Servo advice for Blade 450x (newbie)

[Kumba]

Originally Posted by dendenyc

I'd wait till they strip since when you replace them you'll have to re-setup the electronics and re-level everything. Save the added work for when you really have to.

What he said. Crashes are the best time to start tinkering with things

[HeliNutter]

Get them changed or risk crashing because of the nylon geared servos's....

It would be awful to watch your bird fall from a manky servo that you knew you should have swapped out, especially if you're fbl'd, your servos carry more load.....

[Talesin]

Wait until they strip on your next hard landing or crash to swap them out. They work fine so long as your blades aren't hitting anything but air.

Bought a five-pack of stock servo gears myself. I'd rather have a gear strip than a pitch link bend, swash ball snap off, or grip link snap. It's all about deciding where you want your point of failure... and as 3/4 of the servos on this heli can be rebuilt in-place (stupid elevator), I'd rather take the five minutes it takes to replace the gears. And keeping all of the NON-stripped ones, you usually can save between half and 3/4 of them for a future rebuild.

Really, aside from the apparent designed-to-fail gears, they seem like perfectly good parts. Now to find a micro CNC machine...

[gabeoravitz]

Originally Posted by guyguerra

I returned the non matching servos and bought a stock one. Installed it yesterday and it's back up and flying. I also went online to ampdraw.com (another helpful piece of advice from this BB) and ordered a set of Spectrum H3000 servos. Not sure if I should change them out when they arrive or wait until one of the stock ones strip out.
Thanks for all the help, you guys are great.

Ampdraw is a great place, and is one of my LHS that I frequent!

I say keep them for now and swap them out when one strips. the DS76 is a perfectly fine servo. It's not great, and it strips easy in this big heli. But it's pretty smooth and cheap. And the DS76T tail servo on our 450x is one of the fastest tail servos you can get!

If/when I decide to move to a metal gear servo, I'll probably go with the H3000.

[Coco66]

Originally Posted by gabeoravitz

Ampdraw is a great place, and is one of my LHS that I frequent!

I say keep them for now and swap them out when one strips. the DS76 is a perfectly fine servo. It's not great, and it strips easy in this big heli. But it's pretty smooth and cheap. And the DS76T tail servo on our 450x is one of the fastest tail servos you can get!

If/when I decide to move to a metal gear servo, I'll probably go with the H3000.

I think that between April and now he for sure already took a decision...

[gabeoravitz]

ahh I don't usually look at the dates. No idea how I ended up in that thread if it's that old. I usually only read the first page.

[EEngineer]

Digital servos develop full torque at neutral, analog servos cannot....because of their slower update rate.....

Digital servos can hold their position better, because of the higher update rate....that analog servos can.

Because of the higher update rate, digital servos have a tighter deadband than analog servos.

FWIW

[guyguerra]

I ended up switching the servos right away, and am glad I did. I have two 450x's. One is stock, the other has metal gear servos. The difference is major. I will be selling the stock 450 very soon, it was a spare for when I had crashes. I don't crash as often now, so it doesn't get used anymore. I changed the tail servo to a Saxon and am very happy with it, the stock one lasted about a year. www.ampdraw is an excellent company to deal with and their prices are almost always cheaper than other sites. I highly recommend them. I also use www.hobbyking, www.readyheli and www.amainhobbies a lot. www.amainhobbies and www.hobbyking were great on their warranty on two situations that they could have been hard line and not warranted the items. Hobby King warrentied a 6S 5000mah battery, which is tricky as batteries generally are not warren tied. The balance plugs were sparking. www.amainhobbies warranted flybar rods on my trex 600 because they make 2 sizes and I ordered the wrong size. In both cases these companies could have said no.

As far as servos on the Blade 450x, the one I kept stock has had to have the servos changed many times. On the one with the metal Spektrum H3000's I've never had to replace one servo. I've got a lot of flights on these and know exactly how the servos last.

