Why do I bother... ( Micros )

[PeteStewardson]

OK so I've had a change of jobs which means I only have a really small area available to fly in during lunch. So as my Oxy3 is too big for the spot I bought myself another 180cfx... Big mistake.

First outing today, was really difficult to fly, the usual skitting about all over the place. Turned rates etc down to get something nearly flying, then flipped inverted to find almost no negative pitch, must be so much flex and give in everything that in flight it has less -ve than +ve pitch. Looked fine on the ground pre-flight, and eyeballed similar pitch. Great... grrrr

Flip back upright and go to fly back to myself and the tail lets go. Get her down on the ground looking fine and discover the TT has let go in flight. I even took this out to check it pre maiden.

Why do I bother?!?!? I should have known it'd be virtually unflyable, and then 2 issues out of the box. My first 180cfx a year or so ago had a servo give up in flight, now the TT ( which is not uncommon ) on my second go at owning one.

[Grumpy]

I've gone on record as a micro hater but a few weeks back I got a deal on a new 180CFX that I couldn't turn down. Other than a crash caused by a dog jumping up and knocking the T out of my hands the little 180 has actually been somewhat of a revelation for me. It flies pretty good and so far has proved reliable. Based on my experience your negative pitch issue is probably down to setup. I found zero pitch wasn't set properly and that I had to bump my endpoints to 110% to get enough pitch range.

[PeteStewardson]

Sadly I checked 0 pitch and it was spot on on the bench It also looked to have the same +ve and -ve pitch on the bench. No idea what was up there, but I'm more annoyed at the TT letting go on the first flight.

I'll replace it ( I do have spares ) and try again anyway.

[bill rob]

Shame that,I had a few teething probs with mine but its been all good for a year,touch wood.

[PeteStewardson]

Will have to see whats going on with pitch once I have the new TT in. Just so annoying these things are always a pain out of the box.

[bill rob]

Will have to see whats going on with pitch once I have the new TT in. Just so annoying these things are always a pain out of the box.

Might be wise to do the slipper clutch mod,takes minutes and saves the gears

[Paz26181]

Oxy 3 is the smallest I'd recommend. Micro running costs are just to high. Get your Oxy smacking around in the small space

[Peteski]

My 180 CFX has been pretty good, not perfect but no complaints. It's at 160 flights now and flies great for a micro. The tail did get quite sloppy after about 100 flights, so I upgraded to Lynx tail grips, pitch slider, bellcrank and tail pushrod and the tail is now rock solid - the best it's ever been. I also did the servo saver mod and slipper TT from new and properly centred all the servos at the same time. I haven't had to adjust the head setup since, it's been spot on. The original tail servo did fail recently (started jittering badly around centre) but a new one has cured that. In short it flies very well and is extremely easy to work on, especially considering it's a micro. It's not in the same league as my OXY 3, but it's much smaller and much cheaper overall. I'm going to get my money's worth out of my 180 CFX over the summer and then I'll probably get an OXY 2 when it eventually comes out. That will no doubt be the ultimate micro. But the 180 is definitely not a bad little heli at all.

[Peteski]

I've gone on record as a micro hater but a few weeks back I got a deal on a new 180CFX that I couldn't turn down. Other than a crash caused by a dog jumping up and knocking the T out of my hands the little 180 has actually been somewhat of a revelation for me. It flies pretty good and so far has proved reliable. Based on my experience your negative pitch issue is probably down to setup. I found zero pitch wasn't set properly and that I had to bump my endpoints to 110% to get enough pitch range.

I thought I'd never live to hear this Grumpy! It's not a bad little micro once setup properly. If you haven't already, I'd get the Lynx servo saver arms and split TT as those take away any hassles after a crash and the stock TT is prone to breaking very easily - although very easy to replace. Stripped servo gears are more of a pain though if you don't fit the saver arms. I've found the rest of the heli to be pretty robust after a couple of quite heavy full power crashes.

[Grumpy]

Too early to declare myself converted as of yet, I've only had a handful of flights, but it certainly flies much better than I expected. It didn't crash very well in the dog attack incident and ended up costing me a lot to fix, including two of those fragile servo gear sets and even a busted mounting tab on a servo case amongst other things. But it was reasonably straightforward to repair. I'll maybe get a set of those arms.

[Peteski]

Sorry to hear that Grumpy, not what you want to start off with a new model!

Definitely get the servo saver arms (you can make your own, but the Lynx ones are well proven). They've saved my servo gears a couple of times now and it's a 2 min job to reset them if they do slip in a crash. The alternative is a metal gear set, but I don't think that's necessary. My stock plastic servo gears have survived 3 full on crashes so far, just the arms slipping as designed. With those and the slipper TT I haven't had any other significant crash damage other than a minor cracked canopy (nothing a bit of CA couldn't fix), stripped main gear and a lost swash to grip link. Oh and I did break the stock TT when I caught the tail once in a bodged landing. But the Lynx slipper TT is very tough and forgiving on the gears. Flying over grass all the time though. I think it might just explode if piled into a hard surface!

I agree about the cyclic servo tabs being fragile. You can get metal replacements, which I may do at some point. I did crack one and it's holding up okay with CA, but I'm sure it won't last forever. I don't want to put too much money into my 180, but so far it's been reasonably cheap to run and I think the Lynx tail was a worthwhile upgrade after the original parts wore out, but I wouldn't do it until necessary. The main head and swash seems to be holding up really well, so don't see much point in upgrading that. But I did add an o-ring kit to get rid of any slop in the ball joints and that did seem to make the cyclic more precise. It's actually quite decent and piros really well for its size. Night and day better than the mCPX or 130X.

[PeteStewardson]

I was hoping to get mine up and running just to keep the practice in during the week. So far it's been a disappointment. I left my spare TT's in my desk at work so can't do anything with it tonight but will fix it up tomorrow night.

[fatboyrob]

there is a belt conversion that makes a difference a few in our club have done it. prob worth a look at

[Mike Sanders]

All this reminds me of my 130 on which I have spent loads of money repairing and upgrading. I don't fly it much now because it is still unreliable.

[Peteski]

All this reminds me of my 130 on which I have spent loads of money repairing and upgrading. I don't fly it much now because it is still unreliable.

Nah, it's nothing like a 130. I have both. The 130 is fiddly to work on, the 180 is very easy and much more reliable.