Trex 700 at Charmouth

[Asid]

I Have flown / owned. Min-Air, Hirobo, Robbe-Schluter, Koyosho, Kalt , Align and others. I believe the longevity tends to suffer with Align. Areas such as bearings, slop, play and premature wear.

Other issues such as the 700 main gear and possibly the 450 pro shaft drive could be problems as a result of pressures of bringing models to the market early. This however leaves some feeling like Beta-testers.

Align has introduced many new addicts into the hobby and helped keep many in it. Align is built to a price. You could argue economies of scale as Align mass produce.

Personally. and it is only my personal opinion. I believe you get what you pay for most of the time. This is the case with Align.

Are they good helis? Yes

Could they be improved? Yes

Would that increase cost? Most definitely.

You pay your money and make your choice

Regards

[moonmanflyer]

I think at the end of the day it comes down to people not likeing the fact that so many people fly align helicopters and they just want something different, so any fault on an align product will be advertised and people keep on about it even if they don't own the helicopter just so they can warrent spending extra on the model they own.. I am not directing what i say at this thread i want to make that clear, i was just speaking in general from what i have been reading around the forum. I also don't think it is fair to comment on how much testing a company does as we don't have figures to back that up.. I would imagine Align do as much as anyone else but as i said before faults are advertised more as more people fly the helicopter.

I think Stu makes a very good point here, the hobby has got bigger and there are alot of people flying aligns, also the use of forums now makes people more aware of these issues, where as before it would not of been so comman knowledge.
I have had my 700 in the first month of release and love the heli, yes i have stripped a gear, the links are a little sloppy and i have had to replace a main bearing block but bar that the heli is superb, still flys perfect and i say has to be the heli that has bought my flying on more than any others i have known.
I woulod never wish for my synergy n9 back, though it flew well was a pain to set up and maintain.
I am in process of putting a Aurora together, and though the kit is a work of art, i know that this heli can also suffer from issues, so it goes without saying that, doesn't matter what the make is, all helis suffer some kind of issues, name one that doesn't

[HiroboFreak]

Is lasting durability the issue people are justifying other companies charging much more for their 90 size models and spares.?

It would fool some i suppose

I am sorry but all these horror reports of Aligns falling to bits after 20 to 40 flights are either pure fantasy or more likely the owners are not competent enough to even own a heli let alone fly it.

The purpose of this thread was not to bash them but to raise awareness hopefully back at Align HQ that something is amiss with the main gear,apart from that i cannot fault mine and my main gear is still OK anyway but an investigation would be nice.

ahhhh yes.

Thanks for that.

One day I hope to learn to fly these machines so I am then qualified to comment from personal experience.
Now if only I could turn back time to 1997 when I flew my first RC Heli, pinpoint where I went wrong in the scheme of things & rectify it, I may have been able to contribute better to this thread.

My humble apologies for my uneducated comments.

[ChrisB]

Again the Align links wearing/breaking were a known problem,also you had "a" clutch go,i see you still fly a 700N.

How long have you had it and is it only one clutch that failed?

How many flights/Gallons on your 700N?

To add,i gave my 700 two of the hardest flights i have ever given it yesterday i threw the book at it and the ys91 has never struggled so much but my main gear is still in one piece.

[HiroboFreak]

Yes only one clutch failed. QuickUK came out with their version right on time.
I wasn't going to put an Align clutch back in if the first one failed that early.
My T700 is a recent kit, not one of the first.

Yes I still fly one, it's called a beater.
Like I said, it flies well, just lacks in durability.

Breakdown? Sure.
Not including 5 engine break-in flights.

After 5 easy flights, dampeners & main gear, canopy holes flogged out. Replaced with standard units & modded for mesh adjustment. Reinforced canopy grommet holes. Lost boom support bolt. Still MIA.
Most of the engine mount bolts had to be extracted with extraction tools. Made of case-hardened cheese I think.
After 20 flights, clutch & another set of dampeners. QuickUK clutch fitted, standard dampeners. Links getting pretty sloppy.
After 25-30 flights, full set of Align balls & links after she started going out of track.
After 40 flights, balls & links sloppy again & getting close to needing dampeners.

