Why do I bother... ( Micros )

[Grumpy]

I'm trying not to get dragged down the endless upgrade path with my 180 because I know it's a money pit to go there. The crash after the dog incident (on the maiden flight!) cost me £85 in bits which is more than i paid for the complete heli!

Obviously I can't blame the crash on the heli, and in a way i was lucky because it would have been a lot worse if i'd been flying a big one. Still for what's supposed to be a low cost practice heli £80 is hardly cheap, it would probably be cheaper to crash a Trex 450.

[PeteStewardson]

I'm trying not to get dragged down the endless upgrade path with my 180 because I know it's a money pit to go there. The crash after the dog incident (on the maiden flight!) cost me £85 in bits which is more than i paid for the complete heli!

Obviously I can't blame the crash on the heli, and in a way i was lucky because it would have been a lot worse if i'd been flying a big one. Still for what's supposed to be a low cost practice heli £80 is hardly cheap, it would probably be cheaper to crash a Trex 450.

i've put my Oxy3 in hard 3 times, and I doubt all three crashes have come to more than £80 in total. I just need a small practice heli for the space I have.

[Peteski]

I'm trying not to get dragged down the endless upgrade path with my 180 because I know it's a money pit to go there. The crash after the dog incident (on the maiden flight!) cost me £85 in bits which is more than i paid for the complete heli!

Obviously I can't blame the crash on the heli, and in a way i was lucky because it would have been a lot worse if i'd been flying a big one. Still for what's supposed to be a low cost practice heli £80 is hardly cheap, it would probably be cheaper to crash a Trex 450.

Ouch! That must have been a fair bit of damage then. I do agree on not pouring too much into upgrades on the 180. The servo saver mod is a must (zero cost if you go DIY or just a few quid for the Lynx arms) and the Lynx slipper clutch TT is about £13. Doesn't really need anything else out of the box. I did bite the bullet with the Lynx tail upgrades, but they're not really essential.

[Grumpy]

The parts list was:

• Canopy
• Main gear
• Blades
• Feathering shaft
• Grip control links
• Anti rotation bracket
• Gear set x 2
• Tail bell crank
• Tail pushrod
• Landing gear

To be fair I got a spare set of blades and an extra gear set, plus a programming cable that i didnt strictly need for the repairs, so the true crash cost was about £70.

[PeteStewardson]

Still a lot of cash for one crash on a 180cfx. That's half the cost of a new one from pretty much anywhere. I need to find some dx6 settings for it that make it fly better, and then I think I'll do the servo upgrades and see how it goes.

[Peteski]

Try aileron/elevator D/R at 85% with 30% or even more expo. Rudder whatever speed you prefer, I use D/R 90% and 20% expo. I know it's all personal preference but I find those settings pretty natural. It's a quick responding heli so I don't think it needs 100% cyclic rates. All my servo travels are at 100% except for pitch at 100%/85% to get equal pitch at both ends. I also have a very slight S shaped pitch curve (0,30,50,70,100) just to calm the collective a little around mid stick, but I don't think that makes much difference. I may go back to linear pitch to match all my other helis. Gyro I have set to 80%, but it's very dependent on your individual heli and I'm running the Lynx pushrod/bellcrank which has a slightly different ratio. Basically run it as high as you can get away with.

What flight mode were you in when you flipped it inverted? I ask because if it was in normal mode with stock settings you risk losing power with the 0,25,25,25,25 gov setup. Maybe that's what you experienced rather than lack of negative collective? I got rid of the zero point, but I find it needs to be in IU1 or IU2 to flip comfortably without bogging anyway. But the head seems solid enough to me going between pos and neg collective. The only quirk is that it can be prone to falling suddenly in its own downwash, especially with the stock blades. But it's easy enough to catch if you are sharp enough.

