Protos amp draw

[bgymr]

Hey guys, I have been looking for a graph of the protos flights. But only see graphs for the 12s setup. Im going 6s.

My goal is to build a very light machine. I have JR mini servos everywhere, with a vbar and scorp motor. Very standard setup. I have Glacier 2700 packs. I am only keeping it at 430 blades.

My question is can I use the Hobbywing V3 50a esc. It says it can handle 75a for 10 seconds. I use one on my x3 and find it to be extremely good reliable eqiupment. I have no worries about the BEC either because it is very powerful.

[flint723]

IMO it should not be a problem. I have logs on 6s if you really want to see them but the gist is that hobbywing 50a v3 should have no problem with a P500 430mm.

[DoubleCH]

Depends on your setup and flying style. My friend logged peak 60A with Turnigy 20C 2650, non-stretch 430 blades, 15T pinion, 80A YEP ESC. Same setup and flying style Thunder Power 70C 2250 pulled 83A.

I've once triggered over-temp warning (no not low-voltage warning) on my stock YGE60A ESC with my strong Wild Scorpion 45C 3500 during super-fast continuous tic-tocs for like 20 seconds. This was with 14T and 470 blades (similar to 15T 430 blades) at only 2400rpm HS. I'm running 13T now and reminds myself not to do that 20-sec super fast tic-tocs any more.

[bgymr]

Thanks for the responses guys.

I'm going to give it a try. My worry is not tictocs...I usually don't do more than 8-10 in a row anyway. My worry is more hurricanes as they load up the head pretty good.

But going from the 60 to a 50 I dont see a huge change. I guess that is what my question is.

I run my x3 wtih a pretty big motor, granted not a 3026, but it's big, and the HW handles it with no issues.

I may start with a lighter battery and move up after a few flights.

Anyone else try a similar esc?

Another question....what HS can I get decent tictocs out of 430 blades wtih a 2700 battery? This is usually where i keep my headspeed.

For example I run my x3 at 2850 with 360 blades. Would 2500 be about right for a light protos? I guess they are all light!

[bgymr]

Update:

In my usual fashion, I half a$$ tuned it, hooked up the hw and vbar gov, charged the two glacier 2700 and went to the field.

I really couldn't believe how well it flew. I set up banks but only changed the gyro gain in each. I believe in at gain 43 with the jr 3005.

Anyway, the hw came down cooler to the touch than it does in my x3. Granted I mounted it in the back where it gets tons of airflow.

I flew my usual stuff and by the fourth pack I forgot that I was suppose to take it easy on the smaller esc. But nothing happened. I was flying at 2300. I was truly amazed at how responsive it was at this hs.

So short term it passed. We will see how it handles the summer and back to back flights.

[kavic5150]

Hobbywing escs are a bit underrated specs wise. My old 6HV had a 70 amp HW swinging 620mm blades and it landed cool. I'd be surprised if your HW esc isnt up to the task.

[bgymr]

I am starting to see why this bird has a cult following. It's a totally different feel in the air. Very light. It easily accelerates through transitions.

I run it at 2400 with 13degrees of pitch and it's freaking lively. Its not easy to control at first when going to it from other helis. The same amount of input this bird shoots across the sky. But i really like the feel of it.

I think it's nuts that some of you run it as high as 2800. That has to be a ride and a half.

Quick question. I bought mine used and it came wiht an aluminum tail pinion. Wihtout counting it, would it be safe to assume that the slider on my vbar is at 40 for tail gain because its spinning so fast. the 40 tail gain is in the "trex 250" range as labeled by the slider.

[flint723]

They did make both 20 and 18t metal tail pulleys so that in itself does not mean it's the 18t pulley. IMO the stock plastic pulley (20t) is better anyway if you don't need the speed up, the metal ones I had fit loose on the tail shaft (causing a ticking when slowing down) and allowed side to side movement of the tail shaft even when the pulley was shimmed tight.

[dr dremel]

It could be that you have the 18T tail pulley, but there is also a metal pulley with stock tooth count (20T).

Very little tail gain usually indicates the ball is too far out on the servo horn. I think stock distance is 13mm.

Now having said that, if there is no problem with how the tail feels, I would not worry too much.

Edit: Flint beat me to it

[DoubleCH]

Originally Posted by bgymr

I am starting to see why this bird has a cult following. It's a totally different feel in the air. Very light. It easily accelerates through transitions.

Oh yeah, especially compare to X5. Wait until you try stretch with 470mm blades. Super floaty which is very good for practising new move like piro flips where you can stay at zero collective longer and do your thing. Disc-loading is so light I flew mine with 3S at ~1400rpm and the tail still holds on funnels and backwards. I normally fly 2250-2300 HS with 470 blades, 2400-2450 HS with strong packs. With 430 blades, I think 2600-2700 is good which can do a lot already. Any higher the governor may not be able to hold HS under heavy load or you'll need very high C battery.

