Kiev bought tickets to the Singapore Airshow 2008 earlier this week for Simon, Jess, me and himself (of course!). I woke up this morning with some excitement and gave Jess a call at 9:50am only to find that she just rolled out of bed -- Jess was supposed to meet me at 10:20am so she could hitch a ride. So I thought: "What the heck, since she just woke up I shall drop by dear's place for a quick breakfast while waiting for her."

We headed down to Pasir Ris where we were supposed to meet with Simon and Kiev. The initial plan was to park at Pasir Ris and hop on a shuttle to the Airshow. Mid journey, Kiev called and told us the queue was so long it wrapped several rounds around White Sands, and the carpark was full. Indeed when I arrived, the entrance to Whitesands was not passable and we made a u-turn to a bus stop along the main road to pick Kiev and Simon up.

Pic: Check out the queue/crowd man. Owner of photo please leave a comment and I will gladly remove this pic or put up a link for the use of the pic. I wanted it to show the massive queue which I did not manage to snap.

Pic: Jess calling Kiev to meet at bus stop instead of the White Sands taxi stand.

Pic: Arrival of the heros, with a box of yummy donuts!

So we made our way direct to the Airshow instead only to find that the entire narrow coastal road stretch was jammed. By the time we arrived at the road junction to the Airshow venue, the acrobatic display had already started but we saw nothing from the car! The worst part was that nobody could turn into the Airshow unless they had a car decal. There was no information on where or how we could get them, and the traffic police simply ushered us away and we drove a big circle around the costal road and finally decided that we should freaking park at Changi Airport and hitch a cab ride instead.

Pic: Jess making funny faces while we were stuck in the jam along the coastal road.

Pic: What the hell are we doing in Terminal 3 when we're supposed to be at the Airshow.

So we decided to have a bite (lunch, actually) at MacDonalds' before we headed out to the Airshow... in a cab.

Pic: Jess getting squished between two macho guyz. Heh.

It was already 2:00 pm when we (finally!) arrived at the Airshow. What really sucks about this Airshow is that there's only ONE acrobatic display time slot; there used to be many slots in the past.  Tight budget maybe, or rising fuel prices? This prompted a large crowd buildup near 12 noon -- the jam and etc.

Even at 2:00pm (acrobatic show's over!) there was a massive crowd getting through the security metal detectors and we thought that was the worst, and maybe the last ordeal...

Pic: Oh my freakin' gawd, look at that crowd.

After some "patience" in the queue (for about 10 minutes) we finally got through the metal detectors and we were greeted by a larger crowd. At first, we thought these people were gathering around some display item when we later realized they were trying to get to the ACTUAL exhibition area.

A small bridge (probably about two car lanes wide or less) was all there is linking the arrival area and the exhibition area. There were two groups of crowd in opposing flow -- people going IN and coming OUT. The entire bridge was jammed and at a complete standstill. The outbound crowd got diverted had to climb over a metal chain which adversely hindered crowd movement. Policemen were clueless about what they could do to aid the situation and the mayhem continued...

Pic: Crowd getting onto the bridge to get to the other side.

Pic: Bridge completely jammed.

While waiting in the crowd we saw our first display item (albeit unofficially) on it's way to the exhibition on another bridge across where we were standing.

Pic: The new Airbus 380 on its way to the exhibition area

The situation on the bridge wasn't getting any better. We have people yelling, swearing they'll not come to Singapore again, babies crying, and probably even old folks on the verge of passing out. The mass of people, blazing hot sun, humid air and helpless (should I also mention probably brainless) police didn't help at all. I lost my patience and decided to get moving. I got into a nice spot between the crowd of opposing travel direction where I could bash my way through. The other guys followed suit. It wasn't an easy job, but we finally got to the other side (after about 20 minutes). I bet the rest of the crowd who didn't "bash" like we did were stuck in there for another hour. Note the word CROWD, not QUEUE. These are two different things altogether.

Pic: The other side - actual exhibition floor. 

Apart from missing the acrobatic display at noon, the outdoor exhibits wasn't really interesting. We were greeted by SAF vehicles (WTF?). An AH-64 Apache was on display and probably a little more interesting than the rest  of F16s and boring jets.

Pic: AH-64 Apache. Sweetness.

I was a little more interested in the UAVs but not much information was available to learn about them. All we could do is look at them and... guess what's inside maybe.

Pic: Heli UAV... huge. I think it's called Firescout.

Pic: Strato Hawk SRS-42A Reconnaissence and Recovery SIG. Really long wings, and really huge!

Pic: Frikin huge turbine engines from the B-1B

Pic: Look what's written inside! 

Pic: Tyres of the B-1B. That's the amount of stress the tyres get over a few landings. If you were there to touch the tyre, it's not like what it seems here - it's made of very tough rubber. 

Pic: Air intakes of the twin turbine engine on the B-1B.

Pic: Frontal view of the B-1B. Huge stuff for a top speed of mach 1.2! Jess in the foregroud as a reference for height :P

Pic: My part-time job... 

Pic: Under the wings of the Airbus 380. Huge stuff.

Pic: A380 engine closeup.

Pic: That's gonna be my private jet... hmm...

Pic: Ferrari plane? Yuck. Fugly.

Pic: Look who I met at the airshow? Cisco VoIP expert!

Pic: Eurocopters are sweet!

Pic: Closeup of the head assembly.

Pic: We paid adult price to bring a kid. Jess has been whining ever since she got out of bed about this Airshow thing she agreed to. Now she wants aircon...

Pic: A380 in the distance. No this is not Photoshop'ed. It's original! Hehe.

Pic: Everybody wants to hold the A380...

Pic: Getting some shade

Pic: It tried to take off without me.

So after some whining from Jess (sorry, I need a subject to blame!) we finally got into the air-conditioned exhibition area and boy was it boring. More than half the booths were unmanned (yea, unmanned aircraft and unmanned booths...). Even if there were, those exhibitors looked really bored and didn't bother to entertain us.

Pic: UAV spotted! Guess what heli? 

Pic: Closeup of head assembly.

Pic: The A380 suites. Looks unimpressive for the price you pay. 

We were all getting tired. It was about 4:30pm and we decided we should leave... and we were NOT surprised to see the same crazy crowd getting back onto the dreaded bridge.

Pic: Check out the crowd...

This time they were a little smarter. Barricades were placed along the middle of the bridge to divide the opposing traffic flow, but right now it's 4:30pm and nobody's coming in. Everybody's going home. Half the bridge was unusable due to the barricades. Awesome. Which retard planned this?

Pic: We sat around to wait for the crowd to clear.

The crowd situation didn't seem to improve, and yet again we bashed ourselves through. We tried going for the taxi queue but it was wayyy too long (easily 200-300'ish in the queue!) and we turned back to get on busses instead. There was a huge crowd in the area leading up to the bus boarding point that's not moving at all. Again, note the word CROWD, not QUEUE.

There were barricades along the pavement up towards the shuttle bus boarding point and I realized there's adequete space along the sides of the pavement but the barricades were not placed in a manner that they maximised space. Again, since this is already a freakin' mess I had no patience for these bullshit so I didn't give a shit and moved the barricades away to make space for us to proceed ahead. We got past the crowd, up to the front, and up a bus in less than 10 minutes.

Pic: On the bus (finally) out of the mess.

Pic: At Pasir Ris MRT! Whoopee! 

We went around White Sands in search of a seat (to no avail) and I ended up with new pack of 8 AA Sanyo Eneloop batteries + 2GB xD card for my camera from Challenger instead. The 2GB card's freakin' expensive!

Jess managed to hook up with her friend Jeffery who drives a cab and drove the three of us guys to T3 while she headed back home for steamboat with her in-laws.

