Anyone experienced with Ace gt5.1 setup?

[danny ranchero]

Hi all -
I am newly registered on helifreak - have been flying when i have time for the last coupla years, and have gathered much helpful information here. I live close to the Canadian border in northern Minnesota, 2 hours from the nearest hobby shop, and 5 hours from the nearest city with any abundance of knowledgeable resources.
I have limited flybarless setup experience - i have setup align 3gx sufficiently for my flying skills (fff, circuits, etc). I acquired a gt5.1 gyro with the thunder tiger e325s kit, and flew it for a year on the factory settings. Now, i've swapped the unit onto a trex 550 v2. I have read about everything i can find online, and have got it seemingly dialed in enough for some test hovers. I have come to understand some of the programming, but could really use a talk with someone who really knows these things to help me demystify further. Mainly: swashplate leveling, servo travel/limits, P/I setup, and what i should be looking for as to flight characteristics. As you may know, the literature provided with much of the equipment in this hobby leaves a lot to be desired! I am eager to get more flying time in and have my skills progress, but get stalled out by head-scratching (and 20 below weather). Any guidance would be greatly appreciated!

If it matters:
- Trex 550e v2, align servos, all stock except for Talon 90
- Ace gt5.1 with spektrum satellites. Servo speeds and frequencies set. Horns at 90. 0 degrees pitch at center stick. Tail servo travel o.k.. Cyclic servos seem much faster on collective inputs than on cyclic (?)
- Dx8, single servo, everything zeroed

[Bladecpnitro]

No trim or subtrims in radio endpoints set to 100 as well as DR start with 30 expo on aileron, ele and rudder in your TX
.
My rudder endpoints are set to 150. You may want to start with less than that and see how quick your tail is first.

Do you have your cyclic servo arms at 90 degrees at center stick? You can use subtrim in the GT- 5.1 to get those arms to a perfect 90 long as they are not too far off, like 4 points or so I've used more than that but hate too. Some arms just won't get any closer to a true 90 and need more sub trim in the GT.

Then adjust the links to get the swash level, I usually eyeball it. Then set blades to zero pitch. Check max collective pitch and adjust it in the GT swash menu. 10 is a good place to start, I run 13 on my 550 with a BeastX.

Then check cyclic pitch. I'm running 10 pitch /10 cyclic on my 450. 10 on cyclic makes it flip extremely quick.

Cyclic pitch is adjusted in the servo endpoints menu in the GT. Gary Wright used to recommend doing it in the Radio endpoints (ATVs') but now I think he recommends doing them in GT endpoints. Make sure they are all the same.

Cyclic Pitch - With collective at center stick you can check aileron pitch with one blade turned 90 degrees off the side of the heli and elevator with one blade strait off the nose of the heli moving the corresponding stick for each full throw. I like to check both positive and negative.

Turn off all expo in the GT so you can adjust it in your radio.

Give it a fly and see how it feels. Probably 80/70 is a good place to start with P and I gains for swash and tail. Fly it and keep bumping the gains up until you get a gentle wobble, back off 5 points and let it ride.

Good luck with it man I think you'll like the GT

[danny ranchero]

Bladecpnitro -
Thanks for your prompt and helpful reply. I had the machine out today for a coupla brief hops - about three minutes each before my fingers were too frozen. It was flying really well (? by my standards?), just hovering, making turns and zips in what space i have out front. I tweaked p/i's a little, probably have more to go. Let me ask you: when we're talking "wobble", that will be very apparent right? So far i'm up to 95 on the P gain, and seems smooth. What about the tail? I brought "D-sense" down to 25 to eliminate rubber-band stops - does that seem correct? P gain on rudder is currently at 75.

Yes, arms are at 90.

My next puzzlement is on setting collective and cyclic pitch. I was sure i had this established yesterday - now when throwing a guage on i get perfect pitch range and 0 at center stick, but the cyclic is wildly high and low. There are three menu items involved here - "pitch" in the swash menu, "servo travel", and "servo limit", correct? Leave travels in Tx at 100%? I've been screwing around with the travels and limits, not being able to translate the manual, and not really getting anywhere. What is the relationship between these three, and their actual function? I don't see much happening as i go up and down with the values. I'm looking forward to not feeling so dumb when this jells up for me.

18 below zero outside and dropping....

[danny ranchero]

Let me just add that i understand how to get at all of this stuff within the DX8, and which menus to use for which functions when setting up the 3gx for example - but am tricked by what's what in the GT. Which values do you adjust in the tx, and which only in the GT? Sorry if i'm retarded.....

[Bladecpnitro]

Only overall gyro gain and expo is adjusted in the TX everything else is in the GT.

You only adjust gyro gain pretty much once in the TX and you wind up with a high gain and a low gain that you can grab with your gyro switch easily . Gyro switch down= 100% gain in GT. Gyro switch up=60-95% gyro gain that's in the GT gain window not the TX.

