telebee gyro on a 450

As I throttle up, when my heli is in rate mode for the gyro, it spins around. However when I flip the switch to put it in head holding mode, the tail stays still.

What sort of setting do I have to do to keep it steady in rate mode?

On my DX6i, I set my gyro to 50% and 70%. When you lift off, do you start in rate or HH mode? If I set my Dx6i to 70,70, does that mean my heli is always in HH mode?

mine did the same on my belt cp never did figure out why

kaymm2 wrote:

As I throttle up, when my heli is in rate mode for the gyro, it spins around. However when I flip the switch to put it in head holding mode, the tail stays still.

What sort of setting do I have to do to keep it steady in rate mode?

On my DX6i, I set my gyro to 50% and 70%. When you lift off, do you start in rate or HH mode? If I set my Dx6i to 70,70, does that mean my heli is always in HH mode?

your tail is not setup right. first thing , what you need to do is make sure your subtrims are set to 0. then switch to rate mode then mechnically adjust the servo holder back and forth till you should be able to hover with the rate mode. this is called neutral. then land your heli down,. unplug the heli. and your radio. Now your ready for a hh mode. switch to HH mode then plug your heli. there. you should be good togo/.

Shouldn't I just need to have the tail servo centered, then center the hub on the tail so there is even amount of throw on either side? If I move the servo holder up or down the boom, it'll throw off the centering at the tail rotor hub.

I'll give that a go though. I have almost everyting dialed in for my 450 except for the tail and pitch of the blades. Man it's a lot of work building a helicopter. So many things to worry about. But i'm learning lots. I'll make less mistakes on my 250 and 500 kits though.

Thanks!

yes and no. well in your case you would want to fly on a hh mode anyway. but if oyu want to set up your heli right . then do it the right way. . your concern earlier was that the tail spins when your in rate mode, This is why. your tail is not set up. also telebee is good gyro ,, but when your ready for 3d, i would recommend changing your gyro and servo.

I don't plan on doing 3D for awhile hehehe. Don't know if it's even possible for me to learn that.

i told myself that too. but as you progressed, you will want some more. trust me, been there done that bro!!! goodluck on your flying.

90 deg. on the servo arm and center of travel of the pitch slider can be thought of as your starting point for adjusting the tail setup. You have to start with that right.

Then when you do your 1st hover in rate mode you will want to slide the tail servo on the boom to get the heli to hover without turning its nose either to the left or the right. This adjust ment is very touchy and you will be moving the servo on the boom almost inperceptable amounts to try and get a stable rotation at hover.

While hovering, I look at which way the nose of the heli is moving and which way I have to hold the stick to compensate. Then I land and move the stick in the direction that I had to compensate while watching the tail servo arm. This will tell you which way you have to slide the tail servo, either toward the tail or back toward the body of the heli.

Don't be concerned whether the tail slider is centered anymore as you will have to have a little pitch on the tail blades to counter act the torque of the main blades. Typically the tail blades are leading edge controlled and you will end up the tail blades leading edge biased toward the tail boom slightly when you end up with the heli not rotating in a hover in rate mode.

When you are able to hover in rate mode with only very slight (or no) correction on the rudder stick to control rotation you have the tail pretty well setup You can then try a hover in Heading hold mode and the heli should hold its tail position without any correction on the rudder stick. You may have to adjust the gyro gain at this point to eliminate some tail wag. Rule of thumb is that if you have slow wag your gain is too low, fast wag gain is too high. This is another experimental adjustment that is kind of futzy. You have to get a feel for what slow wag looks like and what fast wag looks like.

This seems like a lot of fooling around with this stage of the setup but it is very inportant to the success of the setup AND once you get this right you have the heli about setup.

After you get a solid hover in Heading Hold mode (HH), check the tracking of the main rotor blades and make any adjustment you need to get the tracking of the blades right.

Congratulations! You are now ready to just concentrate on flying the darn thing.

Hope this makes sense. If you need clarification on something please ask. Starting out we have all been confused by tail setup and each setup is a little bit different depending on the gyro etc. But the above should get you a good idea of what you should be trying to do.

