Getting More Comfortable with Rolls

April 16, 2009 on 7:53 pm | In 3D, Flying | No Comments

I’m pretty confident in doing rolls now. They’re still a bit sloppy, but I think I need to increase my pitch/aileron swash mix a bit, and I’d like to upgrade the motor. When flying the Trex 450 in the RealFlight simulator, my rolls are all really clean and tight, and I think it’s because the sim uses the 450XL 3550 Kv motor, while my actual helicopter uses the 450L 3150 Kv. I think I also just have more confidence in the sim since if I crash, it doesn’t cost me anything.

Another modification that I’ve made that may tighten up my rolls that I’ve yet to test is in reprogramming my Align RCE BL35G ESC. This ESC came with my 450SA kit, but I never found any instructions on how to program it until recently. It is the newer “G” model, and unlike the older ESC versions, has 5 programming options. I realized that my 5th option which controls the throttle response speed was set to “Low” (1 beep), and have since changed it to “High” (3 beeps).

You can find the manual for the Align RCE-BL25G and RCE-BL35G here:
http://www.align.com.tw/html/en/c_rindexe.htm

It’s been really windy here lately so I haven’t taken it up in a while. Here is me doing some rolls from a few weeks ago though (forgive my retarded commentary):

Installed the CopterX Head, Did my First Roll!

March 21, 2009 on 7:19 pm | In 3D, Flying | No Comments

As mentioned in my previous post, I totaled the stock, plastic SA head attempting a roll. In hindsight, there were a lot of problems with my last attempt. I had the flybar weights on, and my swashplate settings weren’t set right. My pitch was also set up improperly, and when I went inverted, I didn’t have enough power to pull me through the roll.

Instead of trying to rebuild the plastic head, I ordered the CopterX head from ebay for $40 shipped, and it’s beautiful. No vibrations and very stable flight. I really can’t see any difference between this and the Align head that costs 3x as much. Hopefully my next crash won’t be as bad since I now have a metal head, but if I ever total it again, $40 isn’t too bad for a quick fix.

Today I tried the roll again, this time with the aforementioned adjustments, and I pulled it off! It wasn’t pretty and I was nervous, but I did it. My wife only got the first one on tape, the second one looked a little better, and hopefully tomorrow I can give it a few more shots. It really is a lot like the Realflight simulator so in the mean time I’ll keep practicing on my computer.