New user

[JTAnimal]

I just bought a BD 3SX I thought the software came with the unit. This unit did not have the software in the box. Do they not come with the software anymore?

[allen james]

It's always best to get the latest software.

http://www.bavariandemon.com/service/software-firmware/

[JTAnimal]

I haven't setup anything except for Vbar in a long time. reading all the posts in the sticky area, my head is swimming . anyone have a sedative, looks like I'm going to need one..

[F1 Rocket]

Not hard at all. Load the software, connect the system, start the setup wizard, follow through till the end, go fly. The biggest challenge new users have is configuring their particular TX. This may cause a bit of head scratching at first but if you are familiar with your TX it should not take too long to figure out.

[jsbach#1]

Yup Download the latest one from the site, takes seconds.
If you're familiar with Vbar setup I wouldn't even bother with the wizard. Just load in the posted default setup file called 550-800 that one.

Then go through it page by page and look for the obvious, like jr, sbus, etc, wires forwards or backwards, rotor style, servos, centering, etc. Leave all the gain and specific tail and flight gains default. It will fly mint ! lol Set endpoints etc. Set collective and cyclic throw. omg it was a blast once I did it a few times, such an easy system !

[JTAnimal]

I'm using a DX8 and the sticky, I read through about the DX8, shows using the trainer button for the rescue feature, I don't like that. the button would need to be more accessible if I'm going to get to it quick enough to pull out of trouble. But I guess I will be able to figure that out.

I always liked my vbar, but with them moving in the direction of tuning options only available if you buy their radio, thought I would try one with bailout. my wife bought a Ikon for me for Christmas, half way through that setup, had to call support, long story short, "O" that unit seems to be having a problem you will need to return it. dump it..

I like a cortex I put on a plane, so I thought I would give the Demon a try. But I cant get into that "ok I'm setting up a new heli mode"

your right I'm sure I will be fine, I was able to download the software and got the unit connected and the sat's bound. I will try the setup tomorrow when I have more time, don't want to rush..

[KSHeli]

With the DX8 it's an easy mod to relocate it to the outside back left location. Just open the tx and swap the switches there is plenty of wire on both. I believe the actual procedure is in 1 of the stickies.
I Don't know if I would skip the wizard the 1st time you may miss a step as new to this system. Hover your mouse icon over the different option and a bubble will pop up with some explanations, you may learn something,maybe.

[jsbach#1]

You want to train yourself to grab rescue 2 moves before its completely wrote off. I made the mistake of grabbing it at the very very last second and wasn't quick enough with my 380 which wrote it off, my fault not 3sx. I literally grabbed it 2 feet off the ground and reaction wasn't there and that bird was accelerating like a ballistic missile !

But if you grab it at a safe time you won't need spidy senses to reach your switch. As you get more comfy grabbing it you'll notice your'e flying is getting better and can do things you couldn't before.

And with practice you'll be able to grab it in a fraction of a second no worries. The rescue being spring loaded is good, as long as you hold it the heli is going up to safety.

[KSHeli]

Originally Posted by jsbach#1

You want to train yourself to grab rescue 2 moves before its completely wrote off. I made the mistake of grabbing it at the very very last second and wasn't quick enough with my 380 which wrote it off, my fault not 3sx. I literally grabbed it 2 feet off the ground and reaction wasn't there and that bird was accelerating like a ballistic missile !

But if you grab it at a safe time you won't need spidy senses to reach your switch. As you get more comfy grabbing it you'll notice your'e flying is getting better and can do things you couldn't before.

And with practice you'll be able to grab it in a fraction of a second no worries. The rescue being spring loaded is good, as long as you hold it the heli is going up to safety.

Spring loaded is great, I'd also recommend gluing a small piece of sandpaper to the top of the trainer button if you are going to use it.. It went to hit it while to low a the sweat on my finger caused it to skip off not once but twice. Spring-loaded toggle is better in my opinion, but that button saved my bacon more than once.

[JTAnimal]

So I'm on the Mixer tab of the software and the swash is moving correctly but when I move the servos to check direction the sat's start blinking and servos start jumping and it just looks wrong. Back in the diagnose tab, your checking movement of the TX I had to reverse all (ail, el, pitch, all the slider were wrong) but now in Mixer it shows areas to reverse. I hate learning a new setup. I'm this close to going back to vbar

DX8
Goblin 700
JR8717HV
8.2V BEC (gryphon)
Torq HV tail

that's all that connected right now, I don't even have throttle connected. Castle 160 ESC

[rhodesengr]

at the start of your thread, I cringed a little when you mentioned you got your sats bound as it told me you were attempting a sats-only type setup. Please go back and read my FAQ in the sticky section and particularly in regard to sats.

If your sats started blinking, it suggests your power voltage drooped and you had a system brownout. As posted many times, the 3SX can be sensitive to low voltage issues. To diagnsose, you need to post the deatials of your power system, esc/bec etc. I don't know that the 3sx is any worse with sats-only as vbar has also had problems. It can be made to work. Usually you need a high current external BEC set for at least 6V or something like an LiFe battery, or a full HV system.

Really the best thing would be for you to get an AR7610 or AR800o and use the full RX/cable loom RX setup and not Sats-only.

Once your RX config is stable, only use TX reverses on the Diagnose tab to get bar directions correct. Then never ever change a TX reverse to get actual servo direction correct. Always do that on Mixer.

[JTAnimal]

Ok I just uploaded a video to YouTube but it sounds like what you said. Salts are blinking. If I do a hard movement, everything starts going crazy, including throttle, good thing I have the belt off.

