First heli, first crash

[KILLzombi3z]

Looking into that Tomstoy2, as well as eventually getting a case for the bird itself. Right now I'm just going to use the box that it came in but eventually I'd like to get something a bit more legit.

[jperkosk]

Originally Posted by Tomstoy2

You will only go into negative pitch in idle up mode, not normal. This is why it is so important to set it up in idle up as he instructed.

That's not quite correct, Tom, you've forgotten how to fly in normal mode, haven't you?

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

I thought there was a little bit of negative pitch in normal mode to keep it on the ground but head speed would make sense. Today i'm going to go back through my work and double check it before the LHS takes a peek at it.

That is quite correct, you need a bit of negative pitch in normal mode for two reasons:

1. It'll help you keep the heli on the ground while spooling up.
2. It'll give you some collective authority in windy conditions. It means it'll help you bring the heli back down when the gust of wind picks it up. Without the negative pitch you're doomed.

The best normal pitch curve for the Belt is about -3 deg at the stick full down and +7 deg full up. Now what's the best pitch in the center stick is a bit of a disputed matter.

Most of us setup the birds to have 0 deg center stick whether in normal mode or idle up. This is for two reasons:

1. It helps you get the headspeed up before lifting off. Stock Belt has a low headspeed, a bit more RPM helps the stability in the air (but it also increases the crash damage)
2. It makes for smooth transition between normal and idle-up modes later on when you'll start using idle-up mode. Mind you, idle-up mode is absolutely necessary when inverting the heli, but it's also very helpful in normal flying because of better collective authority.

So the most common setup for the Belt would be something like this (low/center/high stick):
normal mode -3/0/+7 idle-up mode -7/0/+7

Now all that said with standard radio it's almost impossible to set-up pitch and RPM (throttle) curves to match above center stick (that's what you need for smooth "jumpless" transition between normal and idle-up modes), you need computer radio for that. But this is something you'll need to worry a bit later, when you're comfortable at hovering around in all orientations. For now, tape this idle-up switch in "off" position, and there is really no harm in having a couple of degrees of positive pitch at center stick in normal mode, but I strongly recommend to have at least -3 deg at low stick.

[KILLzombi3z]

Thank you very much for the advice Jperkosk.

Right now i'm having major vibrations. I weighted the bird down sticking something through the skids and put dumbells on that. I was trying to check the tracking, which was spot on, but this gnarly vibration would shake the heli. something is clearly out of balance somewhere.

I didn't look to hard at it. I did recheck that the fly bar was evenly spaced and it is exactly centered. Tomorrow the LHS should be able to figure it out. i'm hoping i didn't put in a bent main shaft right out of the package. We'll see though.

I must say it was a bit discouraging having a big unbalance like that after building it up the first time but it isn't that surprising to me. There's a lot to this hobby i'm not aware of yet and i'm surely just not seeing something completely obvious to the experiences enthusiast.

[jperkosk]

Have you balanced the blades? Stock Esky blades are usually out of balance out of the box. Have you checked the feathering shaft? That's the one that connects two blade grips together. If it doesn't roll smoothly on the glass then it's bent and will produce vibrations.

[giorgos_cupra]

Jerry is right.You need negative pitch in normal,in case of the common effect of balooning.Meaning gusts of wind lifting your heli up as Jerry said.A good pitch curve for a beginner is -4/3/8.Start from there and adjust accordingly.If you see that when you bring the stick down the heli drops like a brick,increase low stick pitch eg from -4 to -3.

If you feel you have a very low head speed and the heli feels somewhat sluggish and unstable decrease from 3 to 2 or 1.A low headspeed also makes your tail not holding.

Also it is very common for all the helis to seem out of balance and "chicken dance" in low rpms.Spool her up until it's light on it's skids.If the unbalancing condition continues,you have a problem,if not you are good to go

[sutty]

Originally Posted by Tomstoy2

You will only go into negative pitch in idle up mode, not normal. This is why it is so important to set it up in idle up as he instructed.

As far as the +3 degrees of pitch in idle up is concerned, this is dependent upon your heli.
The idea here is at mid-stick you want it to hover.
Weight, headspeed, type of main blades used, and a few other factors will determine how much pitch you need at mid-stick in idle up.
Like I said, the idea is to get it to hold altitude at mid stick in idle up.

