Questions questions and answers

[deebee]

I am always asking questions and the thread end up being only 3 posts long.
so I started this thread for me and other protos users to ask simple general questions, please no debate starter questions.

Looks like you can use an entire rjx head for around $60. It's almost that much to buy the grips, grip arms, and feathering shaft separately for the same head.
Anyone know of alloy grips for the Protos that run an the stock feathering shaft or at least don't cost as much as an entire head set. I would rather run break away servo arms and alloy grips, than stock grips and have to rebuild the head with ever blade scrape. I can appreciate sacrificial parts but IMHO the grips shouldn't be that part

[HarryR]

Originally Posted by deebee

Looks like you can use an entire rjx head for around $60. It's almost that much to buy the grips, grip arms, and feathering shaft separately for the same head.
Anyone know of alloy grips for the Protos that run an the stock feathering shaft or at least don't cost as much as an entire head set. I would rather run break away servo arms and alloy grips, than stock grips and have to rebuild the head with ever blade scrape. I can appreciate sacrificial parts but IMHO the grips shouldn't be that part

Deebee , I fly Protos 500's . I am interested in your comment on the RJX head. Have you tried it?? Where did you buy it from and.. where there any "gotcha's "?

Originally Posted by wab223

I'm quite partial to the UK myself. Sometimes I get so nostalgic I actually watch episodes of Time Team.

?

[Mon_t]

I have an RJX head on mine, there are a couple of things.
You need the shorter swash locking arms made for the protos swash.
Also you need to drill out the jesus bolt hole to match the size of the protos jesus bolt.
Flight performace for me personally feels better than the stock head.

It also looks shinier

[deebee]

Haven't tried the rjx head only noted it as an option, s it taller than the current low fbl Protos head? The same height as the previous fbl head?

[deebee]

I have my crashed carbon stretch w/ 430mm blades, I am currently awaiting on orders from Infinity and fusuno for discounted carbon and g10 frames, (yeah I'm like that).
Anyhow question is for those who have used both the plastic and carbon frames.
Should I go ahead and switch to the plastic frame while I wait for the others to come In, or even just run the plastic frame until I have another crash ~20 flights away at the rate I have been going.
Is the plastic frame going to cause a notice able difference for basic sport flight loops, rolls, flips, circuits, stalls etc.?

[Mon_t]

I would just run the plastic frame until your next crash.
I ended up picking up a couple of spare plastic frames to use once my carbon one bights the dust.
Not sure on the height vs the low profile head, but it has 3 holes to change the height according to your needs.

[HarryR]

Originally Posted by deebee

I have my crashed carbon stretch w/ 430mm blades, I am currently awaiting on orders from Infinity and fusuno for discounted carbon and g10 frames, (yeah I'm like that).
Anyhow question is for those who have used both the plastic and carbon frames.
Should I go ahead and switch to the plastic frame while I wait for the others to come In, or even just run the plastic frame until I have another crash ~20 flights away at the rate I have been going.
Is the plastic frame going to cause a notice able difference for basic sport flight loops, rolls, flips, circuits, stalls etc.?

Run plastic frames, they are light and easy to install and cheap if you need to replace them. I would not upgrade to carbon fiber etc. unless you have a specific reason ( like stretch tail for instance). I believe the plastic frames are around 20 bux so have a few spares..

[deebee]

OK I already am running the stretch tail, just not the motor 3rd bearing support or 470 blades. Is their a problem running the stretch boom with the plastic frame is it stiff enough etc.

[dr dremel]

The new Protos plastic kits already come with the stretch boom (to be able to run the low FBL head with 420mm blades). So I guess there should be no problem as long as you stay with the 420 blades.

[deebee]

2500 rpm, 15t, and ikon gov, yge 60, Scorp 3026 880
Gens ace 45c 2600mah/ T-power 2600mah 35c
+-12° pitch

Yesterday I finally got to take my Protos out to a large field. Everything went well was able to tune the gov and get the tail to 95% (gain is a bit high on R-hand slides).