[PeteStewardson]

So it turns out the standard pitch curve in the DX6 file you download off the HH website has almost no negative pitch in normal mode. I always fly with a flat throttle curve and even pitch in all modes so fly in 'normal' mode a fair bit. Never thought to check the pitch curve

Anyway sorted that and turned down the cyclic gain and got it flying a lot better. Then managed to bump it down on landing at more than a feather touch and stripped a servo gear. Looks like I need those new decent servos after all.

[fatboyrob]

you dont need different servos m8 just servo savers i have crashed loads and never stripped any gears since i put them on

[hedge]

Pete no need to buy anything, Google 180cfx servo saver mod and "180 cfx torque tube mod v2" I've crashed loads, like you my first was > 50! However I am still on original servo gears and TT. 180 is a mighty micro but does not have crash ability like a 130 or Mcpx

[PeteStewardson]

Pete no need to buy anything, Google 180cfx servo saver mod and "180 cfx torque tube mod v2" I've crashed loads, like you my first was > 50! However I am still on original servo gears and TT. 180 is a mighty micro but does not have crash ability like a 130 or Mcpx

Yeah I did those to my previous 180cfx. Just thinking of having something more robust this time Plus time is at a premium for me. I will likely do the servo saver mod myself as a stop gap.

My main gripe is always the way the 180 flys, compared to my old trusty 130x ( which everyone moans about but I got a good one in the end and it flew fantastically ) the 180 is a dissapointment. However I turned down the cyclic response yesterday and it was better, I think if I turn it down slightly more, or just play more with DR/Expo I can get it much closer.

[Peteski]

All you need on the servos is a set of these saver arms BEFORE you strip the gears!

https://www.lynxheli.com/product_inf...ducts_id=23947

You can DIY a set yourself, but they might not work or slip too easily. The Lynx ones just work.

Also after you break the stock TT (which won't be long) just fit one of these and that's the tail sorted too.

https://www.lynxheli.com/product_inf...ducts_id=25037

Again you can DIY it if you can be bothered, but I don't see the point in modding a stock TT with the exploding plastic end splines.

[Peteski]

Yeah I did those to my previous 180cfx. Just thinking of having something more robust this time Plus time is at a premium for me. I will likely do the servo saver mod myself as a stop gap.

My main gripe is always the way the 180 flys, compared to my old trusty 130x ( which everyone moans about but I got a good one in the end and it flew fantastically ) the 180 is a dissapointment. However I turned down the cyclic response yesterday and it was better, I think if I turn it down slightly more, or just play more with DR/Expo I can get it much closer.

What was the issue with your cyclic gain? Was the head bobbling or bouncing or something? Mine has always been good out of the box, just needed the rates slowing down to something more sensible.

[Grumpy]

Yeah, the gain on mine seems fine too. All I did was tame down the cyclic travel and increase the end points on collective travel. It flies fine now though it's been windy ever since I've got it so flying opportunities have been limited.

[PeteStewardson]

What was the issue with your cyclic gain? Was the head bobbling or bouncing or something? Mine has always been good out of the box, just needed the rates slowing down to something more sensible.

Nothing wrong with the gain, I just lowered the cyclic response setting in the advanced menus to tame it down. I never bothered with my last 180 but thought I'd play this time to see what effect it had, made flying much nicer although I only hovered it about.

[Peteski]

Nothing wrong with the gain, I just lowered the cyclic response setting in the advanced menus to tame it down. I never bothered with my last 180 but thought I'd play this time to see what effect it had, made flying much nicer although I only hovered it about.

I'd have thought you'd be better off doing that with D/R and Expo then or at least tuning those parameters first. You might find that lowering the cyclic gain causes problems when you start flying it around i.e. not holding its attitude well during harder moves or in wind etc. The factory head gain settings have always been fine for me and the head actually feels quite nice to me. The tail is not quite as good, for example piro stops are not the sharpest, but it hangs in there pretty when it's being thrown around and loaded up. Only weakness I've noticed recently is poor tail hold in backward loops, so I might play with the gyro settings some more - I think my gain might be a little too low.