Confused

You've been dealing with fixed pitch props for far too long now Tom. Never seen any set-up that hovers at mid stick. You should have 0 pitch at mid stick, hopefully in both normal and idle up, and hover slightly above, getting close to 3/4 stick. If you set it up to hover at mid stick this will not serve you well for the future when it is essential that mid stick is 0 degrees. You will want to learn rolls, etc, which will need full use of your -ve and the 0 has to be in the middle. If you learn different to this it will just make it harder.

As Jerry says, you should be able to get -3, 0, +7 in normal, and in idle up something like -7,0,+7 or maybe a little more up to about 8 or 9, but better if they match above 0.

Oh, he said all of the above too. Sorry, I'm just reading it in another window, forget me.

Cheers

Sutty

[wulfrun]

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

Thank you very much for the advice Jperkosk.

Right now i'm having major vibrations. I weighted the bird down sticking something through the skids and put dumbells on that. I was trying to check the tracking, which was spot on, but this gnarly vibration would shake the heli. something is clearly out of balance somewhere.

Not the ideal way to check tracking. Invest in a cheap pitch gauge asap, set both blades to flat at half-stick on idle-up (motor DISCONNECTED) and you'll be near enough to fly it and fine-tune after. Strapping it down by any method isn't good practice, although most of us have probably done so at some point.

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

I didn't look to hard at it. I did recheck that the fly bar was evenly spaced and it is exactly centered. Tomorrow the LHS should be able to figure it out. i'm hoping i didn't put in a bent main shaft right out of the package. We'll see though.

It's not uncommon for the stock shafts to be bent from new. Try and track down something better, like stainless. The Belt is common enough that you should be able to get them. Failing that, check very carefully before fitting (roll on a piece of plate glass).

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

I must say it was a bit discouraging having a big unbalance like that after building it up the first time but it isn't that surprising to me. There's a lot to this hobby i'm not aware of yet and i'm surely just not seeing something completely obvious to the experiences enthusiast.

See above re new shafts. Take the blades out and spin it up without them, to eliminate blade balance. Better still, also take the whole head mechanics off and spin it up either by hand or as slowly as possible - check for a wobbling shaft. Also, check the tail for balance/bent shaft too, although the tail goes faster and tends to buzz rather than wobble things.

[wulfrun]

Originally Posted by jperkosk

Have you balanced the blades? Stock Esky blades are usually out of balance out of the box.

That's interesting, my experience of Esky woodies was that they never needed balancing. I don't use them now but I must have got through at least half a dozen sets when I first had it. Checked them every time and never found them out. Maybe I was lucky as hell!

[Tomstoy2]

All right, all right!!!! Don't need to beat me up!!!!!

My apologies.

Exact mid-stick should be 2-3 degrees negative, not positive. just got too many things going on at the moment. Gets me confused as I find it hard to switch off issues I'm working on,,,,
,,, and believe me, this new build has opened up a serious 16 ounce can of whoop-ass on me at the moment.
Ure it had nothing to do with the pearly-pops I consummed.

[sutty]

More confused now, lol. Everything I have ever read or done says mid stick = zero degrees. If I didn't have zero at mid stick in idle up I would have no helis left as I would have piled them all in.

Don't suppose I would, but they would have to be mismatched for +ve and -ve, and since I spend half of my time upside down now, it could get confusing.

Cheers

Sutty

[giorgos_cupra]

I never had on any heli negative pitch on mid stick!On the belt it was +3/+4,on the raptor +2/+3,on the t-rex +4 and i will have +2 on the tarot.

Tom what's going on here?Shed some light mate!I can't imagine a heli with low stick -9 half stick -3 and full stick +10!That's some crazy stuff right here

[KILLzombi3z]

Thanks for the advice. It's nice knowing there's you guys out there to all pitch in and help another out.

I kinda got blown off today at the LHS. The owner doesn't really speak english, nor works on helis at all. The guy that was going to help me wasn't working today because of the korean lunar new year. He could have let me know he wouldn't be in...

Anyhow. I'm going to take your advice and go through the set up one point at a time. I'll take the blades out real quick, but i don't have two drivers for the feathering shaft (LHS tightened it for me) so i'll have to leave that one out.

I'm going to shoot for roughly +1 deg pitch at midstick. 0 deg seems to make sense, but some on here are recommending +2-3 and the regional champ at the LHS was saying about +3. but i'm no expert either.

