Omicron Gyro Pad Vibe Killer came unstuck!!

[sleeperaus]

Hi,

Just wanted to make people aware of something I unfortunately found with the lynx purchased 'Omicron Gyro Pad Vibe Killer' (henceforth refered to as 'OGPVK')

So xfered my micro brain fbl over to my blade 450x the other day to give it a try. I had some OGPVK that I'd recently got from lynx to try this. I thoroughly cleaned the underside of the fbl and the mounting point where the ar7200 used to be on the 450x before attachment.

stuck the OGPVK to the mounting point on the heli and pushed it down as best i could. Then I stuck the fbl unit to the upper part of the OGPVK, again applying as much pressure as I could to the fbl and the sticky part.

setup everything on transmitter and brain (have done this all before on other heli so pretty confident I know what I'm doing with this part).

Went to field for a flight.
Soon as I started spooling up I felt something wasn't quite right, heli seemed to be trying to put pressure on skids in one direction (and trying small corrections on aileron/elev to counter didn't seem to be working). Tried to see what might be causing it but couldn't see anything at the time.
So stupidly I thought : could be just a 'while on the ground' thing, so I spooled up again and brought it up off the ground..... this was rather short lived as it then proceeded to roll fwd and right, straight into the ground!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyways took heli home, and it was only once back home and taking out of box that I saw what must have happened, the fbl unit had come loose from the OGPVK and was essentially hanging off it!!!!

Not sure if my applying of the OGPVK to the heli was not correct (but I have put brain on other helis with other type of mounting tape and this didn't happen) or if the OGPVK just isn't as good a glue as other types of mounting tapes, but just so others might not get bitten the way I did, 2 cautionary notes here :-

1. If your going to use 'Omicron Gyro Pad Vibe Killer', be damn sure its very well secured to both the heli and the fbl
2. If when spooling up on the ground (and especially with maiden of any new component) things don't appear to be right : shut it down, take it home and work it out, it'll save you time and $$$ in the long run (this one's obvious... so why didn't I follow it??!!)

my crash costs so far aren't too bad : main gear, feathering spindle, lost head links, 1 blade!! PITA

[jrman83]

If that is indeed what caused the problem, then it's known vs what was orientation must have been off. You should have gotten about 10 swash pumps compared to the normal 3. That should have been the first indication.

I use an alcohol swab for everything I stick, even things like stickers on skids, etc. Did the item come unstuck or did the gel adhesive separate from the pad?

[sleeperaus]

I got the normal 4 pumps on initialisation.
I believe this was because, on initialisation, the pad would have been stuck down enough not to move, but under vibrations induced under spool up, it was causing the fbl to slowly come loose from the pad (enough to cause the crash by what you described, ie. fbl thinking it was in incorrect orientation when it was indeed level).
As I mentioned, it was only when I got home and pulled heli out of the box that the fbl was completely loose from the mounting pad.

I used alcohol on all surfaces before sticking the fbl on heli.
Fbl unit came unstuck from the pad (ie. not the adhesive seperating from the gel)

[RichKnapp]

I never had a issue myself.

Did you let the alcohol fully dry before applying the pad?

[learnedthehardway]

Ben might be onto something with the adhesive coming off the pad theory. A friend of mine peeled off the adhesive while peeling off the backing. It's easy to do by mistake.

Used omnicron on fbl units, esc's and sats with no issues. Helps if you wiggle it a little as you're pushing down to get whatever you're mounting seated/stuck on it good.

[sleeperaus]

RichKnapp : "Did you let the alcohol fully dry before applying the pad?"
yes.
My best guess is that I just didn't manage to get a good enough 'stick' when I put the pad on there.
Maybe the suggested 'wiggling' while applying would have helped since I guess that would have got out any tiny air pockets that might have impeded adhesion.
Also maybe I just didn't hold the fbl down on the heli for long enough (ie. apply a bit of pressure over some time) to allow it to bond completely to the heli and the fbl.
Also maybe I should have done the sticking in different order, so stick to fbl first, hold down and apply pressure over some time, then attach to heli, hold down and apply pressure along with some wiggling. Maybe that would have been better?
Anyways I'm going to try the futaba tape on this heli as that's proved reliable in past.

learnedthehardway : The adhesive definitely didn't come off the gel. All the adhesive was still on the gel when the fbl came away.

Thanks for your comments guys. Waiting on some head links to come in then I can hopefully re-maiden.

[BrokeDad]

I hope you don't have any more issues. I just use the 3M tape people on here recommended but have always wanted to try one of those "fancy" pads.

[crma0101]

Used this stuff several times and never had it come off. but one note that may help some is that I have found a lot of the molded plastic FBL cases and some heli parts have a mold release or oil residue on them or in the plastic itself, so I usually take a small piece of 400 grit sand paper and just hit just the very middle of the underside of the FBL and the place I am going to mount it ( no need to go outside the area it will sit to keep things looking nice) and just take the sheen off it, then clean with alcohol, and after it has dried mount everything. Last time I took a AR7200 off that was mounted with this it was on so good I needed my heat gun to warm it up a little to peel off.

[Bhujang]

Originally Posted by BrokeDad

I hope you don't have any more issues. I just use the 3M tape people on here recommended but have always wanted to try one of those "fancy" pads.

Yes the 3M 4011 stuff is solid. Works great for me. Great cushion vibe killer for fbl too.