Pic: Waiting for the cab pickup 

Pic: Arrival at T3

We scouted for a place with little or no queue and found TCC, so we sat down and ordered our meal. At the same time, dear rang and told me she's done with her lessons so I made her pop by and join us for dinner.

Pic: Me answering dear's call while queing for TCC

Pic: Ordering our dishes... 

Pic: My yummy fish burger thing (forgot what it's called). Rated 10/10! Great stuff!

Pic: Dear arrived and that's her Chicken and Mushroom Sandwich

Pic: Kiev's yummy pasta 

Pic: Kiev's Tiramisu. I got another one too, to share with dear. Very nice.

Overall summary, the Singapore Airshow 2008 sucks. We spent more money trying to get there than the cost of the tickets. The parking fee when I left T3 was maxed at $17.33. The cab fares to and fro were hovering around $20-ish. I drove a total of 100km today (about $20 of fuel). Singapore simply doesn't have the capacity to host such an event. The entire exhibition was led up to by a narrow street with a mediocre number of parking lots to start with. Information sources were poor on the parking and transportation. There was no information online on the Pasir Ris shuttles and people were confused - there were in fact two pick up points, but shuttles at Expo costs $5 per person per trip and Pasir Ris shuttle came free with the tickets. The airshow lacked multiple display time slots too leading up to a massive human crowd. Talking about crowd, the crowd control also sucked. People who could make decisions weren't acting appropriately to situations at hand. The exhibits aren't really interesting at all. All in all, not worth the money. Forget the money, it was probably not worth all the time and effort as well. This might be the last Airshow I'm attending... locally. I might consider if I had a trade pass, but no more public passes for air shows or computer shows or car shows. Shame on Singapore.

Well well, quoted from the official site:

Exhibitors, trade visitors and the public who complain about long queues at the registration counters, delays in security clearance, traffic jams and tired feet can expect some relief in 2008. Technology will speed up registration and security checks and a new six-lane road leading in and out of the site, should help ease traffic jams. A public carpark with around 2,000 lots has been constructed.

50,000 visitors, 2,000 lots. 25 people per car. We drive busses? Assume the average family size of 3 in Singapore (not even including the 2,000 exhibitors yet), 2,000 x 3 = 6,000. What happens to 44,000 people?

This blogger has very good pictures of the crowd control mayhem at the airshow:

http://penny0905.blogspot.com/

More bloggers writing about their frustrations:

http://www.weikiat.net/blog/2008/02/23/singapore-airshow-2008/
http://jeszy.qqblogs.com/blog.php?entry=15097 

More whinings about the Airshow:

http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/singaporeseen/viewContent.jsp?id=15319
http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/singaporeseen/viewContent.jsp?id=15324
http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/singaporeseen/viewContent.jsp?id=15325

Man this RC sized V12 engine is so sweet. Check out the valve rocker arms.

Miniature scale porche, anyone? Let's explore a new area for R/C cars! Hee...

It's sad. Segar Field is officially marked out for new flats.

It was a place with good memories.

I maiden my GWS E-starter, and had it stuck on a tree.

Some people whom I've started this hobby with, JY and Wenbin. They've either stopped flying or gone missing (in army). 

More recent photos, family members and all... 

Lots of fun flying.

The guys who invested a whole bit in Nitro might have to end up downgrading, or otherwise we'll have to go to Woodlands or other large enough flying fields.

It's sad... 

Had a whacky day of flying at Segar field yesterday. I haven't flown my Belt CP for months now since I got really busy with work and am having a car problem (more on that later, when I get my lazy ass to take pics of the engine compartment.)

So, I've had some underground training on backwards flight and inverted hover (on the simulator) and attempted them for the first time (for real) yesterday. In fact, it went amusingly well... if I hadn't crashed inverted four times. No damage done in three of four crashes, each detailed below. The final crash broke some small linkages and bent my feathering shaft.

Lessons learnt:

• Crash 1: Ensure that you have sufficient pitch to "punch up" (I set my heli to 9 degress of pitch and it wasn't able to hold inverted, so I freaked out and cut the throttle.)
  
• Crash 2: Ensure that you switch to idle up (DUH!)
• Crash 3: Ensure that you switch to your 3D idle up (Yes, this time I switched to idle up 1 - sports flying)
• Ensure that your ESC does not cut when you "punch" your heli (This caused the final crash into long lalang, luckily... and broke some linkages.)
  

So, crashing inverted (with the timely use of throttle hold) is actually a good thing.

OK, anyway, since I've been getting numerous requests to explain how I set up my Esky HoneyBee King to fly on 2S (7.4v), I've decided to write an article here! :-)

Before I begin, I need to mention that my heli is a King (shaft driven tail), but it's very much similar to a King II (belt driven tail). So, let's begin...

Journey from FP to CP2 to King 

I love flying with the folks at the Bukit Panjang Multi-Storey Carpark but simply couldn't find a heli that's small yet predictable. First I bought the HoneyBee CP2 to replace the HoneyBee (Fixed Pitch, "FP") because I didn't like the slow cyclic and throttle response. Slow responses meant I had to over-compensate for cyclic/throttle movement. It started developing as a bad habit and made my flights with larger helis... well... scary.

After a long journey tweaking and pimping my CP2, I decided there was nothing much I could do to it anymore.

The King was my answer! It was well within budget, and is sold by the largest RC distributor in the region, which means that parts are easily available too!

So... with some luck, I got a used King kit at a steal price and am now a proud owner.

FP/CP2 vs King/King II 

The FP/CP2 and the King are both similar in frame size. Since both the FP and CP2 have proven to fly well on various 2S setups, I asked myself, "why not the King?"

King (top) and CP2 (bottom) side-by-side.

Also, having dumped my CP2 meant I had loads of 2S batts to spare. The quest for a 2S setup on King began.

Electronics 

I bought my King as a kit - that means no electronics! I installed pretty much the most basic electronics you could grab on the market today, with the exception of the gyro... an Esky 6ch receiver ripped off from the FP 4-in-1, Hitec HS-55 (cyclics), Esky 8g servo (tail) and an old Align RCE500 head-lock gyro.

I bought a used Revox APM450XT 3800kV motor with an Aplus 25A ESC at SGD 60 as well. This pretty much completes the entire list of electronics required to make the bugger fly.

All electronics in good view.

Setup and Headspeed

Initial calculations hinted me to grab a 13T pinion for a 3800kV, but the (used) motor I bought came with a 10T that meshed nicely with the main gear, so I thought, "ahh what the heck, just use it." (I know I'm lazy.)

My pitch (swash mixing) was set to +11/-11 on both ends of the throttle stick. The reason for the excessive 11 degrees of pitch is due to the low headspeed. This helps bail out of a bad maneouver. (I actually came to this conclusion after a test flight - see below.)

After mounting the motor on the heli, I spooled up to full negative pitch (-11) at max (100%) throttle and listened carefully to the pitch of the motor.

Next is to set up throttle curves for a constant headspeed from zero to full pitch. (If you have a governor, this step is not required.) I moved my throttle to mid stick (0 deg pitch) and tweaked my throttle curve until the motor's pitch sounded the same as at full negative pitch. This is probably the best and easiest  way to make your rotor's RPM constant. A constant RPM is also good for your tail.

The remainder of the setup is pretty typical to most eCCPM helis, so I won't cover them here. 

Center of Gravity 

Typical of Esky helis, the King was tail heavy. I removed the horizontal tail fin, which reduced some weight  at the back.

I also mounted the ESC under the heli as close to the main shaft as possible. This was to shift the weight back, but not too near the receiver. The original ESC bracket in front of the motor was almost as good as useless... it's probably good enough for my FP tail ESC.

ESC mounted under the heli with Battery Eliminator Circuit (BEC) on the side. The ESC was great value for money - it came hard-wired with a 3A switching BEC!