You'll get it just have patience in making your tail adjustments and only use very small adjustments on the tail servo position on the boom.

cgetman02 wrote:

90 deg. on the servo arm and center of travel of the pitch slider can be thought of as your starting point for adjusting the tail setup. You have to start with that right.

Then when you do your 1st hover in rate mode you will want to slide the tail servo on the boom to get the heli to hover without turning its nose either to the left or the right. This adjust ment is very touchy and you will be moving the servo on the boom almost inperceptable amounts to try and get a stable rotation at hover.

While hovering, I look at which way the nose of the heli is moving and which way I have to hold the stick to compensate. Then I land and move the stick in the direction that I had to compensate while watching the tail servo arm. This will tell you which way you have to slide the tail servo, either toward the tail or back toward the body of the heli.

Don't be concerned whether the tail slider is centered anymore as you will have to have a little pitch on the tail blades to counter act the torque of the main blades. Typically the tail blades are leading edge controlled and you will end up the tail blades leading edge biased toward the tail boom slightly when you end up with the heli not rotating in a hover in rate mode.

When you are able to hover in rate mode with only very slight (or no) correction on the rudder stick to control rotation you have the tail pretty well setup You can then try a hover in Heading hold mode and the heli should hold its tail position without any correction on the rudder stick. You may have to adjust the gyro gain at this point to eliminate some tail wag. Rule of thumb is that if you have slow wag your gain is too low, fast wag gain is too high. This is another experimental adjustment that is kind of futzy. You have to get a feel for what slow wag looks like and what fast wag looks like.

This seems like a lot of fooling around with this stage of the setup but it is very inportant to the success of the setup AND once you get this right you have the heli about setup.

After you get a solid hover in Heading Hold mode (HH), check the tracking of the main rotor blades and make any adjustment you need to get the tracking of the blades right.

Congratulations! You are now ready to just concentrate on flying the darn thing.

Hope this makes sense. If you need clarification on something please ask. Starting out we have all been confused by tail setup and each setup is a little bit different depending on the gyro etc. But the above should get you a good idea of what you should be trying to do.

You'll get it just have patience in making your tail adjustments and only use very small adjustments on the tail servo position on the boom.

+ 10

Thanks cgetman02! It's much clearer now. I've been building this thing for ages and almost there.

When I'm in HH mode, and about 0-50% throttle, my heli is pretty much still but once I get to liftoff throttle range, my heli wants to go backwards. Does that mean my swashplate is still somewhat not level? but i've checked and it looks level from all sides. Or could this be related to the tail setup? If so, I hope your suggestions fixes it too.

You're really helpful.

make sure your center of gravity is level.

I would check the CG and also a swash leveling tool is real handy. I have trouble eyeballing whether it is level or not. Your tail setup shouldn't have anything to do with backward movement.

Curt

Nice explanation i always have trouble setting up the tail its the hardest thing for me everythiing else is easy i think its cause i got a telebee its a good gryo it terms of keeping the nose straight but setting it up i feel is such a pain

I have had good luck with the Logictech 2100T, thanks for the suggestion Fatdaddy, on both of my 450s and now on my 500. It's a decent priced gyro, you can get the gyro/servo combo for around $110 from Heliproz. http://www.heliproz.com/prodinfo.asp?number=138520 The servo will work well for 450 sized helis, for my 500 I am using a Futaba 9257 servo in combination with the 2100T.

Finless has a great series of videos on setting up the Hitec 5000 gyro, which is the same as the 2100T. http://www.helifreak.com/showthread.php?t=68319&highlight=hitec+5000 It's really pretty easy and like I said it really holds the tail well.

If you want to try the next step up in gyros I would recomend giving the 2100T a try. I am also using Zeal to mount the gyros to the helis. Don't know for sure if it improves performance of the gyro but, it's some really cool material!

Curt

For my DX6i settings for gyro what should I put? Is 50%, 70% good? So when the switch is at 0, it's 50%, and 1 will be 70%. Come to think of it, i really don't know what these numbers mean. What if I put 20/90? I just thought that 50 will make it go rate mode and 70 puts it in HH.

