Thanks for the reply rcmaniac098202

I am having a lot of fun because I'm learning stuff. Learning that although at first, crashes were 'oops' and flying again. Now I'm 'flying' about more my crashes have been a bit more !! into things and the damage has increased. To the point that I am now grounded I have fixed the structural damage easily enough. It's fun actually. But the electrickery side of things is where I fail. Especially as it's my weak point in life - I don't really understand it. No one I know can solder these tiny wires back onto things. A friend had a try with my V911 and fried the pcb. So that is now spares. My Solo pro I just got to fly OK by swapping over main shaft swash etc with V911 and then we had a gust of wind blow it into the side of my house whilst flying outside. Too much wind to be flying really so my own fault. Which cracked the canopy in two, broke a canopy spar off the mainframe and snapped another flybar. I had an enjoyable evening repairing these. Then yesterday it stopped mid air - luckily whilst just hovering low in doors. I discovered the red wire from battery has come loose from PCB

So I'm now sat here with my SP propped up in front of me with a magnifying glass looking at it and thinking.... wish I had a soldering iron small enough to solder that back on.

Is there any point in sims if I don't have a tx to use? Also are there any free ones? Hoping it might help with the withdrawal whilst grounded

Originally Posted by Cannafish

Thanks for the reply rcmaniac098202

I am having a lot of fun because I'm learning stuff. Learning that although at first, crashes were 'oops' and flying again. Now I'm 'flying' about more my crashes have been a bit more !! into things and the damage has increased. To the point that I am now grounded I have fixed the structural damage easily enough. It's fun actually. But the electrickery side of things is where I fail. Especially as it's my weak point in life - I don't really understand it. No one I know can solder these tiny wires back onto things. A friend had a try with my V911 and fried the pcb. So that is now spares. My Solo pro I just got to fly OK by swapping over main shaft swash etc with V911 and then we had a gust of wind blow it into the side of my house whilst flying outside. Too much wind to be flying really so my own fault. Which cracked the canopy in two, broke a canopy spar off the mainframe and snapped another flybar. I had an enjoyable evening repairing these. Then yesterday it stopped mid air - luckily whilst just hovering low in doors. I discovered the red wire from battery has come loose from PCB

So I'm now sat here with my SP propped up in front of me with a magnifying glass looking at it and thinking.... wish I had a soldering iron small enough to solder that back on.

Is there any point in sims if I don't have a tx to use? Also are there any free ones? Hoping it might help with the withdrawal whilst grounded

I learned to fly all the way up to CP without a sim. I'm only using my sim to practice some 3D. They weren't too helpful for me, but if you're crashing really badly, I'd suggest you pick up one. And you need a TX to plug into the computer. Free simulators are a POS(piece of sht). Most people use Phoenix(decent simulator, I use it) or Realflight. Expensive, yes, but it might save you more money in the long run.

Soldering isn't too hard after a little bit of practice. PCB Soldering is a lot harder, and I've only done it a couple times do various boards. Avoid touching the board, and drop a little bit of solder onto the board where you want the connection to be. Add some solder to the wire, and then melt the wire into the solder on the PCB. What I do to reduce this problem is to put some hot glue on the solder joint to reinforce it. Works well for my Genius CP!

YIPPEEE!!!!!!

I was talking to my hot rodder mate and he lent me a little fine tipped soldering iron and showed me how to do it. Let me practise on some old pcb's he had. Came home, set up a jig with my magnifier above so I could see and proceeded to solder my battery wire back onto the PCB. Popped a battery back in and I'm flying again.

Lesson leant from this. More time is needed on the basics like hovering nose in. I lose control If I have to think about where I'm going. I need to practise basics more so this is a normal reaction not one I have to think about, process and then perform.

My opinion of crashing has changed somewhat.

Crashing and fixing is all part of the hobby! We all learn along the way.

Originally Posted by rcmaniac098202

Crashing and fixing is all part of the hobby! We all learn along the way.

I will learn in a somewhat longer way than others I'm betting most here have at least a basic grasp of electrickery whereas I have none. None. As far as I'm aware it's magic or wizardry or something similar. However today taught me otherwise. Today taught me that with a bit of motivation (I'm grounded with no power to board) I could fabricate an area to hold things still and firm while I concentrated on looking through the end glass of an old rifle scope as a magnifier. I managed to re-attach a 1mm wire to a tiny pcb. I am honestly well chuffed. I also can't wait to get the little SP out into the paddock with my mods. It has the main shaft, blades, swash etc from a V911 and a prototype modded flybar - which makes it vibrate a little and TBE a bit but it flies well outside(IMO). The stock stuff made it impossible to fly (it was 2nd hand) When I have gained more knowledge I will try different things, perhaps the metal swash again.

