Progress Report

[sutty]

Just got back in after managing only two packs on the 450. My fingers got so cold I had to knock it on the head.. Weather was nice otherwise, but a little annoying in that it has been mild all week. Maybe it is just that I am getting softer in my old age. Oh well, I had fun and flew pretty well for the two packs that I braved.

Cheers

Sutty

[copterboy]

Damn right. I considered taking the 450 out today, but bailed to stay indoors as I have another heli task to undertake. Didn't even go out the other day, work and ladies have corrupted me and taken over for the last few days!!

Mind you I have taken delivery of a busted E-Sky HB CP3 from a friend I drink with. I think it's a wreck and think I'll be telling him to bin it. Need about a dozen or so spares, which took a good 4hrs to check it and find all the parts required.

Possibly including new li-po, servo and possibly 3in1 (which I haven't fully tested yet, but the throttle channel doesn't appear to work) Won't be cheap to get back in the air if so - it will cost him more than what he paid for it. So, I'll probably tell him to bin it and get a 130X RTF and SIM for christmas

[helihathnofury]

...thinking of getting some floats for my 600........

[sutty]

lol, yeah, the floods are pretty widespread now. I hope you're unaffected Mike. The rain has eased off a little now here, and I'm just hoping for a complete break in it so that I can nip out for a few packs on the 450.

Fingers crossed.

Cheers

Sutty

[Tomstoy2]

Sorry to hear about all the rain you guys are getting, especially this time of year!

So, there I was, driving to work, and low and behold, there is this guy my HOA is paying,,, yes, paying, to blow the leaves out of the gutters and into the street along the common areas of my housing community!

I mean,,, really? Really?
What, like nobody at these meetings doesn't say, " hey, I have this crazy dude in the neighborhood,,,"

[copterboy]

Sounds like a job for Hexa Man

[jperkosk]

No progress. Pulling 13-14 hr days out in the boonies of Missouri state working 7d/week. Managed 2 hr lunch on Thanksgiving day, and 1 battery each on mCPx and 130x... Finishing this job I think I'll deserve some compensation...

[Tomstoy2]

Son of a,,,,

so, before going to work I decided to step out my back door and do a quick flight.

Took off of my back deck, in manual mode!!! No problem, really. Got it up in the air, got her stabilized, switched over to gps, holding fine.
Turned her nose in and added left aileron.
Next thing I know she's leaning back and to the side, again! Got her going forward a little but still leaning left. Saw I was going to get too close the the houses so was forced to cut the throttles!
Down she goes, striking the foot path running next to the back fences about 4 houses over.
Broke a couple booms, tore the wires out of a motor, looks like my poor ol' gimbal may have seen it's last flight.

Concequently, the damaged motor was on the leaning side of the wreck. Taking a quick look at it, it appears that one ofthe leads solder joints came loose, as the wire, solder and all is exposed. Another lead is ripped off, too, but no exposed solder, just snapped copper strands, leading me to believe I lost a pole in flight with this motor?

I'll have to look at it more closely when I get up tomorrow.
This is 3 times she's stuffed in, always leading into this same motor. So, if I'm correct I've had this going intermittant for awhile.

It could also be an esc related thing, but won't really know until I check that out. Just think I'll replace the esc anyway. As the old saying goes, "when in doubt,,,".

I've got a spare motor, brand new, already on stand by here at the house, but no esc. Also , I have 1 spare boom.
At least it won't cost much to put together again. Just been a hard end of the season on her.

Been toying with the idea of just changing out the frame to a DJI hexa frame. At $56 for the frame it's pretty hard to beat. The booms are plastic, like my X/Aircraft booms, but heavies and much stronger.
I could get some motor extension plates an increase the motor to motor dimentions from 533mm to 672mm giving it quite the increase in stability.
AeroXcraft makes a real nice combo rigid landing gear/ 2-axis gimbal for the f550 at around $167.

Hmmm, don't really know what I'll do yet.
I do want a 650mm machine, but was hoping for a nice CarbonCore H6,rusks around $435 for the airframe itself and them God only knows what else, probably that much again to $850 for a gimbal.
I'd cry stuffing that in! Probably as bad as I would when I crashed my Avant!

