neuron eznov

[kev bell]

Anybody looking at and tempted by these new units

Neuron Module

Just seen them for sale on Fastlad good price and a possible alternative to a Spirit unit

[Peteski]

Looks good on paper, great price. But not really proven yet like Spirit.

[Grumpy]

The guy behind the Neuron i understand was the developer of the 'Brain' FBL controller. They look really good and the reports I've seen so far are very positive. I'm waiting for the larger version that's due in the new year as it's better suited to larger helis.

[hanson]

looks good, anyone know what the 9 axis are? elevator, roll, tail, pitch? that's 4

[Peteski]

looks good, anyone know what the 9 axis are? elevator, roll, tail, pitch? that's 4

It's a 3-axis gyro + 3-axis accelerometer + 3 axis compass

[horneteer]

Just about to pop one in my 180cfx, will let you know how it goes.

[horneteer]

Took me a while to get this heli up to scratch but now done - a custom stretched 180 cfx with a neuron flight controller. The neuron has been decased to fit and I'm generally happy with the way it flies. It is very precise in the air and slightly on the robotic side of neutral. Flight feel is adjustable but you do need to work the sticks when giving it a spanking, even at the flybar end of the scale. Similar to BeastX in that respect.

A few other things to note. The neuron needs careful tuning of the gains on smaller helis. The default are on the high side by all accounts - both on cyclic and tail. It has a decent rescue function but this is sensitive to vibes. The neuron is a small and light weight unit that uses accelerometers for rescue so this is not surprising. The heli needs to be butter smooth or the controller will need a gel base such as Omicron. Otherwise it will fly fine but will tend to roll slightly left during rescue.

Support is a bit lacking but all in all it suits my needs for this heli very well, and it will no doubt improve further with future fw updates. Also great Bluetooth functionality. Takes a while to connect but nice software that is fully functioning and supports firmware flashing over BT.

Recommended with a bit of caution here and there!

[Peteski]

Otherwise it will fly fine but will tend to roll slightly left during rescue.

Can you not adjust the artificial horizon for rescue? With BeastX it recommends to trim the horizon about 5 deg right from true level to counter the natural left drift from the tail thrust. This worked for me, but not sure what you can tune on the Neuron.

How does it compare with the stock Spektrum FBL on the 180 CFX? Is it significantly better?

[atomiccomp]

Can you not adjust the artificial horizon for rescue? With BeastX it recommends to trim the horizon about 5 deg right from true level to counter the natural left drift from the tail thrust. This worked for me, but not sure what you can tune on the Neuron.

How does it compare with the stock Spektrum FBL on the 180 CFX? Is it significantly better?

I've flown one of these Neuron on a trex 550E. Felt very nice smooth and progressive similar to the beast X but not as robotic.
The bale out was a bit hairy as it pulled sharply to the right and you have no control for longer than i'd like.

[horneteer]

Can you not adjust the artificial horizon for rescue? With BeastX it recommends to trim the horizon about 5 deg right from true level to counter the natural left drift from the tail thrust. This worked for me, but not sure what you can tune on the Neuron.

How does it compare with the stock Spektrum FBL on the 180 CFX? Is it significantly better?

Rescue is not adjustable at the moment. It would be easy to implement but perhaps it shouldn't be as any tweaks will be like putting a band aid on a vibe. Works well enough in the Brain/Ikon though. After way too much faffing my 180 is now a lot smoother than most small helis would ordinarily be and it now climbs straight up consistently. The climb is even more consistent than my Spirit Pros on 2 700 helis, which sometimes veer off slightly at 5 degrees or so. I think the accelerometers in the Neuron just need to be more tolerant of vibes with the right noise filters. This is being done now afaik.

It is nicer than the stock AR6335 but the stock unit is more than adequate for an ordinary 180 imo. The performance gain is not worth the hassle and expense of changing over to the Neuron for most owners. Mine is made up of oversized, aftermarket parts and I wanted something with more adjustability than than the stock fbl. Not an ideal testbed but there isn't much other info yet about the Neuron on rcha, and some have asked about it recently.

I've flown one of these Neuron on a trex 550E. Felt very nice smooth and progressive similar to the beast X but not as robotic.
The bale out was a bit hairy as it pulled sharply to the right and you have no control for longer than i'd like.

Probably vibe related. Doesn't take much at certain frequencies. Usually causes a roll to the left though. Does the swash tilt right on the bench? Might want to try reducing the secondary gain that activates rescue to around 50%. This should be done in both directions of travel.

[atomiccomp]

Probably vibe related. Doesn't take much at certain frequencies. Usually causes a roll to the left though. Does the swash tilt right on the bench? Might want to try reducing the secondary gain that activates rescue to around 50%. This should be done in both directions of travel.

I'm not sure as I'm not the owner but I will ask him. I'd say it may of been to the left too. Worth a look as it's an oldish first gen 550.

[Nitro Head]

I tested a Neuron on my 550 primarily for the bail out function and although I was quite impressed with the general flight performance the bail out function was completely random. I posted on Helifreak (as this seems to be the only way to get answers from developer) and was just told this is a vibe problem, very little support.
I spent many hours trying to track down the vibes and the Neuron does not have any vibration monitoring/logging so this was very difficult. When bailout was activated in a stable hover the Heli would veer off (mostly backwards) quite severly sometimes beyond knife edge hence unusable.

Having read good reports on the Spirit and the fact it has full vibration spectrum analyser I decided to give this a try to track down the vibes, however the vibe levels detected by the Spitit were below half of the recommended max value and on testing the bail out found it worked perfectly every time.

So simple answer is if you are considering the Neuron for the bail out, I wouldn't bother.

[Peteski]

Rescue is not adjustable at the moment. It would be easy to implement but perhaps it shouldn't be as any tweaks will be like putting a band aid on a vibe.

I know what you mean, but I think it makes sense to make the artificial horizon adjustable like in the BeastX. Smaller helis lean over more than large ones in a stable hover so you need the ability to fine tune the horizon datum to prevent any unwanted drift. Plus if you had a heli with an anti-clockwise rotating head it would need to counter in the opposite direction. I think because BeastX is designed for both rescue and self-level flight modes they made it more tuneable so you can get a drift free hover with SL activated. I have to say it's quite impressive.

[Peteski]

It is nicer than the stock AR6335 but the stock unit is more than adequate for an ordinary 180 imo. The performance gain is not worth the hassle and expense of changing over to the Neuron for most owners. Mine is made up of oversized, aftermarket parts and I wanted something with more adjustability than than the stock fbl. Not an ideal testbed but there isn't much other info yet about the Neuron on rcha, and some have asked about it recently.

That's good to know. i'm quite happy with my stock 180 CFX, although I did end up upgrading the tail parts to Lynx once the tail got too sloppy for the tail servo to cope with it!