Since my batteries were small and light (2S, 1200mAH), the tail-heavy issue proved to be quite a problem. I had to mount the battery forwards with the help of an extension board zip-tied to the original battery tray. Velcro helps hold the battery in place during flight.

Battery tray extension made from chloroplast board.

Flight Test

Gearing up:

• HoneyBee King kit, no horizontal tail fin
• Hitec HS-55 on cyclics (long servo wires could do some shortening)
  
• Align RCE500 Gyro + Esky 8g on tail
• Revox APM450XT 3800kV, 10T pinion
  
• Aplus 25A ESC w/3A switching BEC (without the BEC might reduce some weight!)
  
• 3E Model 1200mAH 2S 10C
  
• Thunder Power 1800mAH 2S 18C
  
• Esky 6ch RX ripped out from an old FP 4-in-1
• Hitec Optic 6 programmable TX
  

The first flight test went very well. I had loads of fun flying figure of eights and attempting some (very slow) backwards flight. Amazingly, the Align head-lock gyro holds the tail well with the stock Esky servo and I have no complains.

However, the headspeed was a tad too low. I found the lift insufficient and increased my initial blade pitch from 10 degrees to 11 degrees  to compensate (hence the recommendation earlier). Weight saving could really help here.

My 1200mAH batteries were warm and slightly bloated, which was a sign of over-current. I tried a larger 1800mAH Thunder Power 2S battery and the headspeed was good, but the heli felt heavier and less responsive. I'm guessing 1500mAH 15-20C batteries would be ideal, but I cannot confirm at this point until I've tested.

The heli was also very stable, but may be too stable for some individuals. Since the flybar is of the same length as the Trex, some lighter aftermarket paddles might help with response. 

Further Improvements 

I am trying on an old pair of 315mm woodies from my Belt CP. It looks a little too long, but should give sufficient lift. I am aiming to not exceed 10 degress of pitch to reduce load on my motor. Hopefully this helps.

King on 315mm woodies - a tad too long.

If you have had success on your 2S setup, please post them in my comments!

It was raining badly in the evening on Friday, so the overnight flying group from Bukit Timah decided to drop by Bukit Panjang MSCP (Multi-Storey Car Park) for flying instead. Disappointing thing was that nobody's around. Good news is that I've fixed Jessie's heli and dropped by for a test flight along with some McDonalds fries and coke.

Jessie's HoneyBee FP, repaired and ready to fly!

The test flight went well. The heli was stable, and to my surprise it was almost as good as new except for some missing/worn out/frayed parts that got replaced. The stock NiMH battery lasted longer than expected and a sleepy pilot (me) didn't even manage to exhaust the battery before I decided to end the flying. This heli should be for sale (just let me check again with her), so if you're interested in it, please drop me a message! 

There was also a King II installed with a Telebee gyro and a S3154 digital tail servo. Good servo, yes, but the gyro couldn't keep up with the servo. It does pay to buy a Futaba!

King II with a Telebee HL gyro and S3154 tail servo 

Jason spent quite a bit of time trying some forward flight and turns. Seems to be working out quite well. The only thing he lacks is a better heli! ;-)

Jason doing postmortem of a fixed pitch crash 

Tomorrow (Sunday) morning I'll be dropping by the Segar field to witness two virgin Trex 600N flights. Keep an eye for photos and more updates here.

Had a pretty whacky weekend flying with some nice chaps. The long story goes...

I dropped by William (Ace Hobby)'s IFO funfly at Bukit Timah (field right opp. Beauty World) and had my first virgin IFO flight. Not as difficult as I thought. In fact, it might be easier than flying an E-starter. The only difficulty was vision. Flying something lined up with lights at night is no easy task.

Ding dong around until 1am and met another bunch nearby at Toh Yi Drive. This time we flew helis right through the night - until 7am in the morning. It was the most insane night funfly I've ever been to. I was already brain dead by 5am, but they could still fly at 7am!

3 Imax B5 chargers and a Lead Acid Battery: You can fly till 'ya go crazy

Heli 1 and 3 (counting from the left) are mine. Heli 5 is a poor fixed pitch that got battered badly by me while  I was testing/fixing it. I crashed it into a (damn!) pole and broke some parts, but did some quick fixes to get it back in flight. Well, it came like a vibrating sex toy that couldn't fly and went home broken but flying well. Urm, how else could I describe? Heh.

Also, while hovering my Belt CP, my HobbyWing 30A ESC cut off with the servos still responding. My heli fell to the ground but it managed to get away without any damage. Somehow it seems like an over-current cut, because reconnecting the battery brings the ESC back in action.

I had mid-stick throttle at 40% and max-stick throttle at 75%, there was no reason why an ESC rated 30A should cut in a hover. So that was the last straw! That ESC's going into crappy planes instead, along with the annoying music.

I reinstalled my original Esky 25A ESC on Sunday morning, and got over to Old Holland Road to fly with David (n00b) in the evening. The field's huge and really nice but had too many planes for the comfort of a heli. Planes can pose a danger for heli flyers - Helis need more ground space and clearance between pilots to fly. Plane pilots can stand right beside each other.

So I took off and hovered. Tried some side-in, then a little nose-in, trim a little here and there, and everything felt good. I brought the heli higher and flipped it tail-down. The moment it went inverted, I hit the collective stick downwards and the heli went into an inverted climb for a second or so before I flipped it back upright.

Perfect! No glitch, no cut-off, no weird shit, though with bad collective management. My first zero-crash, 100% controlled flip in months! It was indeed the HobbyWing ESC that jinxed my flying for months.

Time to get back to action! David forgot to charge his TX so... (evil grin) I had the luxury of two extra lipo packs and did quite a bit of orientation training and some figure eights. It was a great evening!

Beautiful sunset photo, thanks to David!

I just received my J-team Compy 300 Fiberglass Frame Upgrade for my Esky CP2. Here's a short review.

(Note: I updated this post on 17 Jun 2007 with new pics and some edited content. During this period, I've also flown, tweaked and crashed the heli so I am now able to give a more accurate review.) 

Packaging

The upgrade set came in a nice black package the size of a typical wallet box. In fact, the packaging looks so neat, you wouldn't even think it's a RC heli part.

Inside, parts are separated into several packs organized into plastic, fibe and screws. There's also a short assembly instruction included.

Price

I got this product from a parallel import source for under SGD 50 including shipping. A local store retails this at $59, IMHO, is quite pricey.

Assembly Manual

Although the manual was simple and easy to understand, it lacked critical details. It did a fantastic job at describing how the frame is to be put together but did not provide instructions for every other part like servos and head assembly.

The manual folded, as it came out of the box.

Unfolded manual revealed two A4 sheets with frame assembly instructions only.

Workmanship

The poor precision of the machining took me by surprise. The distance between screw holes on the plastic pieces did not line up with those on the fiber pieces. I had to force screws at odd angles to fasten plastic and fiber pieces together. The skids are made of very soft, flexible, and virtually indestructable plastic, but is too soft for my liking. I still prefer SuperSkids in this area.

On the flip side, the frame is much stiffer and has much more space for electronics.

Assembly

Assembling the frame itself was easy, but everything else was a pain. Since there were no servo, main gear or head assembly instructions, I had to rely on a small grayscale photograph. Much later into the assembly, I found that I had mounted the servos incorrectly. I had to dismantle the entire frame in order to mount the servo tabs on the inside of the frame.

Servo tabs should be mounted on the inside of the frame. 

I also found out that the link rod and ball link provided in the kit were to replace one of the stock CP2 servo links so the lower servo can be reached.

The lower servo needs a longer link (provided in the kit)

Another half an hour or so was spent figuring out how to install the main gear until I found out that a spacer collar must be installed. 

Spacer collar (provided in kit) is required between main gear and bottom bearing.