Still, if I sold, say my HDX450 I could then use that to fund a CarbonCore. Plus, it's not like I've been happy at all with this pos gimbal I have now, anyway.

Maybe I just need to whore myself out? Find some rich sugar mama,,,

[sutty]

Well yes, that is a son of a ......., sorry to hear that Tom/ I just had a similar moment, but with less costly results. Waited all day for the fog to lift, and then just before it was going to be too dark I decided it was clear enough. Don't know why it lifted just before dark but it did.

Rushing a little, I did not do my normal pre-flight checks, my bad. Took off with no rudder control, something that has happened before with my MB. It is rare, but of the hundreds, probably thousands of flights it has happened on a couple of previous occasions. Anyway, the tail was holding, because on inspection afterwards it was auto correcting, just not steering with my inputs. Panic set in a little, odd not having a control, so I just hit throttle hold and autoed down from about 15 feet into the grass.

Minor damage, but oddly, very oddly, a complete first for me, I have knocked a few teeth off the auto rotation gear. In all my years I have never broken one of those, and I'm pretty sure I won't have a spare, so that's the 450 down for the weekend.

Never mind, only myself to blame, if I had checked, and then re-booted, all would have been well. Can't complain really, I have had an incredible run of maintenance free flying with all my helis.

Who'd have thought it though, the big tail drive gear. It just doesn't happen.

EDIT: Yep, just checked, no spare. EDITED EDIT :-) Found one in my Belt-CP box. Must have been trying to convert the Belt at one time or other to Trex style and given up. How lucky is that. Gentle outdoor under the lights test flight just completed. Woo hoo.


Cheers

Sutty

[Tomstoy2]

Well, I got good news and bad news.

The good news, the gimbal I was able to rebuild,,, once again.

The bad news, the gimbal I was able to rebuild,,, once again!

I know, sounds strange, doesn't it? I'm really having a love/hate relationship with this gimbal.
All I can say about it, on the positive side, is it's been a low investment item.
To crash an $800 gimbal would be the pits!
As bad as it is to put together an airframe, it's a hell of a lot worse putting together an expensive precision instrument like a real gimbal. You're talking a rebuild kit cost for those around $200!!!

Guess I shouldn't bitch so much.

I keep reminding myself that I'm still in the learning phase with this thing, and truth is all of this is still in it's toddler years. Give it about 5 more and the entire industry will change.

Looking back over the past year of experimenting with this darkest of the dark arts I feel like I've made damn good progress.
It's no where as easy as one would think it is. You just don't go out and spend $200-$300 and make phenominal movies.

Lets see, I got a WKM @ $1100, ( the key to everything is a fight controller ), a XAircraft airframe at $170, $350 worth of motors, $180 worth of esc's, a cheap as sin gimbal that today would cost $170, a $300 GoPro Hero 2 camera, including the fpv camera I lost about $220 worth of fpv camera's, and including the 2 fpv transmitters I've ruined about $290, $100 worth of antenna's, around $230 worth of battery's and a $450 radio.
Jesus, no wonder I keep rebuilding this damn gimbal!
Then there is the cost of my Gaui 330x-s, what, at about $300, and my fy91q flight controller with navigation system that never worked and turned into a paper weight at $450!

No, this is not a hobby for the weak of heart. However, nothing is that fly's! I have 3 to 4 times that tied up in my single rotor fleet that I have ignored all year.

The good news, crashes are really cheap. All I had to buy this time was 2 booms at $8 each and one landing strut at $9, and 3 props at $3 each.
I did trash a motor, but I have a spare. I might need an esc, but have yet to test it so at most, $30 if I need to replace it.

So with everything in mind, I've had 3 wrecks this year that cost me rebuild time and money out of around 250 flights!
I call that success!

I'll be the first to admit that I'm now pushing the limits of my current system, I can't do anything more to it other than add an on screen display so I can keep track of her when she's out of sight, let along find it if it goes down out there.
I'll need to invest into a bigger and very much more expensive rig to increase my results to the next level, but I honestly don't feel the need to even think about that now.

My plan for 2013 is to fly this thing every opportunity I can, learn even more and see what the industry leans to next.