I'm trying to keep this cheap for now and stock after dealing with the reasonable cost of repairs OEM, anything above that will most likely get more expensive. I don't have any glass laying around to check things out, or i guess i could rip the mirror of the wall. that's glass.

Anywho, off i go for round two

[KILLzombi3z]

Ok.

Some aspect of setting up this head is eluding me. I went through and checked what I had tools to do. I took the main shaft out, found a picture frame with a glass front and the main bar rolled good on that.

I did notice however, that when the main gear and that small one are mated together, they don't spin level. I spun up the bird real slow to get a good visual on this and each gear was not on a level plain, and they were not wobbling at the same point. There was nothing i could do to fix that one. Used the spare small gear just to be safe anyhow. OH, also, is it normal for the main shaft to have play inside the one way bearing? I mean, that extra little sleeve is in there to and there is that itty bitty amount of play. This concerns me.

I got that swash level to my ability. it took some tinkering around and flopping the idle up switch on and of to "reset" if you will my midpoint. I was doing that cause i was physically pushing that swash plate a little bit and i wanted it back where it should.

Excuse the lack of terminology, but the top links don't seem to be well. I loosened the fly bar to make sure the swash mixer arms or the first pair of arms up from the swash plate if you will, were all level. there was very minimal adjustment seeing as they were just one piece with no means for adjustment.

anyhow, i then discovered my paddles were out of level so i played around with that until they were level again.

so. next step i'm thinking was to measure blade pitch and see what's up. So i slap the blades on get everything ready to go, and my results were:

Idle up: -5/+1/+10~11

Normal: +4/+7/+11

really seems like i'm not adjusting something properly. +4 pitch in normal hover mode seems way to high to me. i was thinking it should be a negative up until midstick and then go positive from there.

Little lost at this point.


Oh and took the advice for not weighting the bird down while spooling up a tad and the paticular vibs were way less. but, once i get the rpms up high the tail lets loose like a cat outta hell. I look and the little slider that adjust pitch for the rear rotors starts freaking out. may not worry about it seeing how once i get it running i'm just going for some hovering and i'll crash it again before the tail issue becomes a problem.

[Luke Warmwater]

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

I'm going to shoot for roughly +1 deg pitch at midstick. 0 deg seems to make sense, but some on here are recommending +2-3 and the regional champ at the LHS was saying about +3. but i'm no expert either.

OK...no argument on this, in idle up, this should be 0 degs at mid stick. If it isn't everything else will be out. Worry about what it is in normal mode later, but for initial setup, in idle up, it must be 0 degs in order to get your head geometery right.

However, from your next post, where you give your pitch readings it looks like your swash isn't at the right height. You are getting far more positive pitch than negative. Your swash height must be in the middle of its travel range, in idle up at midstick.

At this point, don't even think about what your pitch readings are, just get the swash height set (and get the swash level). So to re-iterate, in idle up, stick at midstick, swash level at the halfway point between its potential travel range up and down the shaft. You set this using the links from the servos.

Then, move up the head, checking all other parts are level (still in idle up at mid-stick)....but still don't worry about your pitch yet! Get the head sorted from bottom up. Just note, don't assume that they are level because they were before. You've moved the swash height, so they will be different!

Once you have this (and not before), set the blades to zero degs pitch, again, in idle up with the stick at midpoint. Once you have both blades set like this (using the links attached to the blades), check to see what your min and max pitch is: it should be anything from +/-7 degs upwards.

Once you have done this, the geometery of the head is set up. Only now should you worry about where your pitch is in normal mode.

[giorgos_cupra]

KZ,i can't remember if my belt's mainshaft had any play in the oneway.One thing is certain,you dont want any play at all on the heli.Given that this is an esky model though, zero tolerance on play is out of the question.So i guess that little play is fine.

As for the gears,see if you can bend them in shape by hand.I never messed with mine,never cared enough at the time.

Your arms,well the head's arms paddles etc, must be level at MIDSTICK only.Not lowstick or high.

As for your pitch,you got to correct it,you can't fly like this properly.Bring the swash down all together by shortening the linkages.You need -3/-4 on lowstick.Get the low position pitch and then measure your high.If it aint enough because you lowered the swash,then you got to adjust the balls on your servo arms....