One problem popped up, as far as the tail goes (20 pulley) it handles the rotor torque well, with a barely noticeable tic when abusing the collective.
Problem is with a strong battery and moderately heavy motor loading, I got a over temp warning (soft warning) on the stock yge 60.

Also I ended up getting a 2600 TP eco lite 20c or 25c pretty warm and got an early undervolt warning when I decided to do a couple upright pseudo tic-tocs. Literally pulled the motor down to around half speed with no doubt 100% throttle from the ikon. To be fair I forgot this pack had only been cycled 3 times on the charger and was it's first time in the heli. Lol, what a harsh welcome. Really need to go with 3000 or 3300mah if using the eco lite packs.

What I don't know is if I really need to drop to 14t pinion, or if simply allowing the esc to get more air (its tucked in pretty tight under the battery tray) will solve the problem.

Blades are Maverick wide chord which have noticeably more kick than say a standard 430D or the Revo 430's.

Not sure how far I need to go or where to start with this. I have considered:

1. getting more air to esc. Through tweaking mounting or location and/or opening up an air vent on the bottom front of the canopy.

2. dropping the pitch a bit maybe to 10 or 11 and running a little more headspeed (currently gov at 2500,2600,2700 selectable). With the wide chords at 2500 gov is rock solid , at 2700 it bogs significantly with smooth heavy pitch.

3. And probably the correct solution to avoid future problems is to go with 14t pinion with which MSH lists a headspeed of up to 2750rpm ungoverned. Not sure how much governed I can get with a 14t pinion. I am guessing 2500 and maybe even 2600 with enough headroom for the gov.

Someone please advise me and correct my thinking where it's wrong.

Let me know what you would do if it were yours and you intended to use it for hard sport with some big air, rainbows, punch outs and poor collective managment.

I tried to include as much info as possible, I will be glad to provide more info if needed.

[DoubleCH]

As I've mentioned in a few places in a few threads 14T with stock motor is good enough for up to 2600rpm governed (not just setting it to 2600rpm governed but 2600rpm sustainable under heavy load). Like I said, the stock 880kV motor is running pretty low RPM so once you bogs the motor or set too low governed HS the motor easily drops out of its efficient speed and draws even more power to maintain HS so running 15T you really need to make sure motor speed doesn't drop too much. It sounds counter-intuitive but you may have to crank up governor gains and/or set higher HS to prevent motor speed drop out of efficient range which draws even more power. With 15T, don't let motor speed ever go under 2500rpm which means you'll need strong battery and higher stress on the ESC. If 2600rpm is enough for you (I'm not talking just setting governed 2600rpm HS but drops HS on any load I'm talking govnered HS that doesn't drop below 2600rpm under heavy load), then 14T is good enough for the job but that means you ned to run the skinny and soft 4mm shaft adapter and 3rd motor shaft bearing support.

With Revolution 430 blades, I found 2600rpm more than enough for sport flying, and good for mild 3D and even hard flying. The Revolution blades are a little bit on the wide-chord side for my taste. Any wider chord I think is too much to be optimal. You can't exactly reduce pitch or compensate for the wide-chord effect which I call "bogs before barks". In comparison narrow-chord blade (like my 470mm blade) "barks before bogs" which is more preferable (to me at least).

Why don't you try the Revolution 430 blades with your current 15T setting and keep HS no lower than 2500rpm under load and see how it goes first? The narrower-chord blades should be more optimal. If motor still bogs too much, then band-aid the problem with lower pitch setting but still keep high enough governed HS and gain settings. My friend runs 15T, Revolution 430mm FB blades, 2650mAh battery and 2500rpm governed (but aggressive enough governor gains to not let HS drop below 2500) and it can do more than just sport flying, more like mild 3D plus more, and is easy on the battery, motor, and ESC.