When you are adjusting the gain from the radio the mode you are in (rate or HH) is dependent on the gain setting. In general 0-50 on the gain will have you in rate mode. 50-100 will put you in HH mode. One of my 450s has gain settings of 32 (rate) 67 (HH), the other 450 is 0 (rate) 72 (HH). I don't really know where I ended up with 0 gain on the one 450. I was probably fiddling around and for some reason set it to zero. I always fly in HH mode so I probably didn't notice the low gain setting for rate bacause of that.

Have you figured out how to use the flap/gyro switch to change between rate and HH? I'm thinking that you probably have that part figured out but, though I ought to check. The only dumb question is the one I don't ask.

Ask away with more questions. Hopefully the above helps.

Curt

kaymm2 wrote:

For my DX6i settings for gyro what should I put? Is 50%, 70% good? So when the switch is at 0, it's 50%, and 1 will be 70%. Come to think of it, i really don't know what these numbers mean. What if I put 20/90? I just thought that 50 will make it go rate mode and 70 puts it in HH.

I guess I'm trying to ask how do people come up with gain settings in the gyro menu of their TX. All I know is that when my switch is at 0 (50%) it's in rate mode and 1 (70%) it's in HH. But what happens when I put 0=10%? Does dropping that number affect the heli? Do you mean the gain setting from the gyro itself?

I figured out the flap switch. When I put it in 0 position, the tail kinda wanders and when I put it at 1 position, it sticks and holds the tail. But what if I made position 1=100%? Will the tail be harder to move?

I'm going to try and explain the difference between rate mode and hh mode. Then take a crack at explaining how to fine tune your gain settings in each mode.

Rate mode: The gyro will correct the tail position as long as you give input on the stick.

Heading Hold mode: The gyro will correct tail position until the gyro senses that the tail is in the position that you last corrected the tail position to.

Adjusting gain in HH mode: This is how I adjust the gain numeric value in heading hold mode. I will start with the gain set to 60. Then I will hover and observe the tail of the heli. If it seems to be wandering, (not locked in position, slow wag) I'll start increasing the gain value, in maybe 2 value increments. You may have to adjust the number several times by small increments. The tail should at some point lock in position and stay where you leave it, so if wind effects the tail for example the gyro should correct the tail position to where you last adjusted the tail to.

If in the course of adusting the gain value, for heading hold, you start to see the tail wag back and forth at a fairly rapid rate you are probably too high in your gain adustment value which has caused the tail to be overly sensative to changes in it's position. You want to start reducing the gain in small increments, maybe .5, until the fast wag is gone and the tail feels locked in.

This is hard to describe and I'm still trying to get better at recognizing slow wag (gain too low) versus fast wag (gain too high).

I hope this helps your understanding, of my understanding, of adjusting the HH gain value, and it didn't just muddy the water more.

Please let me know if this helps and if I am answering the correct question.

(You have to take into account I'm still learning a lot of this myself! I'm hoping I keep you at this level instead of this level .)

My next question to you is do you have your gyro connections on your heli hooked up for remote gain adjustiment? There should be three connections to your gyro. #1 goes from the gyro to the tail servo. #2 goes from the gyro to your rudder chanel on your receiver. #3 goes from the gyro to the receiver chanel that is controlled by your gain adustment above.

If you don't have the remote gain adjustment wire hooked up, from your gyro to your receiver, you will have to adjust the gain using an adjustment on the gyro itself. Hover, land, adjust, hover, land, adjust, hover, land, adjust, anyway I think you get the picture. Also if you don't have the gyro remote gain wire connected you won't be able to switch between rate mode and HH mode from the transmitter. (Keep in mind that once you get HH setup you will probably always fly in HH mode, you would only switch to rate mode to check your tail servo boom position is correct)

Wow, I type a lot sometimes!

Hope this helps.

kaymm2 wrote:

I guess I'm trying to ask how do people come up with gain settings in the gyro menu of their TX. All I know is that when my switch is at 0 (50%) it's in rate mode and 1 (70%) it's in HH. But what happens when I put 0=10%? Does dropping that number affect the heli? Do you mean the gain setting from the gyro itself?