Hi EEngineer, hope all is well.
Guy

[Aptaper]

Just one more piece of friendly input. I would not wait to change the servo's. I had one of the cyclic servo's fail in-flight this morning. It has been many moons (about 9 months) since the last crash on that 450X and everything has been working very well. Flew it around 20 times in the last 2 days. It was my "Last Pack" for the morning and about three minutes into the flight the heli flipped inverted un-commanded and it took a bunch of stick slamming and a quick flip of the throttle hold to avoid a disaster. It landed hard right side up. After my heart stopped racing, I observed the servos and noticed that one servo was not moving. The failed servo was making noise, but no action was occurring at the servo horn. This could have been a result of the hard landing, but I think it was what caused the erratic 5 seconds of pure terror that I experienced. I did a tear down and discovered on of the smaller gears was thrashed. IMO the servos are such a cheap fix and the fact that they might help you avoid a much more costly crash is worth the investment. Live and learn.

Mike

[xenophobe]

If you're not crashing much, you can get brand new pulloffs for really cheap. And while they're quite fragile, they do work decently enough.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Blade-300-X-...item2333391df5

[Maj. Woody]

Funny you mention pull offs. I advertised my 450x servos when I ordered it. A local club member was waiting with me when UPS arrived! He bought them and I installed Hitecs all around.

[AcworthGator]

Originally Posted by Aptaper

IMO the servos are such a cheap fix and the fact that they might help you avoid a much more costly crash is worth the investment. Live and learn.

Aren't these servo replacements like $30-$40 each? $160 doesn't strike me as a cheap fix Then again, what do I know. I have yet to maiden my 450 Maybe I will be singing a different tune after this weekend.. To be continued..

[Aptaper]

The new H3020 servo's are 24.99 and the H3000 has been discontinued. Is the 3020 an upgrade to the 3000? Anyone have experience with this servo? The price is nice.

Thanks... Mike

[Aptaper]

Originally Posted by AcworthGator

Aren't these servo replacements like $30-$40 each? $160 doesn't strike me as a cheap fix Then again, what do I know. I have yet to maiden my 450 Maybe I will be singing a different tune after this weekend.. To be continued..

AcworthGator... I was singing a different tune before I almost lost my 450X the other day. It would have been very upsetting to have lost the entire bird over weak servo gears. So I guess I am now leaning towards preventive replacement versus just replacing the gears or waiting for one to fail again. The new H3020's are a little more affordable, but I agree that even $75 dollars isn't cheap, but it is cheaper than buying a new heli

Thanks... Mike

[AcworthGator]

Yeah, I can stomach $100 a little better. Even $160 really. Not so much about the money, but sure is frustrating to need to replace brand new parts on a $500 bird But losing said bird to servo failure in-flight would be absolute disaster. I will still maiden her this weekend but I am going to keep it low and slow and over grass. And be reading up on servo options

[AcworthGator]

Maiden flight complete. Not much (about 1 minute hover), but I am in love

No chance I am going to let this baby hit the ground because of anything except my own bad flying. So, screw the cost. I am going to upgrade servos, motor, and ESC.

When I get them all in, I will be reading, re-reading, and asking plenty of questions. The people and info on this board are awesome.

[Aptaper]

Congrats AcworthGator! What servo's are you thinking about getting? I just ordered the H3020 and they should be here Monday. I hope they live up to my expectations.

Mike

[RoboHeli]

Originally Posted by Aptaper

Congrats AcworthGator! What servo's are you thinking about getting? I just ordered the H3020 and they should be here Monday. I hope they live up to my expectations.

Mike

How did those work out for you?

[Chris g.]

MrRoBoHeli

If you are looking for some good servos HK has some you might be interested in. I believe even with the stock ESC they will work great. If you run 4 all the way around switch the stock ESC over to 6v or just run them at 4.8 but 6v would be better.


http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/s...dproduct=38768

[RoboHeli]

Cool! Would those HK servos work for both cyclic and tail?

Also, do they require any mods to the frame to get them in?