How much tail gain depends on many more factors than just tail speed. When I bought mine used it came with 18T. When I changed to 20T I didn't have to up my tail gain a lot. I'm running Savox 1290MG which is a pretty good and fast tail servo. Since the servo is fast enough, I've always wondered if I could mount pushrod ball 1 hole inner on the servo horn. I did just that recently and it works great. I maxed out the servo movement range by running 140 limits on vBar, both sides. And I can now run 90+ gain (from 60 before, vBar numbers). As long as you set up enough tail pitch (I run close to 45 degrees both sides) and my tail never blows out even with 20T tail gear and 2250rpm HS (except when my tail tension was mistakenly set too loose and belt slips).

EDIT: Managed to take a few grams off my Protos and it's now 1206g with 470 blades, AUW with Thunder Power 70C 2250 at 1601g.

[bgymr]

DCh you're not kidding about the disk loading especially evident during piro flips. It's much lighter than my x3 or x5. I'm sort of relearning piro flips. When I do them usual the bird just flies away. This thing does not require much pitch at all. Do you guys run your pitch high? I feel like 11.5 would be sufficient for what I like to do. I'l play around more.

The tail gets a little noisy when under a lot of load. Really this is my first belt so the tightness i still don't quite understand. So it could just be that. It kicks a little but I think i can tune that. Plus it's windy as all heck ehre. The tail servo is a jr3008. I like the idea of keeping minis throughout on the bird. I don't plan to stretch it because I already have an x5 that I love to run and got rid of a bird that flew too much like it. So i would prefer to keep the protos at 430.

it's definetly a cool heli. My worry with it being so lively, if i dumb thumb one bit, i'll need a shovel to get it out.

[DoubleCH]

One good thing about it being lively is that you can always tame it down. Light weight means less crash energy to break parts. I run 11.5 collective and 10-ish cyclic (lowered with vBar's cyclic ring a lot like 66 or something) and cyclic response is still super fast as you've seen my videos. Never runs out of swash tilt in the air (indicated by "cyclic ring activated" vBar log).

Tail shouldn't make any more noise than any other heli under heavy load. My 450DFC with torque tube makes more noise under heavy load because of the crown gears. Make sure the noise is not from tail bearings going out. To check belt tightness make sure to do both front and rear. Tail tension doesn't need to be high. It rarely slips unless you go super loose. Front tension is more critical. Too loose or too tight you may accelerate belt/pinion wear either by slipping or by unnecessary drag. Stock aluminium pinion is pretty soft and wears out fast which will then wear out belt fast.

[bgymr]

I spent the weekend flying it. Had a twitch here and htere so I grounded the belt. That was easy. But tehn on my 6-7 flight one of teh tail grip connecting rods from the slider broke. I was just doing piruettes inverted. I was able to land somewhat ok, jsut a broken landing gear, but what would make it break in flight like that? It was disappointing. My tail was smooth as butter. And my tailblades were new, although I didn't balance them.

I was running 2300 HS and I just redid my endpoints for the tail 5 flights earlier and instead of going to where the servo binds and backing off, I left like a millimeter on the slider on either end.

Is this why people invest in teh upgraded tails?

[DoubleCH]

Me and a few buddies who fly Protos here all have stock plastic slider/linkages on forever no issue. Mine has over 1000 flights on. I think it's the tail control lever arm that people upgrades. The issue is that the stock plastic lever arm design doesn't run flanged brass sleeve inside bearings making it possible for the tail case arms to squeeze on lever arm bearings inner AND outer races resulting in possible binding, and inaccurate tail response. However, that should not result in breaking tail slider pitch linkages. The more probable cause of breaking pitch linkages are pre-existing cracks in the linkages, bad tail grip bearings or wrong installation (causing grip balls to not align to tail shaft and pitch linkages to bind). While wrong bearing installation may be easy to detect, bad grip bearings may only mis-align grip balls when the tail rotor is running at speed. Tail vibes may also be the culprit.

EDIT: Want to add that while a couple of my buddies now run Lynx metal lever arm, we've been running plastic lever arm fine for many flights. My entire tail is bone stock for all its life of well over 1000, including bone stock $3.80 plastic tail blades, and even non-thrust tail grips. My only tail mod was to shim the lever arm bearings so that tail case squeeze on just the inner race not the outer.

[babyuh1]

You have to watch the P 500 in grass as it sits a little low and can pick up damage to the tail. You may have damaged the link before the flight.
I run the longer Lynx tail fin to protect it.

[kingmeow]

Originally Posted by babyuh1

I run the longer Lynx tail fin to protect it.

+1. I did the same after I broke the OEM tail fin.