Servos

On my original CP2, I use the center hole on the servo horns for higher resolution and torque. Due to the design of the servo mounts on this frame, only the two outermost holes are usable. I had to face the servo links inward as well so that they align with the swash. (See pictures above)

Balance / CG

The final assembly was tail-heavy no matter how I tried to shift weight forwards. This is no different from the stock setup. It seems that nobody actually addressed this issue except SuperSkids. I cut out a piece of old phonecard to extend the battery holder so that the battery can be mounted further forward for better CG.

Phonecard Battery Tray Extension 

Gyro placement

I couldn't find a sweet spot above the boom mount to place the gyro -- there wasn't a large enough surface above the boom mount for the gyro. The wires from the tail ESC weren't long enough either. I ended up placing the gyro on the side of the frame. (See picture above)

Radio and wires

The provided kit was lacking an antenna tube. I ended up routing my antenna around the skids. (See picture above.) There wasn't really much space on the frame for cable zip ties to go around fastening wires either. My wires seem like they may get in the way of the main gear during an aggressive flight.

Cable management headache! Typical of micro helis.

Flight Performance

The heli feels more responsive in flight. I believe this is due to the stiffer frame. Also the collective seems a little more jumpy since I couldn't use the middle hole on the servo horn. With better servos this might improve though.

Crash Post-Mortem and Repair 

I crashed the heli on it's side after the tail lost control somehow. (Later I found my tail motor was burnt.) It was not a very serious crash but was enough to bend the main shaft. Removing the main shaft was a difficult task. Putting them back together was even more challenging! It was difficult to get the main gear retaining pin in place since the main gear is now in between the frame and not directly underneath like it used to be.

I found out that the motor mount and servos are very difficult to access as well. To replace the servos you'll have to dismantle the entire frame (since they are mounted on the inside). Luckily these parts don't usually require replacement!

Verdict

Pros: Nice packaging (who cares?), looks great, stiffer frame means less slop from servos and more locked-in feel, more space for electronics (as compared to stock frame), screw-tightened tail mount.

Cons: Pretty expensive, average machining quality, very soft skids, unable to use inner hole on servo horn, poor out-of-the-box CG, lacking proper instructions, design didn't cater for antenna routing, difficult to repair after a crash.

Completed heli. Looks good! 

Allright, decided to let go my precious CP2 in favor of a new DX7. I'm selling my recently upgraded Esky CP2 (J-Team Compy 300 Fiberglass Frame) for $280.

Specifications

• J-Team Compy 300 Fiberglass Frame
• GS 20-30-12 3550kV Brushless Motor , 12T
  
• HobbyWing Pentium 10A Brushless ESC
• GWS EDF50 DD Tail Motor with stock 4530 props
• GWS ICS50 2A Brushed ESC (for DD tail motor)
• Align RCE-500 Headlock Gyro
• Installed with trimmed Belt CP blades (thicker airfoil, heavier; very stable)
  
• 3 x Esky Servos installed on Cyclics
  
• Spare pair of original Esky CP2 Carbon Fiber blades
• Spare set of alternate tail prop sizes 4040 and 5030
• Stock Esky 6ch Transmitter ET206A (CCPM Mixing w/Idle-up Mode)
• Stock Esky 6ch Receiver
  
• 1200mAH 3E Model 7.4v (2S) Lipo Battery w/Dean Connectors
  

If you made a calculation, the entire set including upgrades would cost well over $600. This set is essentially RTF and I will help set it up for any takers, including some basic no-obligation training, if required.

This heli flies perfectly on a 2S setup. This means batteries are cheaper. If you need more power, you could pay an additional $30 for a Himark 4100kV brushless motor.

Interested parties, please buzz me (Justin) at 90082997. 

I've given away the jinxed CNC head, hopefully with some good luck in return.

I'm happy to be back on the stock plastic parts - at least my blades track. Surprisingly, my heli also feels more "locked-in" - those CNC parts had more slop than the plastic parts.

If you're considering the CNC parts for Belt CP, King or King II (they all use the same head assembly), I'd say, "forgetaboutit!" The aluminum is soft, the slop build-up gets amazingly bad, the head block design sucks (IMHO, the plastic design is better, only the material is weaker) and the replacement parts are expensive. CNC feathering shafts are SGD 4.70 each, while the stock feathering shafts are SGD 2.00 each. Note the CNC and stock parts are not interchangeable!

Meanwhile, did quite a bit of nose-in hover this evening at the Bukit Panjang MSCP. Oddly, I had no problems hovering nose-in and right-in, but an attempt to hover left-in nearly crashed.

Time to go back to a big field and fly figure eights. I find that my collective and elevator control gets pretty bad around turns.

Meanwhile I'm considering if I should sell my hopped up CP2 and Optic6 so I can invest in a better transmitter (Spektrum DX7) and get some electronics for the Mini Titan E325 (which is still sitting unassembled on my shelve.)

Company bowling tomorrow. 

I was almost killed by splitting blades an hour ago. The story goes...

Some asshole sold me a bad CNC head. It consisted of the center hub, flybar control, blade grips, washout and swashplate - basically the entire head assembly. The swash was damaged on the very night I took them home; while attempting to apply loctite on every metal screw, one broke inside the swash.

To summarize, this CNC head assembly I bought from a kid was never able to get the blades to track. It has been this way since the first day I installed them. I've got some experienced flyers look at it and spent hours reassembling it. The best efforts only managed to reduce the amount of off-track after swapping out some old bearings and dampers.

The blades would flutter at 0 degrees pitch and be at least an inch off track. The worst part of it all was that Esky designed this CNC head in a way that it was incompatible with the stock plastic parts and you couldn't swap them around to mix and test. If you had a CNC hub, you've gotta get the CNC flybar control and blade grips. Sucks, doesn't it?

I took it as a lesson learnt; expensive one though. That said, I will never believe anybody who tell me they never crashed, because even experts crash, not to mention a newbie. Secondly, I'll never buy a second hand heli part again, unless I am so absolutely sure it won't be damaged in a crash.

This evening, I decided to give it (tracking) a try again. I swapped some bearings around, switched the blade grips around, and then spooled up. Just when I applied full negative collective, I heard a loud snap and saw a piece of something fly past me.

Here's what happened.

Seemingly harmless CNC head, but look carefully. A ball link broke and is dangling from the hiller assembly.

Closeup of the broken ball link. This was exactly how the ball link broke on the swashplate as well. The Esky CNC ball links are made of very soft aluminum alloy, almost like pure alu. When these soft metal starts to crack, you can't really see the crack forming, so one day it might just snap. That's what I think happened here.

One side of the blade that cracked from the sudden change in pitch.

The other side that cracked and had the weights fly out. 

Damage report: I'm giving away my CNC head if anybody wants it. $160 gone. Broken blades, $15. Stripped main gear, $12. Total, $187. Sucks.

When's my bonus coming? 

A new addition to my hangar - the Thunder Tiger Mini Titan E325. I've been looking forward to this heli for a long time and I've finally managed to get my hands on the kit. I'd probably spend the next month or two building it up part by part and posting pics as I go along.

I'm not going to rush this as I still have my Belt CP to fly. The Belt CP is currently under maintenance with a bent tail shaft and very slightly bent main shaft. Will get them replaced before I can fly on Saturday morning.

Pictures, as usual...

Nice packaging box

RoHS compliant? I thought I'd only see this on computers...

Inside the box... 

The weekend's finally here. Spent some time finishing up what some people call the "flying paper". Hey, it's a kite allright. It's just not made of sticks and cloth. My objective was to re-use whatever I could, spending the least amount of money.

Wiring up the electronics to test.

Cut out of chloroplast board with vertical stabilizer fitted. This board was lying around my room from a previous flying build so I decided to use it.

