Moving on to finer things(trim adjustment)

Man I just burned thru two batteries with no vibration! Now that I am getting to stay in the air longer I am noticing more. I have to hold roughly 1/4 right stick to keep the tail in at a constant throttle. Moved the tx trim over to the right most of the way. Helped. So now do I try either the gain screw or the proportion screw on the rx so that I don't have to use so much tx trim? Also, is it normal that you lose altitude when you give other commands, so that you have to constantly adjust the throttle? I know this sounds clear as mud, but hope someone understands what I'm asking.

chiefqm wrote:

Man I just burned thru two batteries with no vibration! Now that I am getting to stay in the air longer I am noticing more. I have to hold roughly 1/4 right stick to keep the tail in at a constant throttle. Moved the tx trim over to the right most of the way. Helped. So now do I try either the gain screw or the proportion screw on the rx so that I don't have to use so much tx trim? Also, is it normal that you lose altitude when you give other commands, so that you have to constantly adjust the throttle? I know this sounds clear as mud, but hope someone understands what I'm asking.

Not muddy at all. I basically asked the same question today in another thread. Sounds like you are experiencing the same type of behaviour I was asking about. Maybe it is how the HBFP works? Perhaps all of the throttle input is because there is a fixed pitch to the blades, and the only way to control lift is through headspeed. Then the torque of the throttle variations cause you to have to make other corrections to the bird.

I'm sure someone with answers witll chime in instead of just me with more questions!

Don't feel alone. Curt

OK guys, here's how to adjust the tail. Lift off with your rudder trim at center. Notice which way the NOSE has a tendency to yaw. Let's say the nose wants to yaw left. In other words, looking at the heli from the tail toward the nose the nose yaws left-- or looking down on heli it yaws counterclockwise.
Land heli, UNPLUG batterie. Turn proportion pot to the right--clockwise just a very small amount. Plug in heli and bring to hover again. Repeat this process till you are satisfied. It may take two or three trys.
You are never going to get the HBFP perfect, because it has a motor driven tail. That is why you will see the tail twitch right or left when you change throttle speed, make cyclic changes etc.
Just be sure to unplug the batt before each proportion adjustment.
Yes it is normal to lose or even sometimes gain altitude when making cyclic and rudder inputs. In my opinion, that's one reason the HBFP is such a great trainer.
Chief, I assume removing the balls from the training gear helped quiet the vibrations.

Donnie D

I haven't removed them yet. The parking lot was wet and I wanted as much ground clearance as I could get. Unfortunatly I bounced her pretty hard and popped the pinion end bearing right out of the tail motor can. Oh well I guess I've been lucky, because thats my first real damage.

Oh well, tough luck there. I don't know if you've ever replaced a tail motor or not, but it's an easy fix. Takes maybe 10 minutes. Actually takes longer for the soldering iron to heat up than it does to change the motor. I just changed mine out last night.

Donnie D

Haven't changed one yet, but not to worried about the soldering part. I've pulled it out of its holder and popped the bushing back in and it runs. popped back out though. Super glued it and that lasted about one flight. Now I am trying epoxy. Might work. Nothing ventured nothing gained! I have ordered a new one, but ofcourse I won't get it until next week. The bummer is that I have to go out to Hawaii and visit my sister-in-law next week. Hey, maybe I can bring my helo and practice running into palm trees, might be fun after all! Just kidding. Lived out there about 6 years ago and loved it. Also went to high school there. Sorry getting off the thread. Any way I'm making progress and a lot of that's due to you guys---

Donnie D wrote:

Oh well, tough luck there. I don't know if you've ever replaced a tail motor or not, but it's an easy fix. Takes maybe 10 minutes. Actually takes longer for the soldering iron to heat up than it does to change the motor. I just changed mine out last night.

Donnie D

Not anymore, lol. Blazemob bought this little battery operated soldering iron, uses 2 AA batteries and it heats up instantly, I was laughing at him till I used it, I was really surprised, but the batteries don't last very long.

chiefqm wrote:

Man I just burned thru two batteries with no vibration! Now that I am getting to stay in the air longer I am noticing more. I have to hold roughly 1/4 right stick to keep the tail in at a constant throttle. Moved the tx trim over to the right most of the way. Helped. So now do I try either the gain screw or the proportion screw on the rx so that I don't have to use so much tx trim? Also, is it normal that you lose altitude when you give other commands, so that you have to constantly adjust the throttle? I know this sounds clear as mud, but hope someone understands what I'm asking.

as the battery loses voltage the tail will begin to drift on its own, you can try using the trim adjustments on the Tx to compensate for this a little but it will always happen, yet another bad thing about tail motors.

the losing altitude thing is normal too.

I hope you have your next CP heli picked out because if you're at the hovering stage with the HBFP, its alomst time to move to a CP, it'll ba alot quicker responding but it'll actually be easier to fly because you won't have to chase the tail around, it'll stay right where you put it (provided the heli has a decent HH gyro)

Thanks for the note of confidence, But I think I'll stick with th HB for a while

Practice makes perfect. When I started flying with the E-Sky HBFP, I swtiched to the Super Skids 300 landing gear system. Te heli flying was more stable. Plus the landing gear system doubles as a LIPO Battery holder which allows you to slide the LIPO Battery to find your CG a lot quicker. Needless to say, I used the super skids 300 landing gear system, the super skids titanium tail boom, super grips, and added the X-treme productions metal rotor head and the heli flys reall well for a 4-channel FP and it looks awesome.

Below is a pic - Click on image or goto my website for a video:

RTF-HELI,

That is a great looking bird. We have similar upgrades that we have done. I don't have the nice tailboom, still stock. I have added the CNC swashplate, it seemed to make a difference in control.

I haven't flown mine with the canopy on it yet! Since adding the Super Skids the canopy didn't seem to fit and I haven't bothered to modify the canopy yet. Did you have to make some cutouts on the canopy to make it fit with the Super Skids?

Curt

You have to modify the canopy a little bit. You will need a hole puncher and a little swiss knife. Goto: http://www.rtf-heli.com/DF4ANDESKYFPCanopyinstallation.html for a short tutorial on how to do this.

I'll head on over and check it out! I guess I should make it look more like a heli than an egg-beater, or (whop-ity-whop is what my wife calls it).

Thanks, Curt