I figured out the flap switch. When I put it in 0 position, the tail kinda wanders and when I put it at 1 position, it sticks and holds the tail. But what if I made position 1=100%? Will the tail be harder to move?

Maybe this will help also:

http://www.heliproz.com/images/wangtelebee.html

I have it hooked up like you describe. 2 cables go to the RX and one to the servo.

Basically on the gyro itself, if I have remote adjustment cable attached does that mean whatever gain setting I have on the gyro is ignored? The little dial thing on the gyro, what should I set it to? 0? Also is this dial for rate or HH?

For setting up the tail in rate mode, what should I set position 0 to in the TX?

I'm a bit fuzzy on where I should change the gain, on TX or gyro itself?

Thanks Curt!

I'm not sure what you should have the pot on the gyro itself set for if you are using the DX6i to adjust the gyro gain. On some brands of gyro with the pots I remeber Nuttz saying that he leaves the gain pot adjusted all the way posative. I'm not sure if the remote gain ingnores the pot setting or how that works.

Starting out in Rate mode, (0) on the switch, you should start with a setting around 30.

This should allow you to hover enough to physically adjust the tail servo position on the boom for a solid hover with you having to use very little rudder input.

I hope this doesn't confuse you but, I'll give it a try. You can have either of the positions 0 or 1 of the flap/gyro switch on the DX6i setup for either rate or HH, it just depends on how much gain you have setup on the DX6i for each of the switch positions. A gain setting, in either switch position, less than 50 will have the gyro in rate mode. A gain setting, in either switch position, above a gain of 50 on the DX6i will result in the gyro operating in HH mode.

Let me know if this makes sense or if I can explain it a different way so it clicks for you. No problem!

I get that 0-50 puts it in rate and above 50 puts it in HH.

It's been raining a lot lately and I haven't had a chance to take my heli out to fix my tail problems. I can't wait to finally lift off and hover the thing.

Thanks again.

Hey guys, I have a Hobbymate HB2835-H 3800KV motor. what pinion should I use? 12T? I'm just gonna start hovering and some light flying so I don't need a super fast head.

Hi, it was sunny today so I got a chance ot work on my tail.

I did what was suggested, center servo arm in rate mode. I moved the servo back more on the boom and the heli was not going right or left. However now, there isn't much travel on right rudder before it bottoms out and binds. Lots of travel for left rudder. basically every limited travel to right now.

What am I doing wrong? Thanks guys.

ok, heres what I do and have never had a problem with my Telebee's, first I unplug the gyro and plug the servo directly into the Rx where the gyro would normally plug into, then I make sure the servo operates in the right direction and Thats when I make sure my servo horn is centered.

Then I adjust the servo up or down the boom until the tail pitch slider is in the middles of the tail blade shaft.

Then I unplug the servo and plug the gyro back in, then plug the servo into the gyro. I always leave the yellow wire uplugged and that means the gyro will always be in HH mode. You'll never use rate mode so setting the heli up for that is kinda pointless.

But after that I get everything turned on and start testing, first I check to make sure nothing is binding or bottoming out then I make sure the gyro isn't reversed. Then I take off and see if the gain needs to be adjusted to keep the tail from wagging, when the yellow wire is unplugged the servo limiting and gain must be adjusted on the gyro.

After all that is when I make adjustments to the postition of the tail servo on the tail boom.

I actually always set all my gyros up that way, used the same process with these gyros ,Telebee, ESky HH, GY401, GY502, GY520. but only the Telebbe I leave the yellow wire unplugged, the rest need it plugged in

Nuttcaze, I'll use your suggestions next time for setting up my tail. thanks!

Earlier on this thread I mentioned how my swash mix for pitch was like at 125%. i just found out why. In my pitch curve I had it at 80% for full throttle. hehe. so when point 5 on my pitch curve to be 100% I was able to bring the swash mix on pitch down to something like 80% and still have about 10 degrees of pitch.