Underside of kite with electronics and power system all mounted, albeit in a sloppy manner.

Top view of kite.

Maiden flight tomorrow. Let's see how this thing flies. I got a hunch my CG has to move further forwards. 

Okay, so the theory of anything with excessive power can fly, which really means anything, technically (including pigs), can fly. So here's my latest experiment. I'm going to make a (cheap) kite out of chloroplast and some old electronics lying around. Missing in the photo below is a receiver, which I will be getting this weekend.

Build stuff: GWS 350C brushed motor with gear, prop saver, 1047 prop, wooden stick mount, 2 x Esky 9g servos, elevon connectors, carbon rods, Multiplex 8A brushed ESC w/deans, 800mah 2s lipo battery. 

Chloroplast board with my initial build sketches. 

More to come as I build... 

I was at a funfly event last friday night when I saw two guys flying a 450 size EP heli dangerously close to themselves.

Let's just call them A1 and B2. A1 was helping B2 test fly his E-sky Belt CP. A1 was hovering it within a (dangerous) distance of less than 1 meter away from himself. At times, he flew it so near that the heli was under the transmitter's partially extended antenna.

From afar, I saw that A1 was constantly fighting the controls and obviously something was wrong with the heli's setup. B2, who was standing beside A1, got a little frightened and stepped back.

I saw what was happening and yelled, "Too near! Too near!" but it fell on deaf ears and A1 continued to hover the heli in a very twitchy manner.

After approximately 2-3 minutes of (hair raising) hovers, A1 finally handed over the controls to B2, who was new to 450 sized EP helis. Both of them are flying the E-sky HoneyBee, a micro-sized Fixed Pitch heli and barely started 2 months ago.

B2 attempted to hover the heli but was not able to control it. I was concerned so I went over and asked to try his heli. Before the heli even lifted off the ground by three inches, I felt something was wrong. It was unresponsive to my cyclic inputs to counter its drift. I told B2 to stop flying and let me inspect his heli.

I'm not claiming to be an expert, but some common sense tells me that if the trims on aileron, elevator and rudder are something in the region of -60, +55, -43, something is really wrong. Indeed, the heli was incorrectly set up. The tail servo was mounted the wrong way round, causing binding at certain angles. The linkages were not perpendicular to each other and the swash was not mechanically leveled. With the extreme trims, the left and forward cyclic movement were inhibited as the servos have reached their max travels.

While I was checking the heli for B2, A1 was chatting with B2 and told B2 that "the Belt CP is such a stable heli that [he] could hover it right in front of [himself] with without worries" because if anything happens he can just "hit forward cyclic".

It was the worst piece of advise I've ever heard given to a newbie. It could be be a bad setup advice, a bad battery discharge advice , but of all bad advices, a bad safety advice is the worst advice of all. When it comes to safety, there's nothing great to boast about.

I bring your attention to this article. Those who know HengHeng88 can also ask him how badly he was injured by a Belt CP.

I also witnessed another case of a relatively new pilot flying a Trex 450XL and lost control of it while he tried to bring the heli back from a high altitude. He did not realize how fast the heli was coming back at him and underestimated the amount of forward cyclic he had to give to slow the heli down. The heli literally flew to 10 cm in front of his face and the bunch of us freaked out for that split second. Luckily enough he hit forward+left cyclic and cut the throttle so the heli crashed into the ground just beside him. He got the shock of his life.

Sometimes it's not about your skills. There's something called electrical faults and mechanical failures. I don't give a fuck if you fly somebody's heli and crash it. I could just sit there and laugh while you empty your pockets for the repair costs, but if that heli hits you, him, or in any case anybody else, it's going to inconvenient everybody at the funfly. It's not as if we can sit there, laugh, and watch you bleed to death. The police are going to have to get involved and if that flying site gets banned for some reason, it's going to suck as well.

I think flying too near oneself is usually a bad habit developed by micro-electric flyers and this habit should go when something the size of a Trex or Belt CP is to be flown. I was once like that, but after a few good lectures from the nice chaps whom I've flown with, I've learnt.

General Safety Tips for R/C Flying

Never fly too near yourself.
Never fly too near others.
Never encourage or dare others to fly near themselves.
Never fly too near with other pilots. In fact, fly one person at a time if the field is small. I usually stand aside and look at other pilots just in case a heli looses control. This happened once at BP; a loop went bad and the heli flew inverted nose-in towards the pilot and crashed BEHIND him. Luckily no one was nearby.
Never fly on drugs, alcohol, during PMS, in foul mood, when tired/sleepy, or while having sex.

Always fully extend your antenna.
Always test flight no higher than knee height.
Always check your cyclics before your fly.
Always hit throttle hold before walking away from your transmitter.
Always hit throttle hold when walking with your transmitter in your hands.
Always unplug your battery first after you land or crash.
Always test if your throttle hold works! (Yes, B2's throttle hold was not even set up.)
Always try new tricks further away and higher up. It gives you chance to recover and others time to evacuate a dangerous situation.
Always practice on a computer simulator first.

My Optic 6 battery seemed to deplete faster and faster after every charge, which was getting really annoying. Typical Nickel Cadmium (NiCad) and Nickel Metal-Hydride (NiMH) batteries suffer from a something known as Memory Effect. This happens when we don't discharge the battery fully before we charge them; the battery will seem to "forget" its real capacity adapt to the shorter charging.

I had to give my battery a good discharge so its capacity would return, but didn't have the luxury of expensive chargers to automate this process for me.

I dug around the house for some old electronics and managed to pull out a motor from an old portable battery-operated fan. I soldered two short lengths of wire to it and then connected a 104 capacitor at the ends. You could do without the capacitor, but the leads from the capacitor would be great help with connections to the battery terminal.

And so I made a DIY battery discharger and successfully discharged my battery. You'd be surprised how quickly it discharges it from 9v to 1v!

NOTE: Do not discharge Lithium Polymer (LiPoly) batteries. LiPoly batteries will be damaged when discharged below 3 volts per cell and they do not suffer from Memory Effect. In fact, if you discharge a LiPoly battery, you 'll reduce its recharge cycles.

Moving on, Daniel (a nice chap I met from flying) dropped by one weekend and took some photos of my flying toys, and even captured me holding a dripping wet plane which I crashed inverted into a puddle of water.

My Belt CP in hover...

What a beautiful sight of my E-starter against the blue sky

Crashed and dripping wet... 

It has been a busy... month (wow, time flies) at work. Buzzing around the usual suspects, bunch of Windows 2003 servers, Linux boxes and of course my all-time favorite, VMware. Stay tuned...

I dropped by AceHobby and grabbed a 12T pinion from William. Went home, ripped out the old 10T pinion and jammed the new 12T pinion in and thought to myself, oh well, it's gonna fly now.

I happily punched the numbers into a calc and saw 1500. Wow!

Reinstalled the motor on my heli and throttled up to the max. Switched on the optical tach and... huh? 1300 rpm? No difference?!?!

Shoot. I went to read up on motors and came across some sites with the help of Google. Credits to the articles are at the end of this entry.

Meanwhile, I shall summarize to some human language here.

Brushed motors have an electrical equation that expresses voltage and current (due to resistance) against speed and torque. Since speed and torque are expressed on the same side of the equation, they are constant given a constant voltage and current on the other side of the equation. We can then plot a linear chart as follows.

In the context of my fixed pitch heli, voltage is a constant (my 2s lipo at 7.4v), the resistance of the motor makes current a constant (V=IR), and lastly the torque requirement is a constant (the blade's angle of attack meeting air resistance). Therefore, the speed of the motor will be a constant.

So, simply said, if I change the number of T on my motor's pinion, I'm actually increasing the torque requirement on my motor in attempt to increase headspeed on the shaft. Since the torque and speed constant of the motor maxes out my headspeed at 1300 rpm, no matter how I change my pinion, the eventual result is that my headspeed remains at 1300 rpm due to the total torque requirements of the entire gear system. If I over-gear or under-gear, I will only loose headspeed due to the losses in efficiency.