& I consider myself to be one of the lucky ones.

So far she's done about 45 flights. Never crashed, & not flown like a grandmother either.

I'll try another set of Align balls & links when she starts going out of track again.
If they wear prematurely again, I'll keep flying with them until she "starbursts" then have some mates around for a few beers & to toast marshmallows over it's burning carcass. :lol:

My old N9, 150 flights & 2 sets of dampeners ($24). NOTHING ELSE! & still kicking butt! You get what you pay for!

I sold my N9 to give the T700 a go. It looked the goods & was cheap as chips! (For crashes at least).

I ordered another N9 kit after a mere 10 flights of the T700.
That's no BS & I'm in no way affiliated with SynergyRC.

I've had my say, & it's my opinion only.

Cheers.

[electricsceadu]

at least we haven't got another stick of align rock
(align rock is very similar to blackpool rock when you cut it in half you will see align printed in the middle)
thanks for being truthful and not giving the usual align owners bs on how fantastic they are, the align brand is just the old skoda/lada of helis (the new skoda's don't count as they are just a rebadged vw)

[ChrisB]

Thanks for the info,it does seem to have been a bit of a bitch

Mine is on flight 60 now,the canopy is splitting around the mounting rubbers also since about flight 20.I did have some issues with the RHS boom support bolts keep working loose but this seems to have cured itself now.

I was horrified with how brittle my links seemed so like many others swapped them for the Quick UK ones which are fine.

I agree with everyone that the screws are too soft especially for a big ship like this,i also have 3 of the engine mount capheads that are rounded off but have left them until it needs an engine removal.

I am concious of the main gear and although mine has some black marking on the teeth it has yet to fail but it may just be a matter of time hence the need to cure this issue.

My dampers have been Ok so far but i have suffered premature failure on earlier Align helis and run the PTFE ones in those now.

My experience of the N9 is very limited but i am well aware that its a very good model,the N5 might always tempt me for a future 50 size. Apart from the 450 Pro i am converting to Mikado as far as electric helis go and with a Beam 50N and an Outrage 50N planned i would never rule them out for Nitro models.

But for 90`s i will stick with the 700N at least for the time being.

[SRH990]

I ordered the MicroHeli mod 1 main gear and pinion from Grand RC which arrived last week, I finally got around to fitting it on Friday. I'm not very impressed with the pinion that's supplied, it looks fine but when I went to screw it into a new clutch bell I'd bought especially, it went in about half way then started to get tight so I took it back out and cleaned up, next attempt it went tight about 90% of the way in and wasn't coming back out again so I had to use some pliers and brute force - not a good idea, ended up with the pinion about 1mm short of fully in with no way to get it back out. When putting the bearings on the other end I had exactly the same problem with the aluminium nut, it looks like the profile of the threads on the pinion is a little off. With no way to go back I fitted the new bell & pinion with the new main gear. The new main gear is chunkier than the original, there's less fresh air in the middle and it's perfectly round, the mesh with the pinion is pretty good too.

Now, I stress this main gear & pinion is the solution to a problem I haven't had yet, I've never stripped a main gear in 120 plus flights but the Microheli gear seems quieter and smoother and it's been fine after some deliberate hard pitch pumping sessions.

The only problem I have now is that I've partially stripped the front tail drive gear that meshes with the auto gear. I think this probably started with a couple of quick stops when the Spartan gyro decel was on 100%, I didn't loose tail drive but you can see where it's skipped the top of a couple of teeth or so, I've got a new auto gear and tail drive gear on order and I'll have a look at the gear mesh with the new ones fitted, if it's a little slack a couple of minutes with a small file should enable the tail gearbox to be moved forward a little to improve things.

I must admit, I was beginning to wonder why so many people seem to have had problems with stripping main gears but a club member who has a new 700 with less than a dozen flights managed to strip a couple of teeth off and he flys with a pretty low headspeed.