As for the vibration,i mentioned it before but i didn't get a reaction.Setup the heli first.Be done with the setup completely.Then let the heli completely free in an open space.Spool it up untill light on it's skids.If the vibrations continue then check all the other things.If not,that's normal and all helis do it,shake until they catch up some rpm

[Luke Warmwater]

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

once i get the rpms up high the tail lets loose like a cat outta hell. I look and the little slider that adjust pitch for the rear rotors starts freaking out. may not worry about it seeing how once i get it running i'm just going for some hovering and i'll crash it again before the tail issue becomes a problem.

This is a separate set up issue (tail set up). It could be the mechanics of the tail or it could be the gyro set up. Sort the head first and we'll come to the tail after.

[wulfrun]

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

I did notice however, that when the main gear and that small one are mated together, they don't spin level. I spun up the bird real slow to get a good visual on this and each gear was not on a level plain, and they were not wobbling at the same point. There was nothing i could do to fix that one. Used the spare small gear just to be safe anyhow.

Once again, that's Esky's quality (i.e. low). Up to a point, don't worry about it, that's "normal for Esky"!

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

Oh and took the advice for not weighting the bird down while spooling up a tad and the paticular vibs were way less. but, once i get the rpms up high the tail lets loose like a cat outta hell. I look and the little slider that adjust pitch for the rear rotors starts freaking out. may not worry about it seeing how once i get it running i'm just going for some hovering and i'll crash it again before the tail issue becomes a problem.

Just a thought, if you're talking about buzzy vibes, check the tail-shaft. A bent tail-shaft causes high-pitched vibes that can send the gyro crazy. One other thing to check is the belt speed-up gear, the small one that engages on the lower main gear and carries the belt pulley. I've broken a couple of them and they usually shed a tooth, or most of it. It's a bit dark in there and looking edge-on just won't show you a missing tooth, the outline of the broken bit just looks like a normal tooth, so have a thorough look.

[KILLzombi3z]

Well fellas, she's all set up! Mintu (sp?) helped me out and fixed my mistakes in like 5min with nothing but eyeballing it. Very impressive. I guess when you've been doing this for 15yrs and are a national champion is comes easy.

Anyhow. I finally got her up in the air and hovered around. I'm still not able to keep my hover in a tight spot or anything, but i can keep it within a 8ft radius which is good for me. It's very mentally draining at points, and easy to get your thumbs mixed up. I'd just randomly loose concentration on thumb movements and have to set the bird down and recoup.

I'm having troubles getting away from quick jerky type inputs and being smooth and anticipate the movement instead of reacting. All in good time.

Thanks for all the support and advice. Got me through my first crash and helped keep me in the air!

[wulfrun]

Originally Posted by KILLzombi3z

Well fellas, she's all set up! Mintu (sp?) helped me out and fixed my mistakes in like 5min with nothing but eyeballing it. Very impressive. I guess when you've been doing this for 15yrs and are a national champion is comes easy.

Anyhow. I finally got her up in the air and hovered around. I'm still not able to keep my hover in a tight spot or anything, but i can keep it within a 8ft radius which is good for me. It's very mentally draining at points, and easy to get your thumbs mixed up. I'd just randomly loose concentration on thumb movements and have to set the bird down and recoup.

I'm having troubles getting away from quick jerky type inputs and being smooth and anticipate the movement instead of reacting. All in good time.

Thanks for all the support and advice. Got me through my first crash and helped keep me in the air!

Glad to hear it all came together. Keep at it - you won't crash again if you give up now but neither will you learn anything, skill-wise. I don't often get much time on mine (UK weather!) so I'm not that much ahead on skills - I can hover it all day in a lot less than 8ft radius and do some slow flying around in big spaces but that's about my limit yet. After more practice, you'll realise all of a sudden that you've hovered out a whole battery - that's a nice milestone.

[KILLzombi3z]

Haven't had to much flight time lately. I've been unlucky at catching the LHS at the right time to fly. I did download a different sim to practice on that has been way better than the sim that came with the BeltCp.

What do you guys normally do in down time? I'm itching really bad to fly but can't risk another crash trying to fly in the spot i was before. Sim time actually kinda flys by once i get into it tho.

Also, LiPo batteries.. I've heard mixed things about leaving them at full charge all being bad. Some say 24hrs, to couple of days. Mine have been at full charge for maybe 4 days now and i'm curious how bad it is.
I was reading you want to keep them around 50% for storage and in general when not in use to increase longevity.

Any tips?