Align 3G Maiden flight

[robgt]

Ian Contessa took his Trex700 to Midland Helicopters today and fitted an Align 3G flbarless unit and head conversion to it.

Quick setup done, they took it outside and gave it a test hover.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSE_pZOEasE"]YouTube- Maiden Flight of T-Rex 700 FBL[/ame]

Looks very much plug and play to me!
I can't wait to get my 600 converted now
Cheers,
Rob

[Geek]

I take it they came in the country today then
I still want one

[Stuart]

Looks good - any reason why his tail has about a 5 degree's offset ? - or is my eyes....

[robgt]

The main shipment has not yet arrived, this was a sample unit I believe.

I spotted that too Stuart - I think he was royally ribbed for it, of course
LOL
Cheers,
Rob

[jamiem]

Tailbos is definatley twisted a little!

Looks very easy to setup if thats how quickly it was installed and test flown! I can see me trying FBL this year....

[Grant85]

It looks to be really stable but if I was trying out something new for the first time it certainly wouldn't be out on a road

[Stuart]

The main shipment has not yet arrived, this was a sample unit I believe.

I spotted that too Stuart - I think he was royally ribbed for it, of course
LOL
Cheers,
Rob

Thought he'd discovered some new trick to keeping a tail fixed into a position - lol

The wonders of science.....

[robgt]

Not a road so much as the end of a trading estate Grant
Quite safe there.
Cheers,
Rob

[Grant85]

Not a road so much as the end of a trading estate Grant
Quite safe there.
Cheers,
Rob

Just didn't want to think the heli could get damaged that's all LOL!

[coolice]

Hey guys.

Lol, I wondered how long it would be until my off bonk tail was spotted ;-)
I'm constantly getting stick for it, but as it's never impacted flight performance I've not fixed it. Will do now though.

Location wise it wasn't ideal for a maiden of a new setup but we were all keen to see it fly, infact it showed how good the setup is as the wind was gusty and turbulant bouncing off the buildings.

Ok, now to the important stuff of how it felt.
In a word very good, collective is obviously very positive at +-14 degrees, but with 60% dual rate and 16% expo in normal mode the cyclics felt well balanced.
The preset gain pots on the control unit did not need adjusting to stop and cyclic hunting, I am planning to up these little by little until I provoke a wobble then back them off. This coming weekend I'm planning to get in a lot more flights, starting off slow and building up to pushing the model hard as I was with it flybarred.

The initial lift off from the hard tarmac did show the need for skid rubbers, which is mentioned in the manual. The main control unit does have separate power sections meaning my Fromeco Arizona provides 6 volts to the main servos and the rudder and gyro gain channels pass on their provided voltage to the tail servo. The means you don't have to run online drop downs if you are flying a dual output regulator.

As with anything new you get very apprehensive on the first flight as to how it's going to pan out, but first impressions are very good. The rotor head area looks so much cleaner now, the main head block is marginally shorter to with the space for a flybar no longer needed.

Roll on the weekend now :-) I shall keep you posted on how I get on and what I find.

Ian

[Kwickkwack]

Looked good and hope all goes well this weekend
Was the guy on the phone trying to call the fire brigade, it certainly smoked the area fairly quickly

[Jamin_00]

Hey Ian, long time mate

Looked real good and I must admit to still expecting you to go all 3D on us with it lol.

I too would not like to test something over concrete

Bad enough over a field lol

[darryl]

my tail has that cant down to. I just assumed that was the way it was meant to be as my tail is locked solid.

How would I go about fixing that as everything is located as its supposed to be!?

Could this be a problem with LE booms?

Sorry to hijack your thread, the fbl system looks the dogs, enjoy!

[moonmanflyer]

Tailbos is definatley twisted a little!

Looks very easy to setup if thats how quickly it was installed and test flown! I can see me trying FBL this year....

On your electric 700.....lol

[Lynx.1677]

Wow. That sounds easy to setup and looks pretty stable to me. Can't wait to get my 500 fbl system now!

I bet the boys at Mikado are pooping themselves now?