So it seems like the only way to get a higher headspeed is to find a suitable motor that's capable of higher torque / speed ratings.

I believe this torque / speed constant applies to other motors like brushless motors as well. If you use the wrong gearing, chances are your motor will heat up and your flying time will shorten for the same performance. So experimenting on the gearing is very important to get an optimal speed / torque ratio. 

Credits (click them to get exact link)
http://mechatronics.mech.northwestern.edu/
http://www.educypedia.be/

I barely made 3 minutes of flight with my Belt CP this morning and before I knew it, the entire rotor head assembly broke off mid-flight. Nothing much was damaged. Just broke a tail strut, lost a link rod.. and of course... the head assembly came apart.

I might have over-speeded my head, but I'm doubting it. The last I tached was 2200 rpm, well within limits.

I'm beginning to doubt the quality of the parts. Argh.

Meanwhile... being a lazy bum, I bought a wireless keyboard and mouse. Time to sell my Apple keyboard. Since I've already sold my Mac, there's no point keeping the Apple keyboard. I can't use the features on it anyway.

I've gotta stock up on AAA batts just in case my wireless keyboard runs out of batt while I'm online... 

A little background on brushless motors. 

Brushless motors are much more efficient alternatives to traditional brushed motors, primarily because it does not have a brushed commutator that induces friction and reduces electrical contact efficiency as the motor turns faster.

Brushed motors vary their speeds according to the voltage supply, thus requiring very simple speed control mechanisms made of (basically) variable resistors. Brushless motors require computer controlled speed controllers which not only varies the voltage supplied, but also alternates the electrical currents on the electromagnets within the motor, thus allowing higher and more precise speed control. That's why brushless motors usually have a kV rating, or RPMs per Volt rating. You can't find this with brushed motors.

Back to RC helicopters. 

I did an experiment with William yesterday evening. His 4100kV brushless motor with 12T pinion hit a max headspeed of well over 1700 rpm. He was hovering well at slightly below 1500 rpm. With his setup, his efficiency was only 65%.

As for my brushed setup, I had slightly less than 1300 rpm at full throttle. With the weight of my heli, it could hardly fly anywhere above knee level. 

... which brings me to discuss the optimal headspeed of the Honeybee.

My heli was pimped with upgrades that added quite a significant amount of weight. If you had the original setup, you should be hovering at a headspeed somewhere below 1000 rpm.

If you had a heavy honeybee like mine, your comfortable hovering rpm should be 1400 rpm with untrimmed blades, or 1500 rpm with trimmed blades (approx 5mm off the edges.) The higher your headspeed, the more responsive your heli will be, the shorter your flight time as well.

You would want your headspeed to hit as high as 1700 - 1800 rpm so you can have adequate "punch" when you needed it.

There's a good headspeed calculator tool here:
http://www.runryder.com/helicopter/gallery/32055/hdspeed.html 

Here's what you should key in to get your calculations as near to real life as possible.

Lipo Cells: 2S
Lipo Volts: 3.7 (2s = 7.4v)
Efficiency: 75%
Gear Size: 140T

These are some of my findings for different rating motors against pinions.

3100kV 14T - Esky has a cheap outrunner for this, but I cant' find suitable pinion.
3600kV 12T - Pretty standard setup for most brushless FP honeybees.
4100kV 11T - Some people are using this for the punch!

I will drop by AceHobby tomorrow to see if I can grab a brushless motor. But first, I need banana plugs to solder onto my new ESC so I can use it on my Belt CP... 

I was dropping by McDonalds to get a Fillet cos dinner was pretty pathetic... and ended up in a free McWait. Apparently four malay guys in front of me had trouble deciding what they wanted to eat. They decided on a Cheeseburger, then changed it to McChicken, then when I thought they were finally done, they added another Fish Fillet, then another Apple Pie... made something else into a meal, then after the money was collected, added another pack of fries, and ... ... and ... ... and then ... ... and ... ...

I mean, they say guys are fickle minded but... what the f@#$^%? The counter beside mine had already cleared the queue while it all happened. I decided to switch queue and guess what? I was already done with my order while they were still deciding what else they should eat for the night. The counter staff must have had lots of patience.

Anyway, joined William from AceHobby and his gang at their FunFly just now. I flew my "zhng" heli for the first time. I would consider it the "zhng" maiden flight. Check out the cool lights.

Had to go for all separate electronics due to the gyro upgrade. Messy cable work. As you can see, the gyro is on the left, and all the ESCs on the right. I made JST connectors to hook up the tail and main motors.

The lights had messy wiring as well. Can't really see clearly in this pic, but the lighting effects looks cool!

Overall, it was lacking the power to fly. Maybe I should try a higher pinion gear for the motor, or maybe just dump it for a brushless...

Seems like pinion gears are cheaper. I shall try that another day. Otherwise, I was very satisfied with the gyro's performance (GWS PG-03). The stock gear drive tail works perfectly fine! Don't bother to get psyched into buying a direct drive tail!
 

I think I went on alcohol and is producing videos almost every day. Decided to take a rest today but check out the videos I did yesterday and the day before:

Faulty Servos (3GP, 2.1M)
Explains how a servo can fail other than not moving at all or striping its gear. Weird problems like these do happen.

Esky Transmitter Mode Change (3GP, 2.8M)
Explains how to change the stock Esky transmitter from mode 1 to mode 2 or vice-versa. The video was done in a very sloppy way (due to the amount of screws I had to remove from the transmitter assembly) but you should get the idea once you've taken everything apart.

Sidetrack...

Lunch with dear and CKS at Science Park. CKS said he watches PPG... Power Puff Girls. WHAT!? Yuck.

Dropped by Ngee Ann Polytechnic with Wenbin today. Helped him setup his Trex XL, switch Optic6 from Mode 2 to 1, and witnessed the largest RC coaxial heli I've ever seen in my life. We helped get it set up properly with the DX6 and I did its maiden hover. Hah. What an honour!

It was amazing and cheap for its size as well! We swapped out the PG-03 for a GY401 to it and it was flying like a dream.

Went jogging today with dear and yang. Stamina sucks. Two rounds and I got a giddy spell. Gulped down half a bottle of water and continued on round 3. Still sucks.

I just bought a second hand Esky Honeybee... well... for some weird reasons I won't reveal yet. I got it at a killer price but it was in bad shape, so I spent some time fixing things up and making mods that work well enough for me to test the heli.

Ugly, ain't it?

Anyway, while fixing up the heli, I dismantled the 4-in-1 and chanced upon a discovery. Read on...

If you're intending to go separates on the HoneyBee (CP2 included), you can simply just remove the mixer/ESC/gyro portion of the assembly and reuse the 6ch receiver that's included.

Or if your 4-in-1 burns out, simply discard the mixer/ESC/gyro portion and reuse the receiver for your planes and other helis.

Watch the explanatory video I made (3gp file, 1.7M)

Some simple pictures below as well.

First, remove the four tiny screws. I can't stress enough how important it is to get a correctly sized tool for screws. Don't go for cheap screwdrivers. They are usually poorly machined and thus lack accuracy. You will end up ruining your screws than getting any work done.

Once you're done unscrewing, the entire assembly should come apart as shown. Left to right: Mixer/ESC/Gyro, Receiver, Plastic Cover.

 This is a closeup of the 6ch receiver. Notice channels 3 and 4 are missing. They are actually on the other side. (See next photo.)

This photo shows the mixer/ESC/gyro and the "missing" channels 3 and 4 on the receiver on the rear side. Notice how the mixer/ESC/gyro connects to the receiver's channel 3 and 4. You can also use this mixer on other helis if you know how to. It's fairly easy.

