere.
Then added the slider and the tail grips (minus blades). Inspected, cleaned and greased the thrust bearings. (slider moves freely but I haven't even got to the stage of putting the tail control rod on, lol, I haven't even installed the tail servo yet)

Spooled up and have some minor vibes starting to appear. A slight vibration on the boom and small but visible vibes on the boom struts. They quickly disappear if I touch the boom struts lightly. I tried a cable tie across them to see if that would lessen this vibe, but no luck. This is where I start to think I need to cure this issue before adding tail blades as they will probably increase the vibe. Do I need to look at the chinese-bolt-mod-thingee? There is slop between the grips and the hub, maybe this is what I need to sort out first?

Anyway, thought at this stage I would install the tail servo and the gyro. I am not going to connect the servo to the tail yet. I just want to see if the gyro is picking up on this vibe. At this stage the metal gyro shelf is still entirely vibe free.

I still have my GP780, but might skip that. I have a Quark on my 250 but would like to keep that there, it works! I need something that works to keep my sanity intact, lol. So might try the Curtis Youngblood miniG. (i'm going to use one piece of PU gel to mount the gyro)

Hopefully the tail servo will not 'jitter'. I will update once I complete this, but I am interested in what my options are with the tail grips.

Thanks for reading, and time I got back on the tools, lol.

[wanderer56]

This is the latest and greatest tailblade grip that most of the 500 owners are going to. It has an added thrust bearing that helps eliminate a lot of the slop.

http://helidirect.com/align-metal-ta...ro-p-25417.hdx

There are just so many things that can cause vibs on the 500E. Slightly bent flybar(never got one perfectly straight out of the package), paddles not perfectly level, play in main gear and main shaft, side play in flybar cage, loose drive belt, play in linkage, play in tr blade grip, flybar not perfectly centered, loose bearings in wash-out arms and mixing arms, play in tr control arm linkage. Bent motor shaft, bad motor bearings, thght blades, etc. You'll just have to go through it and try to eliminate as much of the slop. Some guys never had a problem with a completely stock 500E, plastic and all, but I fought vibrations the whole way until I comverted it to fbl. Spool up is now as smooth as can be.

If you can afford it, ditch the GP780 and get a Quark.

[toonttm]

... ...

[DKS_ONE]

I had a phantom vibe too... it SUCKED!! I replaced literally the ENTIRE TT tail and everything in it. Tried one TT bearing, two TT bearings, Three TT bearings... same. Changed horizontal stabilizer fin and mounting, boom struts, main gear, auto rotation gear, motor bearings, main shaft bearings, main shaft and the flux capacitor... STILL vibed. I disassembled and reassembled I dunno how many times and one time I put it back together and it just stopped. Kinda makes me mad cuz I have no idea what I changed but it is fine now. I feel for you on the vibes, hope you get it figured.

[schoep]

If you have a vib spending $100's of $ on a upgrade (FBL)dosn't seem like a fix,it's avoiding the root of the problem and buying a bunch of parts.
I've spent alot of fly time chasing vibs. and my only conclusion is once you found it, you spend alot of money you didn't have to. I chalk this up to why we call it an exhelirating hobby.

[torpedoarmed]

Don't overlook the motor. I finally identified mine as one of teh cheif sources. My fence crash last year was terrible.
I replaced the shaft and bearings in teh motor, still a wicked vibe, replacedc them a second time thinking maybe I did something wrong, still major vibe.
Called Inov8tive.com talked to a tech, he suggested ion the crash I may have lost a weight int he bell housing, replaced the motor and major vibe gone.

Now final tail vibe. I bought a Vbar, having vibe analysis is worth millions, I identified a vibe at 14K RPM, meaning tail rotor.

As for the Pro "B" tail rotor, IT IS GREAT BUT! Mine was factory new, and from day one one grip was dead on the money the other had abotu 2mm +-1mm of play when you pulled it out from the hub. I checke dthe bearings, even milled teh screw down thinking it was out of spec and bottoming out, stil had teh play.

Last night I replaced the Hub, I did ad ry run adn both grips where 100%, however when I disassembled them and greased them up the first one one had the play again, I swapped it to the other end of the hub and it was 100%. Next the final grip, same thing it had play, I put a spare thrust bearing in and boom, no play.

When I say no play I mean ZERO when you pull it from the hub, it can still rock around like the old ESP but, it is so minor it is ilrelavent.

Chris