lets talk Dampers!!!!

[Nick B]

Would orange kbdd be ok in a fbl 550?

Noticed abit of movement in mine with the black dampers.

[paulsouthport]

I don't have a 550, but use them in my 600 and they are much better than the Stock Align jobbies. 550 has same head as 600?

[paulsouthport]

Also, FBL definately responds better to the harder material

[Nick B]

Yeah,same size...will try them...got some green ones too.

[Cagey]

At last, back on topic. Mind you it was getting interesting for a while back along. Nevertheless, I was informed by FLs a while ago that basically, soft dampening devices were for soft flying and hard were for hard flying, simple ? Or not ? The thing is, I wonder if you'd get a not too disimilar effect by dialing in more or less expo ? Am I missing something fellas ? Cheers.

[Steve]

No, expo won't do it alone.

Softer dampers allow the feathering shaft to move more in the head block so the head can respond to gusts of wind etc without the heli itself moving so much - hence why the F3Cers like them. But it's a double-edged sword - the extra movement also allows the blade grips to swing further during rapid changes of direction which is why boom strikes etc have been mentioned.

If you're looking to change direction quickly (i.e. 3D) then it's hard dampers you need. If you're looking to stay put, then it's soft ones.

[paulsouthport]

With FBL heads, a soft dampener will momentarily dampen the reaction from a servo input, meaning the FBL unit may over compensate. When the head finally catches up it may move to a more extreme position. At least, thats my logic for it. The proof for me was, sloppy dampeners with FBL made the heli unpleasant to fly, scarey at times. Hard dampeners gave me a grin. Expo wouldn't work in that situation because it only affects your stick inputs, not the FBL inputs.

[Cagey]

Got that, thanks Paul, Steve.

[Steve]

I must admit, I'm actually quite nervous of maidening my new heli because the dampers are so much softer than I've ever known before. Time will tell I guess.

[cjcj1949]

As someone will point out I don't have flybarless and have no experience of them but, from what I remember of control theory, which isn't much, the rubber things will form part of the overall control loop and a value or range of values will be designed in. It should be possible to setup the controller for a range of hardness values or a figure should be given in the spec for the controller. As flybarless is used for 3D it would probably be pointless to use softer rubber.

This thread has been very useful though. It sounds as though soft would be good for beginners. Especially if it can convert a 450 into a partially self correcting heli. Perhaps even useful for A test use?

[electricsceadu]

just a quick one on fbl dampers
not all fbl units like hard dampers
the sk360 in my sceadu nodded very badly with hard dampers in it, but with the stock dampers ones it works very well
when the sceadu was flown without a fbl unit the hard dampers worked well
my freya fbl with sk360 works well with the std dampers (i've never tried it with hard ones in it)

[Steve]

I must admit, I'm actually quite nervous of maidening my new heli because the dampers are so much softer than I've ever known before. Time will tell I guess.

Been there, done it. Maiden flights (x2) this afternoon.

Flew lurvely.