If you want to run really high head speed in idle up 2 you have to be able to lower the over al head and tail gains with the flip of the gyro switch. That will require that you go back into your TX gyro page and adjust the switch up (1 Pos) gain to your liking. You adjust that in the radio but watch the gain numbers move in the GT gain window.


The P and I gains or the gains that you start tweaking first. If the heli flies half decent after lift off I think I'd start tweaking the tail first. Start by bumping the P and I gains up 10 points each, fly it and tweak some more, little by little trying to achieve a gentle tail wag or slap back action in the tail and back off 5 points.

If the head wobbles though after first lift off you have to go ahead and back off the P and I gains for swash and get that erradicated. If the tail wags back and forth you have to back off the P and I gains for the tail as well. Always keep the ( I) gain 10 digits lower than the P gain at first.

Its not likely that wag or wobble will occur first time out but there is always a chance. That's also why Thunder Tiger recommends originally setting your gyro switch up with a low and a high setting of 100 and 60 and take off first with 60 and flip into 100 ready to go back to 60 if things get crazy. I've never needed that on a small 450. It might be different on a large heli.

When you flip that switch on your TX to lower overall gain to 60 it changes gains for main and tail but not the individual P and I gains that you have tweaked and set in the GT.


Run the gyro gain in your radio all the way up until you see in the GT 5.1 screen, light numbers reading 100% against a black background. You may have to run the gain all the way positive and negative to see which one caused the black background to surface.

Then when you flip the gyro switch you can have a number in there say like 60 with a black background. 100% gain for 3250 head speed and 96% gain for 3500 head speed is working good on my 450 now.

No sub trims should be in the radio with all endpoints set 100/100. The rudder endpoint always controls piro speed so you can bump it up if the tail doesn't respond quickly enough at full throw.

Here is a vid of a heli with a head wobble. I dont' know exactly what his issue was here but thats what I'm taliking about when I say head wobble.

I had a similar issue with the GT on my 450 when I first started seeking higher head speeds. I'd flip into idle up 2 for 3250 head speed and the head would wobble like this in the vid. I had the gain set too high for high head speeds.

[Bladecpnitro]

I assume you got you servo frequencies and speeds all set right? The GT has a crazy way of setting servo speed at 75% of their rated speed. like my Futaba 9257 on rudder is .8 seconds so I enter .6 seconds. Servo speed x .75 will do the trick.
example .75x.08= .06.

[danny ranchero]

Hey, all of your input is like gold - thanks for taking the time to enlighten me.

Yes, i have servo speeds and frequencies dialed in - i figured out the 75% factor thanks to a Gary Wright write-up.

How about the question in my earlier post regarding the difference between "servo travel" and "servo limit" in the gt? This is the main thing i'm fumbling with. If ya get a second to look at that post, would you help me sort that out?

I'll keep you posted as to my results - i'm pretty busy with trying to make a nickel, and hanging with my three-year-old. It's too cold for any good flying, and the days are short this time of year. Besides, i'm just finishing up a 450 build that i'm pretty excited about too!.... I was originally planning on mounting the gt on the 450, but changed my mind.
I find that splitting attention between several models can get me confused as to where i was at the last time i worked on a machine.....

[Bladecpnitro]

Originally Posted by danny ranchero

Hey, all of your input is like gold - thanks for taking the time to enlighten me.

Yes, i have servo speeds and frequencies dialed in - i figured out the 75% factor thanks to a Gary Wright write-up.

How about the question in my earlier post regarding the difference between "servo travel" and "servo limit" in the gt? This is the main thing i'm fumbling with. If ya get a second to look at that post, would you help me sort that out?

I'll keep you posted as to my results - i'm pretty busy with trying to make a nickel, and hanging with my three-year-old. It's too cold for any good flying, and the days are short this time of year. Besides, i'm just finishing up a 450 build that i'm pretty excited about too!.... I was originally planning on mounting the gt on the 450, but changed my mind.
I find that splitting attention between several models can get me confused as to where i was at the last time i worked on a machine.....

Servo endpoints is where you set your tail rotor limits left and right and cyclic pitch.
I cant remember which side A is but you can take the numbers way down low until you see which side it's limiting and bump the numbers back up to allow the rudder to get full throw without binding.

On cyclic servos they don't seem to do a whole lot, I took them nearly all the way down far as they will go equally to get down to 10 degrees of cyclic pitch.
It would be nice if those could have been adjusted in the swash menu like pitch is.

In my swash menu I have elevator and aileron left at 100 while the pitch is reduced a little to get 10 degrees of pitch at center stick.

