Piloting Skills for L platers

[AnthD]

Nice AR vid !

the Goblins look so responsive and quick ! .. Great looking too .

[Peteski]

Also .. Peteski ,

i cant remember if you had the Phoenix V5 sim , but if you did cool challange for you , Map ; Stockholm Bridge - you can fly under the bridge and back over the top , great training routine !
And if you get really cheeky you can make it over the top and under the way back !
Regards
Anth

Thanks, but I'm using neXT which is a bit limited on the scenery options. Sounds fun!

[Peteski]

PS. Is anyone using a Blade 500/700x? Why they like compared to the T-Rex ?

I asked that very question in my local shop last week (he stocks both). While the Blades were on discount, once you add in the cost of a decent ESC etc there wasn't that much in it on price. His advice was to go with Align for the long haul. Better motors apparently and better build quality. He said the Blades fly well enough though and would be a bit cheaper to get in the air if budget was tight.

[james_2k]

Nice AR vid !

the Goblins look so responsive and quick ! .. Great looking too .

Just so you know, my recent crash with my 570 has cost almost £600 to repair. Think about that.

[Dan22]

I asked that very question in my local shop last week (he stocks both). While the Blades were on discount, once you add in the cost of a decent ESC etc there wasn't that much in it on price. His advice was to go with Align for the long haul. Better motors apparently and better build quality. He said the Blades fly well enough though and would be a bit cheaper to get in the air if budget was tight.

I have both the Align 550 DFC V3 and Blade 550x, to be honest there isn't much between them. there are parts of the Blade which are better than Align and vice versa.
But like you say, the Align has the longevity from a parts supply point of view.
Blade 550x parts are still plentiful and there are bargins to be had.
I was pleasantly surprised with how the Blade 550x fly's, both helis are using the Vortex VX1e. I have converted my Align DFC to the FL head for a smoother feel, hence why the feel similar.
The Blade has more power, even using the stock pinion but flight times suffer.

If i had to sell one it would be the Blade, as i have had the Trex for over two years now and have become quite attached

Can't really go wrong with either TBH

Dan.

[AnthD]

Thanks for the responses cheers for the comparison Dan .

James your crash cost you £600 for the 570 !!! That's horrific scenes mate .. Isn't that a write off or at least a house insurance job!

could someone just keep me right here please , I'm just working out in my head the electronics for my build when I purchase , I'm still leaning towards a 600L and buy in spares and a few packs going to give myself about a £1200 budget , what I'd like to get more understanding of is where things are plugging in to ..
SO .. I will have x4 servos - X1 Goveror - 2 batt packs - FBL unit - RX unit

now im a little confused with the Satellites and Gov unit ..

could someone please clarify for me the wiring here Servos plug in to FBL unit etc .

also anything I've forgotten .. Thanks in advance


AnthD

[james_2k]

if you buy the 600l super combo, all you need is a transmitter, 1 or two satellites to attach to the gpro and batteries.

not sure if your budget includes a charger but you need one of those too, and some 1.5,2,2.5,3mm hex wrenches / loctite, grease etc

Wiring is: Battery->ESC ->Motor
ESC-> FBL controller -> Sats/Servos

Think you will need an external bec such as the castle bec pro as the esc doesnt have a bec integrated, that goes from the batteries -> fbl unit.

You could also use a smaller 2s lipo instead of a bec, which would connect to the fbl unit, some prefer this. but i dont.

the manual you get will have all the stuff you need to get yourself up and running.

regarding my crash, the whole heli cost almost 2k (with batteries) so rather than build something else, i just rebuilt the goblin as its a great machine - wasn't on house insurance though!

edit: i still find it amazing that this 600l is so much cheaper than the goblin 380!

[Grumpy]

As i mentioned earlier, the 600L super combo comes with everything you need except transmitter, receiver and batteries. Obviously you need tools and a battery charger but they are one off purchases.
Personally I'd recommend powering the servos and receiver from a 2s liPo, it's cheapest, simplest and most reliable solution.. The 600L is made to work that way as the servos are HV so will take a 2s Lipo without regulation. Having said that i use a HV BEC on my Trex 600 and it works fine too. You don't need a 'governor'.. the governor is built into the ESC and/or FBL unit.