Thanks to David, I got a fresh new pair of blades for my Belt CP this morning. I installed the blades, hovered it, set the tracking, and it was back in the air again! My first 450 size electric maiden outdoor flight.

After a short hover, I went into a forward flight, did a few turns and tested the tail hold with an upward punch. The tail didn't respond quickly enough with the Airtechnic servos. I set the gain way up to almost 90% and it still couldn't hold when I punched the heli upwards. I'll have to test with the Esky servos tomorrow.

Other than the upward punch, the tail holds extremely well otherwise; at least much better than my previous micro helis.

Despite the strong winds, I could hover it nicely at one spot. This was also a huge difference from my previous micro helis.

The power was good enough (at least, for me) with the stock motor and ESC. However, I realized that the stock  ESC starts the motor rather sudden, i.e rough start.

The only thing was that I had to trim my elevator forwards due to the tail-heavy design of the Belt CP despite having my batteries pushed way front. Only a heavier battery would help.

Mid-flight, one of my tail blades came off and my heli went into a pirouette. I managed to bring it down safely without much damage. Nicked my blade though. I can only blame this on myself for not checking the manufacturer's assembly to see if they applied loctite on the tail screws. Apparently they didn't!

Other than all the little twitchy weird things that happened, I'm very satisfied with my Belt CP. The only thing that might need more tweaking are the servos. Maybe I will replace them with better servos next month, but for now... stock parts works great.

My heli setup breakdown:
Esky Servos on CCPM
Airtechnic Servo on Tail
Futaba GY240 Gyro
Esky ESC 25A
Esky Brushless Motor 3100kV
Esky 1800mAh 11.4v Battery 3s1p
Hitec 6ch Receiver

Still awaiting the TT mini Titan E325... 

It was quite unexpected. I should have followed my first instincts to stop for the day but I didn't. I was getting tired. The heli was sitting there smiling at me, telling me "yea, please give me another flight." So I did. I picked up the heli, connected the battery and started throttling up.

Barely 1 minute into the flight, I don't how it got to me - I call it the "PicooZ syndrome", i.e. throttle left. I wanted to punch the heli upwards to see if the tail holds well, but I yanked the elevator stick forward instead, sending the heli into a forward flight towards a pillar. Realizing my stupid mistake, I pulled back hard on the elevator and... boom! My heli fell like an apple to the floor.

Bent boom and chipped blades.

It happened too fast. I didn't know what exactly happened. I am guessing a boom strike  but the damage doesn't really tell it. Ah, just my luck.

So it's grounded for another weekend I guess. Can't fly it tomorrow so I'm left with my E-starter.

I've created three videos that document the Belt CP CCPM problem and how I set them up. I hope they would be useful to first-time Belt CP owners. If I'm doing it wrong, please correct me as well!

Video #1: The Belt CP CCPM Problem

Video #2: Setting up the servos

Video #3: Setting up the swash

You will need a 3gp capable player to play these files. Most mobile phones are capable of doing so. Otherwise you can download Quicktime.

It was a night spent testing my newly built (bought) Esky Belt-CP. I had to get the gyro set up, try out different servos for the tail, and get my CCPM settings right.

Here are some problems I encountered.

Wrong Motor!
I was given a 3100kv motor instead of a 3800kv motor. The 3800kv motor looks as if it has grooves on its side. The 3100kv motor does not; just a shiny silver metal. I paid for the RTF kit $269 and it should have come with the 3800kv motor instead. No wonder the headspeed and piro rate seems slow.

Wrong CG!
The Belt CP is, again, like other Esky products; it's heavy at the back. I had to move the battery wayyyy forward to get it to balance out but still quite unable to get the CG right even with canopy on.

Tail Servo
Apparently the Airtechnic AT-80A servo does perform a little bit better than the stock Esky servos. I will have to get my heli trimmed out and do more flights before I can confirm this.

Stupid CCPM Design
The linkage design makes the elevator link (ch2) travel distance less than the other two links (ch1, ch6). This is a major headache to setup in your TX. I had to meddle with my EPAs. Even till now I am still meddling with it to get my swash level at all stick positions. It seems almost impossible.

So, I came up with my own Belt-CP Setup Guide

1. Don't trust factory setup. Enough said.

2. Redo the damn links.

What I'd suggest most people to do is to take the link rods out and re-measure them to the lengths as per the manual. Once the lengths are correct, put them back onto the heli.

3. Getting to 50% stick.

First, get your stick to 50% position. If you're using something like Optic6 without a visual cue, just set your pitch curve to 50% at all levels. That's the most accurate way to get exact 50%.

4. Fix ch1 and ch6.

Center your servos using subtrim. You will find that the linkage rods to your left and right servos are shorter than expected if you followed the manual. Lengthen by about 1-2 turns to both rods to get the lengths right and the arms 90 degrees. At this point of time you should have a level swash on the left and right sides. If not, either something is not at ninety-degrees or your subtrims are out. At last-resort, adjust the length of the rods to your swash to get it level. You shouldn't need to touch them if you followed the manual's lengths.

5. Fix ch2.

Make sure your front (ch2) servo horns are sub-trimmed to ninety degrees (to the servo body, not to level ground!). Then, get two push pull rods to be the exact same length as per the manual. If you have to shorten the rods, you'll have to shorten both together. Both rods should always be of the same length.

6. Fix elevator swash.

Now you should find that the elevator is tilted a little forward. Lengthen the link to the front of the swash until your swash is level. You should have a perfectly level swash by now.

7. Fix EPAs (ATVs).

Now set your pitch curve to a linear 0%-100%. Go to 0% stick and set your EPAs such that your swash is level. The EPAs for ch1 and ch6 should always be the same, but you will find that the EPA for ch2 will be higher than ch1 and ch6. For mine, ch1/ch6 EPA is at 80 while ch2 EPA is at 110.

Go to 100% stick and repeat the entire process.

Now here's the sticky part. Your swash is level at 0%, 50%, 100%, right? Move your throttle up slowly and you will realize there will be a point where your swash is not level. This is what I call the stupid CCPM design problem... or did I do anything wrong?

8. Fix pitch.

Let's just get to the pitch now. Get a pitch gauge and measure pitch at 0% stick and 100% stick. Make sure you measure that from the same blade every time. I usually pick the blade with a black tape. 

Get the total pitch of your blade. For example, if your +ve pitch measures 7 degrees and your -ve pitch measures 11 degrees, you have a total pitch of 18 degrees.

Now, with a total pitch of 18 degrees, it will be optimum at +/- 9 degrees. Set it like so, i.e. 0% = -9 deg and 100% = +9 deg. Again, always do this on the same blade.

Once you're done, you'll realize that at 50% your blade is perfectly at 0 degrees. Now go ahead and set the other blade to +/- 9 degrees.

At this point of time I will usually set my blade tracking. I set my throttle curve 0,10,20,30,40 and my pitch curve 50,60,70,80,90. Using the settings the heli would hardly take off the ground. Throttle up slowly and you will see that the blades are out of track. If you got lucky, they will be in track. The lower blade requires more pitch, i.e. lengthen the linkage rods. Set the tracking right and you should be ready to fly.

9. Fix gyro.

There's plenty of guides available for gyro and tail setup. You should just read those. 

I hope the guide was useful... or at the least more useful than the Esky manual! 

My el'cheapo servos have taught me some valuable lessons. In my previous post I mentioned about "upgrading" my tail servo to an Airtecnic AT-80A. I had this believe that a servo with higher speed rating would be better for the tail. I mean, who doesn't think so? I was so wrong. It was more of a downgrade. Here's why.

I was doing a test flight of my Belt CP in my room and had to set my gyro gain way above 80%, and still no sign of a tail wag. (Bad, dog!)