[DoubleCH]

13T Revolution 430mm FB blades 2450rpm governed HS (max sustainable with 13T)

My Stretched Protos Trying 430mm Blades with 13T (4 min 20 sec)

[deebee]

I will probably end up going back to the Revolution blades

One of the reasons for all the questions is because I am hesitant to drop to the 4mm shaft adapter.
How bad Is it though?
Will it bend in flight or if the tail blades strike the ground?
I am going to guess that it would most definitely bend if the belt jumps in a crash?
How about the durability of the 14t pinion, similar to the 15t?

I am glad you mentioned the bark before bog analogy, it makes perfect sense if you bog before you get a collective bark then you really don't have enough torque to swing 'em.

I currently have the gov cranked up enough to hold hard 2500hs with the mavericks, it will bark em quite well as long as I am running a relatively strong pack. Of course that is how I got the temp warning.
Maybe a bump to 2550 would get the motor closer to the sweet spot and let me back off a little on the gov.

I really like the Mavs I think the strong pitch response, along with a little more stable/tame cyclic response. Really plays well to my less than confident style of flying. I am sure I could get the same kind of feel with an adjustment here or there.

I checked last night, my esc is mounted with the metal plate pressed against the bottom side of the battery tray, definitely not ideal. I am going to turn it over, so at least the plate is in the open air. I also have have a small aluminum heatsink sitting around that i might put on it. A cooler running esc never hurt anyone.

Thanks for the quick reply, really gave me somethings to think about. It's great that we have someone here in the Protos subforum, who's been there done that and knows the Protos in and out.

Edit: pulled battery tray and flipped esc over get the heat sink off the battery tray, removed a portion of the heatshrink and used the rubber O-ring to secure a heatsink that allows for later addition of a small (30 or 40 mm square?) fan.

Without knowing the actual amp draw, I don't know if this is a solution or a bandaid, but I have never known a cooler running esc to be a bad thing.


Went ahead and changed the esc around and flew a couple of my strongest packs really hard, including a 4k mah 45c, and wasn't able to get a temp warning. Amp draw of course was unchanged and still higher than I wanted.
As soon as my 14t pinion came in I put it on and went for a couple test flights.
Needless to say my power system was much happier, gov gain came down 4 points and still provided a more solid feel with less stress on the motor esc, and Lipo.
The third bearing is in the mail.

[deebee]

Is anyone still getting tail booms with misaligned slots/holes? Out of 3 packs (6 booms) from 2 different sources I have got one maybe 2. I would call straight, the rest were half and half between usable and useless w/o modification.

When I first got the Protos I heard they had some problems with misaligned booms in the past. I was under the impression that MSH was aware of this and had fixed the problem.?

[Mon_t]

Originally Posted by deebee

One problem popped up, as far as the tail goes (20 pulley) it handles the rotor torque well, with a barely noticeable tic when abusing the collective.
Problem is with a strong battery and moderately heavy motor loading, I got a over temp warning (soft warning) on the stock yge 60.

Couple of things to check.
1: At full pitch, check the swash follower arms are not hitting your ar bracket (had this happen a couple times since moving my canopy posts).
2: I used to get a funny tick when attempting piro tick tocks. Turned out the belt was jumping the teeth on the tail pulley high load. Tightening the tension resolved the issue.

Originally Posted by deebee

When I first got the Protos I heard they had some problems with misaligned booms in the past. I was under the impression that MSH was aware of this and had fixed the problem.?

If it has indeed been fixed, they might be old stock and yes my last set were crooked (not that I'm too fussed).

[deebee]

I figured out my problem, I had waaaaaaay to much pitch. So much so that i am amazed that the drive line and tail both held.

The Protos has one tough drive system on it, I have snapped a j-bolt, grip arms and blades, swapped in fresh and was in the air 10 minutes later. Try that with a dinosaur heli.

Not to concerned with the booms either only one out of many was out enough that I felt the need to file the hole out to a slight slotted shape.