I'd not bother buying spares in advance, just buy them when you need them. Trex spares have excellent availability so you are unlikely to be grounded waiting on parts for any longer than it takes the postman to deliver them.

Wiring is simple. The four servos and ESC plug into the appropriate ports on the FBL unit. The battery or BEC plug into another port (or ports) on the FBL unit. If you use satellite receivers then they have their own special ports on the side of the FBL unit. In a nutshell EVERYTHING plugs into the FBL unit.

[james_2k]

except the motor

[AnthD]

Thanks for this James / Ste !

Ok that's great the combo is the one I will get and will bond with my DX8 , unless I upgrade to the Beast X and not use the slandered Align FBL unit .. ?
Ok sorry about the complete schoolboy here but ; about the RX and Sats - im taking It there doing the same job it's the choice between using a sat? To talk to the tx?
This is what we talked about a while ago with the Lemon Sats Ste , so how many would be needed just the one Sat? Everything else is going in i promis !!! Ha

[tomatwalden]

Essentially, you need two antennas for resilience. Therefore, you need to buy 2 sats if you keep the supplied (Align) FBL unit. If you replace with an AR7200BX you only need a single sat as the FBL unit doubles as the second receiver.

FWIW, in your position, I'd buy two (DSMX) sats and keep a GPro. If you choose a combo with the 3GX, I would consider replacing it with an AR7200BX+1 sat. Simply because I think the 3GX is a very non-intuitive unit to configure. But that's just my humble opinion!

[Grumpy]

The 600L will come with the new G-pro FBL unit which should be just fine. I agree with Tom, I'd not change it.

On small helis you can get away with one receiving antenna but for larger helis you want two antenna to prevent the signal from being blocked by the large solid heli frame. You can use two satellites to give you that dual antenna diversity. they should be located on different places on the heli so you always have line of sight from the Tx to at least one of them.

You can use genuine Spektrum DSMX satellites or one of the 'Spektrum compatibles'. My experience is the Lemon Rx compatible DSMX receivers are just as good if not a little better than the original ones but are much cheaper.

PS.. You might see that each satellite has two antenna 'whiskers' sticking out either side. People get confused into thinking that this means each satellite has two antenna, but thats not the case. The two 'whiskers' are actually the two ends of a single antenna. The antenna is connected to the receiver in the middle rather than at the end but it functions as a single antenna, this type of antenna is called a 'dipole'.

[AnthD]

Tom/Ste ,

thanks for the time and advise guys it makes sense with regards the Sats .. So I'll keep the Align FBL GPro unit .. In to that plugs basicly everything (apart from the motor obvisly as stated!) and the x2 Sats can go either side of the heli frame for optimal RX/TX .

my final question is how much voltage is the FBL unit and Servos requiring I know Ste you mentioned they don't need a regulator so that's just taking straight from the Lipos 12S so is the lipo just connection going to the FBL Unit to suppy power to the servos and the motor plugs in stright to the lipo ?


Thanks again
AnthD

[james_2k]

definitely do not connect your 12s batteries to the fbl or servos.

you have two options, run a 2s lipo direct to the fbl. or run a bec, which i prefer due to not having to recharge or worry about the extra battery, and having selectable constant voltage. but some prefer the other way.

i run my servos at 8v. works very well.

esc->motor
and
esc->fbl->servos
and

2s Lipo OR bec -> fbl

the manual will have all this info too

[tomatwalden]

There are two basic setups for helis - "normal" - which is about 5 or 6v and "High Voltage (HV)" which is about 7.5v.

You need to check what the components are rated for. Normal servos will not take 7.4v - only HV servos will. Equally, not all FBL units can, although I'm fairly sure the GPro is HV capable.

No. The motor does not plug straight into the LIPO! The motor plugs into the ESC. The ESC plugs into the LIPO and the FBL unit.

Like this .. http://www.rcuniverse.com/magazine/reviews/976/BEC1.gif