Then I swapped it for the stock Esky servos. My tail started to wag at 75% gain. That was a sign of improvement, i.e. the tail servo is doing its job and now the gyro's over-compensating the movement instead.

I stared closely as the servos move and realized that the Airtecnic servo had much coarser movements than the Esky's.

A little research afterwards, I realized the speed specifications (in seconds per 60 degrees) was for the fastest movement for a servo arm around a complete 60 degrees turn. It's not stated anywhere if it includes the delay from electrical signal to mechanical movement, neither does it tell if the servo moves as accurately as we wanted it to go.

I do have a believe, for example, that a servo rated 0.12 seconds for a 60 degrees turn might not move as fast for a 0.5 degree turn as another rated slower.

Let's just put it somewhat like driving cars. Every different make has different acceleration curves. Although the BMW can hit 100kph in 7 seconds but a Honda probably beat it within 30kph due to weight and other factors.

In a heli's tail servo, it hardly moves much to keep your heli stable. If it went 30 degrees clockwise, you'll be in a crazy pirouette.

So, how small a movement can your servo make and how accurately can it move from point A to B?

I read a little deeper and stumbled upon this link on Futaba's website. It describes how digital servos are made to respond faster and more accurately. The graph made a lot of sense as well. It tells me that a good servo provides very consistent torque throughout it's movement until it stops.

A futaba digital servo

With a more consistent torque, changes to your tail will become more linear and thus easier for your gyro to compensate its movement. If your servo had an exponential-ish movement curve, it would become very difficult for the gyro to correct its motion.

I may be wrong. But these are based on my first impressions and thoughts. The physics of it makes some sense as well. What do you think? 

It's raining through the entire weekend. Singapore's all cold and wet. Good news for those lazing at home, but bad news for people like me. The wet weekend really spoilt the flying most of us had planned. At least for me, I didn't have the chance to test my heli's performance outdoors.

Several friends asked what I usually do being up so late at night, so here's a pic of my room. All you see is a computer screen and heli on my desk. These are the only two real things that keep me occupied.

Something's new in the house. My parents just installed a water feature in our balcony. Looks quite cool but I wonder why spend the money and reduce the effective space for drying out clothes in such wet rainy weather!?

There's actually a fish in there...

Back to the geeky heli topic. Saturday evening was spent with dear as well as fixing up my heli. Dear tried to look interested but you could tell... OK... helis are really just guy's stuff.

"I'd rather sleep..." 

I finally got a used Futaba GY240 for S$120 and mounted it on my heli. In case you're not a geek and is wondering what the heck a GY240 is, it's a gyro. A gyro helps keep the helicopter's tail controlled. Sounds simple? There's alot of physics involved!

A GY240 on top of my tail boom mount.

I upgraded my tail servo as well. It's an el'cheapo Airtecnic AT-80A servo rated at 0.07 sec and 1kg torque at 6v for S$18. Such speed rating is quite amazing. I can't seem to find a matching rating from any other branded servos like Futaba and JR. I really hope it works well.

Airtechnic AT-80A on the tail.

Some time actually went into tidying up the wiring. This looks much better now.

And of course, the bird is now all ready to fly but was held back due to bad weather.

All electronics installed and ready to go.

Well it looks like I'll have to wait for Wednesday before I can really test anything out. 

While shopping with dear at Marina Square today, I got myself a really adorable thing put on my desk. It's a factory-painted 1:144 scale model of the F-15C for $11. (C'mon man, how much you girls spend on those mobile phone straps?)

All I had to do was to put the parts together. Even the undercarriage was very detailed for such a miniature model.

So that's for the weekend. 

Anyway, if you're wondering why I'm using el'cheapo parts for my Belt CP, here's why.

First, I've already placed an order for the Thunder Tiger mini Titan E325 heli. It's a much better heli than Belt CP so I am saving to beef that heli up instead.

The Thunder Tiger mini Titan E325 

Next, my cable modem just broke down so I spent another $100 getting a replacement.

Lastly, my van's tyres are worn out and I just spent another $140 replacing them.

Bad week, maybe? 

Since the entire toy heli craze started back in October, I have gone through numerous "upgrades". It went from PicooZ, to the HoneyBee, to the CP2 until I've decided to give up on all motor-driven tail helis. I got the Esky BeltCP to start learning proper forward flight and figure eights on. A heading-hold gyro was also very much desired.

My first 4 channel helicopter. The Esky Honeybee on which I learnt how to hover. It's still my personal fav for slow flying. Sold it off in December to upgrade to CP2 (below).

My Esky CP2 which I sold off after 3 weeks because of its poor stability in outdoor flight. 

I received the Belt CP ARF kit on Thursday complete with a brushless motor, ESC and 4 servos. I got an additional 6ch receiver as well as battery to get everything going. What's lacking still? A gyro. (More on that later.)

It took almost 4 hours to get all the electronics together and mechanically set up.

I mounted the ESC on the bottom of the frame instead as the top mount is designed (poorly) with a gaping hole in the center. I couldn't get any double-sided foam tape to hold the ESC securely in place! It is much more secure at the bottom now. You could also see how I placed the receiver.

So this was my best bet with wiring work...

I also made an el'cheapo blade holder. Luckily it's temporary. 

The heli got its maiden flight on Friday with the help of Junyang's GY401 and hovered very stable. I will be getting a second hand GY240 over the weekend for myself.

The completed heli. A beauty, isn't she? 

Meanwhile CKS passed me his Align gyro and I am very tempted to try it... in my PLANE! Ha! To keep the ailerons stable. I wonder if it works.

The mini toy helicopter I bought (see this entry) has crapped out. It was badly damaged during a chalet last week. I also bought another $40 plane during the chalet. It landed on the roof top and I couldn't get it back down so I'm left with only the controller and several spare parts.

OK, flying RC (remote control) toys are fun, but I can't fly these cheapskate toys for nuts. I felt like something better, but wait... I have to think about the money! (It's always about the money, isn't it?)

On Monday, I sat down for a while and thought through my hobby lists.

First it was Tamiya minis (those mini cars that ran around a track) and bicycles when I was younger, then music (ahh, the cello costs $1.5k excluding repairs and upgrades!), then it was audio systems (yes, I have a nice audio system setup in my room costing well over $1k), then it was mobile phones (this one turned into a business) and I almost went into cars... Hey, not 100% my fault! Hanzhong started me on the car showrooms! Lucky that was too expensive to even get started!

So I decided on flying RC gadgets. They costs a few hundered bucks, yes, but are still cheaper than the monthly cost of a car in Singapore!

I searched hard on the net for days on flying RC planes. I also consulted my friend CKS who was a RC hobbyist. I was thinking of a plane until I dropped by a hobby store in Far East Plaza. Uncle Sam was friendly and told me a heli would be more fun, so I was sold on getting a heli.

I bought the E-sky HoneyBee. See pics below. It's a 4 channel ready-to-fly (RTF) heli at $269. I also bought an extra training kit (the orange pingpong balls), a USB cable to hook up my controller to a computer flight simulator and an extra NiMH battery.

There must be a pun to "ready-to-fly". 

The instruction manual states... "This is not a toy." Now, I know why. After 2 days of practise, I still can't fly it! WTF! Not even with the help from a computer simulator. And... if you're a newbie reading this, don't try it at home. It is VERY important that you get some experienced people to help!

Yea! Too old for a toy? No way! I never had a proper remote controlled car when I was young. Now I have a flying 'copter!

I got it at $39.90 from Carrefour in Suntec this afternoon. I also bought a larger one for Ah Loy's birthday. The larger one was much more interesting but required a huge area to play.

It's a freaking cool toy!

Some pics of my 'copter using my makeshift "studio" setup in my room where I take product photos with an old Canon Powershot A70.