The Official E-Flite mCX Modification Resource Thread

[shaggybirdman]

dude get the cusker kit. it's flyable, controllable, fast to install, and best of all cheap.

[HeliHoverAP]

It's not really that big of deal to me. I'm teaching my 10 year old step daughter right now on it. Plus I was seeing what I could do, and not what someone else already did.

[SCFarm]

Just performed the pen spring mod, even though I don't have the cusker, it seems to have helped nicely. Also turned the servo links down 2 turns on the left and 4 turns on the right. Trimmed out nicely now.

[shield]

I can't remember exactly where I saw this but I recall reading about a modification that changes the angle of the 5-in-1 board. This new angle causes the board to fall in line and be parallel to the linkages giving better throw. This sound familiar to anyone or am I crazy!?

[chandlert]

Hello. I have two mcxes (my guess at the plural of mcx). The first one I bought was a new BNF mcx S300 from HH a couple months ago. After flying for a while I read up on all the mods and ordered the Cusker 19mm kit. I trimmed the canopy the day I ordered the kit to be ready. A couple days later I went to an indoor fly put on by my LHS at a college arena and bought a used RTF mcx. I didn't fly that day, just checked it out and I will be ready for the next one! The S300 is called mcx r and the other is mcx 3, model names on my dx6i, named after my kids (I continually tell the wife the helis are theirs).

I decided to keep the mcx r mostly stock so my younger kid can keep flying it. I did the msr swashplate swap. I pulled the msr bearing and collar from the msr swashplate and placed them in the mcx swashplate, not required but I wanted to try. The msr collar was very tight on the outer shaft, but loosened a little during install. No play like the stock swash. No changes to the mechanical setup; it has a stable hover and quick flight on all axis. Now I can easily switch between short (12mm) and long (14mm) swashplate ball ends depending on the pilot.

The mcx 3 has a few mods. I started with the aluminum Cusker 19mm kit and a mcx swashplate, but there was too much play between the stock swashplate collar and the outer shaft. A friend recommended I use an msr swashplate. I installed the aluminum collar on the msr swashplate by removing the four ball ends and sanding the collar smooth. I used a little Zap-a-Gap medium CA+ to glue the collar to the msr collar, the msr collar to the bearing and the bearing to the swashplate. I only used the anti-rotation guide extension. I trimmed the swashplate linkage guides off the lower blade grips and sanded the lower blade grip smooth. I did not need the guides since I also installed the pen spring mod. The flybar is shortened and has 1/16 Plated Brass Dura-Collars as weights. A quick sanding and black paint and the Dura-Collars match the rest of the rotor assembly. The Dura-Collars made it very easy to level the flybar and were cheap. The final mod I did was to angle the 5in1. I know 90 degrees is preferred with helis, but the servos seem to be smooth their entire travel. Also, with the angle, the forward/reverse/left/right stick input makes the swash travel a little further at the end points. It is really, really fast in all directions and stable in hover. I have pushed it hard and have not had a blade strike. I have to be smooth with the right hand inputs or it will lose some lift during direction change, but not enough to crash (yet). I will have to get some longer pushrods as I am almost to the end of the stock ones.

I now have a stock/slightly modified mcx and a modified mcx. I cannot wait to take them out to the arena. Here are some pics and measurements. Have fun flying.

Stock mcx Flybar 1.7g
5 in 1 4.5g
Stock mcx Swashplate 1.1g
Stock msr Swashplate 1.2g
Cusker 19mm Collar 0.3g
Cusker Guides (too light to be accurate on my scale) @.05g each
mcx Swashplate with 19mm Cusker 1.4g
msr Swashplate with 19mm Cusker 1.5g
mcx Swashplate with msr bearing and collar 1.2g
mcx Flybar plastic end caps removed 1.6g
mcx Flybar 97mm with Dura-Collars 1.8g
1/16 Plated Brass Dura-Collars x 2 1.4g
mcx 3 w/o battery 23.0g
mcx r w/o battery 23.0g
mcx Stock Swash Ball 12mm
msr Swash Ball Short 12mm
msr Swash Ball Long 14mm
Stock mcx Flybar 130mm
mcx Swashplate Pen Spring Mod Length with 19mm Cusker 5.5mm
msr Swashplate Pen Spring Mod Length with 19mm Cusker 3mm
Pushrod Angle 80 deg

[chandlert]

Originally Posted by shield

I can't remember exactly where I saw this but I recall reading about a modification that changes the angle of the 5-in-1 board. This new angle causes the board to fall in line and be parallel to the linkages giving better throw. This sound familiar to anyone or am I crazy!?

Shield,
I angled the 5in1 about 15 degress form 90. The push rod is closer to 20 degrees, but I did not want to cut too much! It seems to work well. I cut the upper 5in1 mount with my dremel tool and sanded the lower one to 85 degrees. I did not cut any of the lower mount off to keep the 5in1 as far forward as possible and to make sure the pushrod does not rub the lower body mount. I then sanded the two with a block to make sure they lined up straight at the correct angle. Once it was sanded and cleaned up, I used a body mount washer inbetween both frame mounts and the 5in1 (on the two 5in1 mounting screws). Hope that helps.

Chandler
my mods are above

[The pitbull]

Have you had any problems with the swashplate mod?

[Toshido]

After reading the links on modifying the charger for the MCX2 I was getting ready to gear up and make one of the mods for my charger.

For another project I bought two 6v 1000mA wall adapters. Unfortunately it does not seem to have enough power for that job
So I was going to cannibalize one of the adapters for this mod, but thinking about it I decided to double check the volts and amps of the adapter, as well as the actual plug. After rebuilding the adapter I checked the polarity and it was correct (center positive) and I tested the fit as well, perfect.

Not really a mod at all since this seems to be perfectly plug and play, but considering the adapter costs all of $3.20 delivered I thought you might like to know.

Oh and it fits perfectly in the provided spot in the styrofoam in the top of the box...

Wall Adapter

[S300]

For those of us still flying these old birds because there both fun indoor heli’s & great for teaching kids to fly heli’s.

Here's a GREAT resource thread that is still valid & works (unlike most of the links above)…The ULTIMATE mCX2 Upgrade Guide

Instead of using expensive aftermarket parts that rarely work right & fail early. He focus’s on using the right combination of factory parts to make them more fun to fly. The flybar mod is a great example.

Couple things that I would add…
Put a couple drops of silicon shock oil in the swash, there’s a couple openings to put it in.

Grease the main bearings with Labelle PTFE Grease (PFTE = Teflon), doesn’t attract dirt like other grease’s do…Bing Search: Labelle PTFE Grease

Force RC main blades work better than the original mCX or Blade logo’ed main blade’s.
The Force heli’s were heavy (for there size), so Blade / E-flite / Force RC / HH created blades that produce more thrust / down force.