Phoenix Aircraft configurations

[Frankd1]

Thought I would try and start a thread where people could post there aircraft configurations that they edited in Phoenix sim.

Here is mine for the YAK 55 foamie

weight 0.37lbs (6oz)
frontal c of g -0.2
thrust to wt. ratio 2.0
min and max aileron 45 deg.
travel
elevator travel 50 deg.
rudder travel 50 deg.

Exponential in the sim of 50% on all flight controls.

These are some of the changes I made but if anyone has suggestions for better flight characteristics then post away!

It seems to fly pretty good although I am having some difficulty with hovering, and harriers but that is probably due to pilot ability!

Frank

[Daedalus66]

Frank, good idea for a thread.

Here's my recipe for turning the TRex 450 into something that flies more like my Maxir.

Weight 0.4 kg (lighter)
Power 0.15 Kw (less power)
Motor RPM 30000 (gives about 2500 head speed)
Main Rotor dia 0.62 m
Main Rotor Chord 0.27 m
Hover Stability 100% (instead of 96%)
Tail fin 0.005 sq m (to reduce tracking)
Tail Rotor dia 0.12 m

Any other tuning like expo I do on the transmitter (JR 9303). I generally use about 25-30% expo and set the dual rates to 70%.

Flight mode 1 throttle is a straight line (0-50-100) while 2 and 3 have a V configuration (100-60-100).

I find this nice to fly and close enough to the Maxir to provide good practice.

With any luck, the temperature will get above freezing this weekend and I'll be able to remind myself what the real heli feels like.

Cheers.

[bilboa]

Here's my setup to make the Spark fly similarly to my stock Blade CP Pro. My BCPP is completely stock except for the addition of the G90 heading hold gyro. You can just turn off the Heading Lock Gyro setting if you don't have one. Rather than posting all the individual changes I'll just attach the settings file. If you have Phoenix 1.03c you should be able to just unzip the attached file, and save the .fly file into C:\Program Files\PhoenixRC\variants\helicopters, and next time you restart Phoenix you should see a Blade CP Pro variant of the Spark. You can rename the file if you already have a Blade CP Pro variant.

There are a few ways in which this model differs from the real BCPP, that I can't seem to fix due to limitations in Phoenix. If you find a way to improve on these things I'd appreciate hearing about it.

1. The sim model is a little underpowered in forward flight and slightly overpowered in a hover, compared to the real BCPP. This is because Phoenix doesn't seem to simulate translational lift correctly, so if I increase the power enough that it feels right in forward flight, then the sim model has too much power in a hover, so it's too easy to do stationary flips and such compared to the real BCPP. However if I adjust the power so it's right in a hover, then it feels underpowered in forward flight. I've chosen to split the difference.

2. It's much harder to hover the sim model over a spot on the ground than with a real BCPP. I'd say if you can keep the sim model within a 5x5' area, you'll be able to keep the real BCPP in a 1x1' area. This is again due to a Phoenix problem with the way it simulates hovering instability. Even if you keep the model perfectly level, it drifts around a lot, and requires you to keep flying the model back to the spot you want to hover over. The real BCPP does this a little bit, but not nearly as much as the Spark. Increasing the hover stability setting doesn't really fix the problem, and just makes the sim model too stable.

3. The tail holds much too well on the sim model compared to the real BCPP, if you have the HH gyro option turned on. On the real BCPP with stock tail motor and G90 HH gyro, punching the power quickly will make the tail move, you'll always get a little bit of wag when doing quick yaw changes, and it can't hold the tail perfectly when doing flips. The Phoenix version does all of these things perfectly if you turn on HH, and I haven't found any settings which have a noticeable effect. With HH turned off in Phoenix, the tail behaves more realistically like the BCPP would in rate mode.

I think those are the major differences, that I can tell at my flying level. Otherwise I've found this to be very useful for practicing my Blade CPP, as long as I keep these differences in mind.

[Towser]

Blade CP Pro, stock

Do you have any settings that resemble your Falcon 3D on Phoenix? I fancy something like this for in the warehouse - dont want anything too big, and would like longer flight times than you get with Trex.

Cheers,
Towser

[bilboa]

Sure, I'll post my Falcon 3D setup later. I just modified some settings on the Phoenix Trex 450 to get it to be similar to the Falcon. It's not as well tuned as my BCPP setup though because my Falcon has been sitting on the shelf the last few weeks waiting for parts.

Hobby Lobby just got all their parts back in stock, so I should be receiving all the back-ordered parts this week, so if I have it back in the air by this weekend, I'll try improving my Phoenix Falcon setup some more.

[bilboa]

Here's my current Falcon 3D configuration. This is a variant of the Trex 450. It don't think it's very accurate at this point, since I've got a lot more flight time on my Blade CP Pro than the Falcon. I think this has more power than the Falcon and faster cyclic response, but I'll have to wait until my Falcon's back in the air to do more tuning on it.

Same instructions as for my Blade CP Pro variant; unzip this file, and put the .fly file in PhoenixRC\variants\helicopters\.

By the way, if you want something to fly inside, I'd say even a Falcon is a bit big and fast for indoor flying, unless you have a lot of open space in your warehouse. It's almost the same size as a Trex 450, so if you wouldn't feel comfortable with a Trex inside, you probably won't be comfortable with a Falcon either. I think a micro size FP or CP heli might be more fun inside.

[Towser]

Here's my current Falcon 3D configuration. This is a variant of the Trex 450. It don't think it's very accurate at this point, since I've got a lot more flight time on my Blade CP Pro than the Falcon. I think this has more power than the Falcon and faster cyclic response, but I'll have to wait until my Falcon's back in the air to do more tuning on it.

Same instructions as for my Blade CP Pro variant; unzip this file, and put the .fly file in PhoenixRC\variants\helicopters\.

By the way, if you want something to fly inside, I'd say even a Falcon is a bit big and fast for indoor flying, unless you have a lot of open space in your warehouse. It's almost the same size as a Trex 450, so if you wouldn't feel comfortable with a Trex inside, you probably won't be comfortable with a Falcon either. I think a micro size FP or CP heli might be more fun inside.

Thanks for that - I'll take a look at it. The main reasons for getting this is that it's lighter (so longer flight times) and it's cheaper to buy and repair. We have loads of places here in the UK for spares! :) And yes, the warehouse is BIG! lol. I've got a Blade CP (brushless and twin tail motor) and Honeybee FP for indoor work, and the area I used to fly them in is about no bigger than 10 meters by 10 meters, sometimes half that. So for the warehouse I was looking at either the Falcon 3d or King II. Or maybe a Dragonus..... ;)

Happy flying

[Ade]

as far as im aware the falcon 3d is the same as a mini pred in the UK. My experience with the mini pred is far from postive. its a copy of the zoom 400 with a slight tweek to the tail drive. still flies horribly tho and has reliability issues with the tail drive.

my choice would be between the dragonus or trex SE v2. both of them are far more enjoyable to fly than any other micro on the market. much more stable and less devient when flying around.

Ade