Progress :D

[Aeris]

I received my TRex450SCF about three weeks ago and thanks to all the helpful information and people here I have had my third proper flight this evening

It was a little windy and I broke my training UC before flying (what a difference getting rid of that makes!) but I managed to keep it in the right place more or less

Special thanks to fatmantom and made2fade in the chat room for helping with pitch/throttle settings, gyro sense and general help

I seem to be getting a good 8 minutes out of my Align 3s 2200 LiPo and I am now at the stage where I need some more batteries as having to wait an hour for a charge just isn't good enough

[Smoothound]

Be careful, 8 mins sounds a long time on 3 cells

[cambs flyer]

Good on ya bud' that's excellent news, Plus you have the satisfaction knowing she was built by yourself, and now shes doing what she was built for.

How did you find the instructions and general build, was it fairly straight forward, or a little puzzling at times?

[fatmantom]

glad your getting somewhere with it aeris....

i wasnt much help i'll be honest but i think we managed to get the answers eventually! lol

good luck with it and have fun mate,

[Aeris]

I would say a little puzzling in places, here are a couple of things that got me:

The instructions tell you to set the servos neutral at the lowest throttle stick position but accepted wisdom says they should be neutral with the stick in mid position.

The manual says to set the tail rotor pitch neutral at servo mid position whereas the gyro manual (and other people) says it should have some pitch dialled in to compensate for the torque produced when hovering.

The other bit I made a mistake on were the threaded rods for the top and middle pitch rods, I got them mixed up and had to go back and swap them around.

My biggest mistake was setting the gyro sense wrong, the first flight consisted of pirouettes >_< What I had done was have the tail servo mounted so the rudder channel needed reversing to operate in the right sense conventionally - the gyro (CSM SL310) didn't seem to be able to deal with this and whatever else I did it would still sense the wrong way. The cure was to just mount the servo on the other side of the boom and its okay now

The kit is 85% pre assembled so it only took about three evenings to get something helicopter shaped built, but I decided to go back and put some CA on the self-tapping screws. I also checked the rotor head and tail rotor to make sure they had CA and thread lock in the right places.

I found installing the servos was quite fiddly but after you've done it once its not so bad. Same with setting the pitch, I had to google on how to use a pitch gauge but now I have done it once I feel okay about it.

What should I set my flight timer to for these batteries if 8 minutes is a bit long?

[heliward0]

5-6 i say..genral hovering that is

[fatmantom]

5-6 minutes...is about right i think...(thats what i do)

[fatmantom]

wooow thats scary...

[Aeris]

Ah okay, I will set my timer for 6 minutes in future Thanks again!

[heliward0]

wooow thats scary...

great mind think alike eh tom!

[fatmantom]

yeah some slightly quicker than others!!!

[Made2Fade]

Well done Nick... glad you got everything sorted mate. Sounds like you been having fun too. Keep with it and ya know where we all are if you have any questions. Your right about that training gear, feels great taking it off but be careful because just when you think you've cracked it the inevitable can happen. Id put them back on if you can and take your time. Will be cheaper in the long run. Good luck with it all mate, its a great hobby your gonna love it.
Cheers
Lee

[Aeris]

I only took them off because I broke the central bit >_< I'll have to find another one. I didn't even break it flying either!

[Aeris]

I am up to about eight flights now, I kept the training UC off so far as it really does help the handling. I had my first crash, into a small bush, nice soft landing and the only damage was the boom being moved inwards a bit -I think I came off lightly there

I notice that I am having to ride the throttle a lot to keep a stable height and doing any manoeuvres seems to bleed a lot off (this is just trying to get my hover penned into something respectable ) Is that normal or should I do something with the throttle/pitch curves?

Hopefully I will get Phoenix next week then I can start learning nose-in

[Made2Fade]

increase your throttle curves so you have more throttle throughout the range. What are they currently set at Nicky?
Lee