[F1 Rocket]

Sats (connected direct to the 3SX) can be safely used so long as the input power to the 3SX is good. From the description of your issue I would say you have very poor input power. This should really be addressed even if you do decide to use a full RX.

[JTAnimal]

Ok I found a AR8000 X. So I assume I need to reset everything, fist time using a receiver for me so excuse the rookie questions. So would I mount this receiver in the back (Goblin 700) it will be inside the canopy? And use 1 of the sats with the RX? For type of receiver? What do I select now?

[JTAnimal]

I had the gryphon on low voltage, changed that and the problem is gone. But should I go with this RX? It's just sitting in a box so no big deal using it if that's what's best.

[rhodesengr]

well like Danny said, its good you found your low voltage issue.

What size heli is this? What voltage did you set your BEC to? What is its current rating?

In principle, if you have a very solid voltage source source 6V or more AND you bind in DSMX AND you set your TX frame rate for 11ms, the sats will works. BUT, few will argue that using is sats is better than using the AR8000.

PLUS there is at least one other distinct advantage to using the full RX. It has to do with failsafe settings. Will a full RX like your AR8000 you can use "preset" failsafe when you bind. This allows having self level come on if a real failsafe is ever initiated. You can't do that with sats.

If you decide to use the AR8000 (with its sat), just bind the RX to your TX as you normally would (not using the 3SX software). The RX connects to the 3SX with the cable loom which came with your 3SX. You will have to select cable loom in the RC tab. The stock cable loom is pretty short so you will have to mount the RX pretty close to the 3SX. There are longer cable looms available from dealers like Esprit. BTW, some of this is covered in the instructions which hopefully you have downloaded from the BD site. That documents discusses how with sats, the minimum voltage is 5.5V and also shows how to make connections with the cable loom.

Its a shame you got off to a bad start with the sat problem. The 3SX is not hard to set up and extremely reliable if you do things properly. The Rescue and SL work great.

[JTAnimal]

I'm not frustrated with this unit yet, it's been fairly straight forward and I can see that it will work. Most of my problem came from trying to setup another brand and that unit was bad. Now I'm making stupid mistakes, because this heli should have been in the air by now, and I'm moving too fast.

The BEC I'm using is a Gryphon Quaser 75v 20 amp, now set at 8.4v, 20 amp peak, 10 amp continues

The other part that bothers me here is I use a Opti guard backup, if the BEC should fail, but if the unit acts like it was with low voltage, good luck bringing it down in a power failure using a little backup battery

I'm ok using the RX, I just liked having the 2 sats on each side of the heli. Now I will have one sat and one RX but the RX will be up under the canopy. I wanted to know if this is how others have setup this. I have only used sat's on the VBar and it's worked great so far. But if the RX will make this setup more reliable, then I'm ok with it.

[jsbach#1]

Ya don't even talk about being frustrated, cause once you fly it and try the rescue you're gonna laugh hysterically at how awesome it is and what a well kept secret it is

Whichever way you decide to wire things up it sounds to me like somethings funny with your gryphon or something else is sucking too much power. We have thousands of flights literally this past season on 3sx birds in various formats and the only time satellites flickering we traced it to a bad ec3 connection problem from the 2s pack.

Even at 6v even with only one servo line bringing power into the 3sx the gryphone should have more than enough juice to keep evertything topped up far far away from a satellite flickering on the bench.

Simple man, try a 2s pack or a different bec with the satellite only setup just to see whats up. The suggestions about having full fail self remembered in the receiver so it can do a self level and auto down is valid in the event of a real glitch.

[rhodesengr]

Originally Posted by JTAnimal

The BEC I'm using is a Gryphon Quaser 75v 20 amp, now set at 8.4v, 20 amp peak, 10 amp continues

The other part that bothers me here is I use a Opti guard backup,

Now I will have one sat and one RX but the RX will be up under the canopy. .

running everything at 8.4V would be fine. You would have no low voltage problem at that level.

Still, full RX is better IMHO.

I don't have an Optguard yet. When i went to buy one last month, they were out of stock. But my understanding is the kick in .5V below your normal voltage. So it that is somewhere in the 7V range, it should be fine. At some point you should just test it on the bench and see how long you can stir the sticks before you get a brown out. I think in either case, it will be better with the full RX.

RX and/or sats under the canopy is pretty typical. The canopies are plain fiberglass which has less affect on the RX signal. I just mentioned that you can get longer looms and sat cables for that matter because some folks are more particular where they mount stuff.

On my 700L, my RX is mounted next to the motor which is not ideal from an antenna placement perspective but it fit nicely there.inside the frame between the motor and the 3SX Hard to see in the photos but the RX is vertical Never had any signal problems.

[JTAnimal]

Let me be clear, there was nothing wrong with the Gryphon. it was my stupid mistake, I had this on another 700 heli but had taken it off a while ago, put in in a bag in my parts. When I installed it on this 700, I didn't bother to look at the settings on the unit, why would I, I knew it came off a 700 that was also running 8.4V. But that's stupid thinking, check the settings, all the sliders were slid the wrong way, that would select the lowest voltage. My mistake, just to be clear. when F1 rocket said you have a power problem, that's the first thing I looked at, and sure enough check your settings..

One last question and I think I'm fine, if anyone reads this, and your using Spektrum with a receiver, I'm concerned about the mounting of the RX. it has to go in the Back on a Goblin 700, there is lots of room. But what is best for receiving signals.

Most know with sat's it is best to arrange the 2 sat's 90deg from each other, for the best reception. what's best for the AR8000 and one sat? for mounting on a Goblin 700??