One thing I have deffinately learned is to take my time, not to jump ahead of myself, do all my homework and do ALL of my inspections!

It's all to easy to jump on the band wagon for the latest and greatest thing that the industry comes out with.
The key is to let time pass and see exactly what problems arise with it before investing the money.

My WKM is a prime example. I have never seen a company so devoted to their product! They have been exceptional with comming out with updates for the firmware to improve their product. A couple of times they have missed the mark, but in all they have hit it damn near every time. I couldn't be more pleased.
Considering that it's only been about 2 years since they came out with the WKM they have upgraded the firmware somewhere around 20 times? Never charging for an upgrade either!
This, my friends, is the way to run a company!

A long, expensive and rocky road I have traveled, too true. However, I haven't regreted it. The pain, frustration and expense, in my eyes at least, has all been woth it.

[rapidgaz]

Hi folks, do any of you use a vbar gov on a nitro. If so can you help me out a little.

[Tomstoy2]

Sorry Gaz, I run a flat curve instead.

Good to hear from you though! Hope you're doing well.

Rain stop?

[rapidgaz]

No worries Tom. I always keep a look into what's happening on here.

[Luke Warmwater]

Wots a nitro?

[jperkosk]

The thing with a "gov" thing, I recon
Been called that myself by a Cockney-speaking taxi driver on the way from Heathrow, though, so I'm really confused now

[Luke Warmwater]

Is a Vbar gov like a coalition gov? We have one of them....but not on a nitro, it was on a low turn-out.....

[sutty]

No, they're not the same. The coalition one has so many turns even the vbar governor couldn't get them under control. Plus the vbar version perform a clearly defined and useful function, and does so without suffering from corruption.

[Luke Warmwater]

Originally Posted by sutty

Plus the vbar version perform a clearly defined and useful function, and does so without suffering from corruption.

Aha...the complete opposite in all respects. Although they do have one thing in common; neither are funded by Starbucks!

[sutty]

Not too much to report, but progress of some sort. I finished for Christmas last Thursday and since then I have been forcing myself to fly almost however cold it has been. Some days I have been hard pushed to fly a pack before I have to come back inside to warm my hands. Today was particularly cold, and after one pack I thought that was it, too cold. However this forced me to think about what I could do. Previous experience of trying gloves has just been a none starter but I had to do something as I don't want to waste an otherwise nice sunny and windless days just because it is cold.

So don't laugh at this, or think I'm silly for sharing, as it is obvious, but I hadn't thought of it. You know those gloves with the tips of the finger missing, well I always thought they would be no good, as they didn't go back far enough. I'd previously thought about cutting the tips of some gloves but I'd thought I would have to cut them back so far that my fingers would get cold anyway. So I'm in the kitchen discussing it, and she says, well why do you have to cut all the fingers off, and I went, waaaaaa, why didn't I think of that.

Stupid right, but I had never thought of that. So, I cut the tip off the thumb, and the tip off the index finger, and went out to test. No good, because I pinch, or at least guide with my index finger, there was still interference. Landed quickly, and cut a bit more off and tried again. Still no good as the material was rubbing on the ring around the sticks. In the end I have ended up losing almost all of the index finger, and a little more than the tip of the thumb, but once I had done that I was able to fly almost unimpaired and my hands remained warm enough to manage all of my packs in a row, and I could have carried on with another heli. Didn't though as it was going a little dark, so I settled for what I had achieved.

First time she has ever made a positive contribution to my hobby.

Here are my winter flying gloves.



Cheers

Sutty

[Luke Warmwater]

I too have been wanting to fly in the cold. I'm afraid I didn't get inventive, just went shopping and picked up a Transmitter Glove that I tried for the first time today. I works really well, with the one problem of the clear plastic screen getting misted up so you can't see the display on the Tx.

Timer is set to beep and vibrate, so it's no big issue, but I do like to check every now and then...

The other minor issue is one for plank fliers only....or rather, hand launched plank fliers. Solo flying is just about impossible without taking a big gamble that you can get your hand back on that stick, without getting caught up in the sleeves of the glove first!

This is the one I went for:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1707845920...84.m1497.l2649