[Bladecpnitro]

If your using digital cyclic servos you can set your cyclic pitch easier with transmitter endpoints. I use hitec hs 65 mg analog servos with plastic gears and servo endpoints for cyclic pitch in my TX didnt play well with analog servos.

[syberbruno]

...this is my actual setting
flyes very stable without any drift...sticks move quite direct
hope it helps..greetings from germany

AKTUELL
Swashplate
P 89 I 77 I D-stick 90 D-sense 25 Feed Foreward 85 I-lim 18 Hover 5

Tail


P 80 I 70 D-sense 22 Tail-D-DB 10 Tail Assym 0 Tail-Dyn 25 DMA -Pitch 0 DMA-cyclic 0 Smmoth stop 0



Pitch 100 Ail 90 Elev 90

Servo Setting
Tail typ 1500 Tail sek 0,051 Tail-Freq 333 Sw-Plate 120° SW sek 0,051 SW-freq 200

[thishleo]

I have started to setup a mini titan E325s with a gt5.1 gyro. I bought this helicopter second hand. I went and restored all the gyro settings to the settings given in the user manual and now I am having the following problem.
The problem I am having is that my cyclic servos are not in sync, they are not in their neutral position(i.e servo horns perpendicular to the servo), sluggish and upon increasing or decreasing pitch, the would slowly drift to an extreme point.

I am very confused and have been looking to fix this for almost 3 days. I really hope you could shed some light on this situation.
I have been reading some of the forums too but cannot seem to figure out what the exact problem is. I have not setup a fbl system before and this is my first one.


If its any help, i am using a dx7 transmitter. my swash servos are ace dc0915 and for the tail i have a savox servo.



Thank you ,


Thish

[gwright]

don't expect the swash to behave "normally" in static conditions,..i.e. sitting on the workbench, unless you are in programming mode in the GT5. If it works correctly then,.. go out of programming mode and go fly. You're not in the air, it's sensing a commanded motion, comparing it to what it's sensing, and computing where each servo should be. It moves the servos and nothing happens, so it moves some more,..etc. The swash will do strange things sitting on the ground that will never happen in the air. There is a decay built in that will slowly return the swash to neutral when the sticks are neutralized,.. but ALL sticks must be neutralized,...i.e. center collective also. If collective is low or high, the decay is reduced and the swash will simply sit there sometimes in a strange position.

[ricardobowe]

Hello,

I too am having some issue with the G-T5 and I want to give it another go before I throw it in the trash. I have a TREX-450 and I am following Gary Wright's instructions and I think I am getting some results that are favorable. My questions are with the collective pitch and tail.

Concerning the Collective Pitch. I have the servo arms at 90 degrees and when I go Max Pitch I get about 16 degrees. I try to reduce it back and to 12 degrees with the swash menu but the I am at the value 90. I can go lower but I think that I would have to redo the PIDs which I suck at. I have used a combination of dropping the swash pitch option to 90 and reducing the Pitch Servo Travel to get 12 degrees and lower. Is that ok to do or should I do everything in the G-T5?

Second question, When I have flown this heli the last time I tried to do a Pitch pump and the tail blew out to the right every time. I tried to increase the DMA cyclic/pitch as stated in the instructions but to no avail. Is there something I need to do to keep the tail from blowing out.

I am sure your all shaking your head right now but I not sure what I am doing with this G-T5 and I have previously setup Microbeast and 3GX controllers successfully. I just dont know why I am not getting it and am very frustrated.

Any help is appreciated

[Bladecpnitro]

Originally Posted by ricardobowe

Hello,

I too am having some issue with the G-T5 and I want to give it another go before I throw it in the trash. I have a TREX-450 and I am following Gary Wright's instructions and I think I am getting some results that are favorable. My questions are with the collective pitch and tail.

Concerning the Collective Pitch. I have the servo arms at 90 degrees and when I go Max Pitch I get about 16 degrees. I try to reduce it back and to 12 degrees with the swash menu but the I am at the value 90. I can go lower but I think that I would have to redo the PIDs which I suck at. I have used a combination of dropping the swash pitch option to 90 and reducing the Pitch Servo Travel to get 12 degrees and lower. Is that ok to do or should I do everything in the G-T5?

Second question, When I have flown this heli the last time I tried to do a Pitch pump and the tail blew out to the right every time. I tried to increase the DMA cyclic/pitch as stated in the instructions but to no avail. Is there something I need to do to keep the tail from blowing out.

I am sure your all shaking your head right now but I not sure what I am doing with this G-T5 and I have previously setup Microbeast and 3GX controllers successfully. I just dont know why I am not getting it and am very frustrated.

Any help is appreciated

How far out are the balls set on the swash servos? You may have to move them in one hole?
I run 14 degrees of pitch on my 450 Pro with balls set out to 13.5MMs.
14 is a lot though it makes it harder not to go fast. I like it that way though.