Blade SR problems after belt drive kit

[quaffles]

Hi,

So I'm new to posting on the forums and I've lurked a little trying to learn the ropes for this helicopter.

So to start off, I bought the blade SR for my first heli. My dad had the 120 SR and I was flying that quite well so I wanted to upgrade to something a little bigger.

My 2nd flight I had a crash. Lots of damage, took it all apart, bought the new pieces required etc. I really didn't like the tail motor on this heli so I decided wth, I'll get the belt kit.

I have successfully installed the belt kit but I am having issues.

I have already tested every portion of the tail, the gyro is working properly (reacts correctly to left/right turning motions), I get full motion of the tail blades, no slipping on the belt, etc. However, it seems that my heli is still spinning counter-clockwise. I have repositioned the tail servo several times making small tweaks but nothing seems to help with the spinning. This is after reversing the gyro which did make it better...

So if you are still with me I have a few questions.

1. Does the pot on the ESC (the pot on the bottom side of the heli) still have an impact? right now I have it at approximately middle

2. When I have channel 5 active on the remote, is the physical pot on the gyro actually disabled like the manual says? Also, if I have my gyro reversed, does that also mean (on the remote) that + becomes -?

3. Is there any other place in the heli that could be causing the rotation? Keep in mind, I have tried it where the centre position of the rudder trim is all the way to the right.

To expand on 3, could a bent head shaft cause issues with spinning? I think it is fractionally out of alignment as I can't get the main rotor blades to line up perfectly. Or could the O rings used for the main rotor blades cause problems?

Sorry for the wall of text and if this is the wrong place to post, I apologize. I have been fighting with this helicopter since the beginning but I am not willing to give up on it after all this invested time. Any help would be greatly appreciated as I'm quite a newb.

[DKS_ONE]

Ok, spinning left I assume as you mentioned putting trim all the way right to no avail? You also mentioned that reversing the gyro helped, this to me means you may have the gyro correction the right way now, but the tail isn't doing it's job to counter the main motor. Is the tail rotor spinning the right way? When viewed from the right side looking at the tail rotor, it should spin counter clockwise. If it's spinning the wrong way, then the rudder direction, although it looks to be moving the right way physically according to the blade position, will be reversed. That's the first thing I would check and be absolutely certain belt tension is good otherwise the tail will not spin as fast as it needs to to generate the thrust required to counter the main motor.

To answer your questions:
1) No, the gain on esc will no longer have any effect on anything

2) Yes, the gyro pot will be disabled as long as you have gain wire plugged in, but one thing to be sure of is to check that the gain wire is plugged into the Rx the right way around. The second part of the question, no, reversing gyro doesn't reverse rudder direction or gyro gain values.

3) I don't think anything in the head is causing your spinning, although if there is a bent spindle you'll get vibrations that may throw the gyro out a bit, but shouldn't cause it to continually spin.

Another thing to try is disabling the gyro. Unplug the gyro altogether with and see if you can make slight adjustments to the pushrod until you can get it to hold. Don't try flying this way, but see if you can get it spun up and light enough to spin but keep it on the ground. Training gear would be good for this test.

Hope this helps! It may not be all that we need to figure this out but it's a start.

[metalwizard]

Tripple check yourself. I had put the tail blades on wrong one time did the same thing.

take the heli look at the RIght side (look at the side of the heli with the tail boom going to the left of the heli blade side toward you tail FIN away from you.)

when you spin the head on the heli in the direction the rotors normally spin does the tail go COUNTER clockwise?? and are the leading edges of the tail blades In FRONT??

if NOT you have the belt twisted the wrong way.. and/or the tail blades on the wrong direction...

THe directions are a little confusing on that its easy to get wrong!


EDIT: SOrry I had not caught the DKS had said this already!

hope that helps out

[DKS_ONE]

Two of us said it, it HAS to be true!!! lol!

[Air Wolf]

I can confirm from experience what Danno and metalwizard said. I had my belt twisted the wrong direction the first time and all it would do is spin in circles on the ground. Re-installed the belt twisted the right direction and everything returned to normal. Viewed from the right the tail rotor should turn counter clockwise.

[quaffles]

Yes, I triple checked to make sure the blade is spinning the right direction with the blades pointing the right way. I got it with a pre-assembled tail. One 360 degree turn of the tail blade is about 80-90 degree on the head.

On the plus side I think I might have figured out the issue! I believe it has something to do with the adjustable pitch control link. I believe after my crash in my naivete I adjusted the links way to far! The exposed portion was at about 3-4.5mm in length. I shortened that down to about 1.75-2mm and I can already feel the difference in rotation just holding it in my hand (even though that probably isn't safe doing).

So after a painstaking amount of debugging and troubleshooting I may finally be on to something!

Thanks for the responses, at least I know I was on the right path for trouble shooting the tail!

[metalwizard]

the length of the pushrod should not matter as long as at neutral (zero stick zero trim) the arm on the servo is perpendicular to the boom AND the arm on the tail slider is too. (the slider should be close to the middle)

Hope it works out!

[GSPI]

Yeah the length really shouldn't have much effect but if you have the pushrod binding it could lock in place and spin like that.

[DKS_ONE]

The push rod length has to be such that the tail pitch slider arm is 90 to the tail boom when servo arm is also 90 to tail boom and rudder is in center/neutral position in normal mode on gyro (or even better, when rudder servo is plugged right into Rx). Once you have that, then the rest of your settings come into play. Yes, if you had the push rod too long/short, it would make the heli spin and depending how far it was out, you may not be able to compensate for it.

[metalwizard]

Yep you can adjust that by changing the length ofthe pushrod OR by moving the servo back and forth. it is best to NOT use the trim or subtrim leave those at Zero.

and as DKS said Bypass the gyro temporarily (plug the servo directly into the rudder spot) to set these. BUT dont try and fly that way unless you got mad skills.. LOL

[quaffles]

Well I had it hovering for awhile before implementing/changing it to 90's.

I made the changes and it would spin ccw. Moving the servo in to the main shaft fixed that issue. I can now hover but I don't think I understand channel 5 well enough.

Whenever I get it flying properly and having the gain set to where there is very little dogging it never seems that I can just turn it on and fly. I have to do the entire process of finding the right gain value again. I'm pretty sure it is because it changes the channel 5 mode (ie. the servo/gyro stops responding when I spin the tail left/right).

Then again, I could be talking out of my ass. Need to do some more reading on it I guess. I'm just glad I can get it hovering.

[DKS_ONE]

Once you have the tail set up right and have the heli holding in a hover, the gain shouldn't have to be changed or reset really. You using stock Tx? Or programmable? Probably says in an earlier post, I'll edit this later if so. What gain value have you been using when it does fly well? And when you have to reset it again, what value to you end up with? Not sure what to tell you on this one, definitely not right but can't say as I've ever really experienced this kind of situation before.