I am confident I can keep my Solo Pro flying now I have done some soldering that 48hrs ago I believed impossible to do myself. So I think I will order a Super CP with Devo 7e tomorrow. I've settled on this combo as my next foray into RC heli's based on members input on this forum and availabilty to me in NZ. I am guessing I should order some spares at the same time - what am I likely to need?? I am expecting to crash. But not like my last few crashes - full on throttle at impact. I am also expecting it to be very hard to fly so will need to learn the basics properly. Can't wait

Ooooh, just remembered - I would like to secure wires from battery to pcb with a blob of hot glue as mentioned but I don't have a hot glue gun. Would a blob of clear silicone suffice?

Originally Posted by Cannafish

I will learn in a somewhat longer way than others I'm betting most here have at least a basic grasp of electrickery whereas I have none. None. As far as I'm aware it's magic or wizardry or something similar. However today taught me otherwise. Today taught me that with a bit of motivation (I'm grounded with no power to board) I could fabricate an area to hold things still and firm while I concentrated on looking through the end glass of an old rifle scope as a magnifier. I managed to re-attach a 1mm wire to a tiny pcb. I am honestly well chuffed. I also can't wait to get the little SP out into the paddock with my mods. It has the main shaft, blades, swash etc from a V911 and a prototype modded flybar - which makes it vibrate a little and TBE a bit but it flies well outside(IMO). The stock stuff made it impossible to fly (it was 2nd hand) When I have gained more knowledge I will try different things, perhaps the metal swash again.

I am confident I can keep my Solo Pro flying now I have done some soldering that 48hrs ago I believed impossible to do myself. So I think I will order a Super CP with Devo 7e tomorrow. I've settled on this combo as my next foray into RC heli's based on members input on this forum and availabilty to me in NZ. I am guessing I should order some spares at the same time - what am I likely to need?? I am expecting to crash. But not like my last few crashes - full on throttle at impact. I am also expecting it to be very hard to fly so will need to learn the basics properly. Can't wait

Ooooh, just remembered - I would like to secure wires from battery to pcb with a blob of hot glue as mentioned but I don't have a hot glue gun. Would a blob of clear silicone suffice?

That glue should suffice. Or drop buy the dollar store and pick up a cheap ass hot glue gun. Awesome stuff, really.

If you're going to be soldering a lot, I'd get a stand. Got this one, and helps me lots on changing plugs, etc.

http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/s...em_holder.html

Backordered, cause everyone seems to like these.

All was going very well with tonight's practise hovering nose in. Untill a momentary lapse in concentration caused a bit of a crash. I throttled down before impact but upon impact the motor started spinning full and there was smoke!!!
I grabbed my little heli and whipped the battery out. The 'thing' just above the right hand servo(If looking at front of pcb) was glowing red and smoking even with my limited knowledge i'm guessing this is bad. Perhaps my mad flybar mod wasn't such a good idea combined with my almost non existent flying skills..

That would seem like you burned the speed controller FET. It's pretty common. I can't see how a flybar mod would cause that unless it added a fair amount of weight.

Flybar mod left Heli very unstable - akin to no flybar. I think the crash into the fireplace may have caused it to crack or something. New board is on the way along with a bnf V911. Not sure I can squeeze a Super CP on my card this week without the wife noticing.

I've looked with my aged eyes and it seems I could take the servo motors off of the PCB of my Solo Pro. More spares Also good practise with regards to soldering these tiny wires - I could solder them back on. The PCB is so I can't make it worse

A wee update.. I simply feel sorry for any rc heli that arrives here now
I got my bnf V911 - it arrived in 11 days from placing the order from Banggood. I am v impressed to be honest. Out of the box it hovered perfect. I put my two batts through it indoors and was a happy boy again. Charged the batteries and as It was quite still I took it outside. First battery I was having a ball - it was much much better than my first V911 I thought. I was also easier on the sticks and could do slight banked turns without flybar strikes. Popped second battery in and it was getting a tad dark but I wasn't that bothered. On take off I noticed the wind had got up a bit and I had to counter it a bit. Then I was struggling a tad so decided to call it a day. At that moment a bunch of parrots burst out of the bush squaking and carrying on, one or two hit my 911 and it tumbled out of view over my garden hedge and into oblivion. I'm not sure who was most surprised! I laughed initially but quickly realised I couldn't see little heli I nailed the throttle to try keep sight and it came into view. That was about the last of the control I had and seconds later lost orientation. So I cut throttle and it dropped. Less than 50m from where I sit typing this and no one can find it. Me, the wife, the neighbours, we've all looked. I am gutted. I only had it for 4 batteries worth of flight. There's only 6 houses here but a lot of trees
So to date, since xmas I have lost/destroyed two V911's, an IR 3 ch coax and a solo pro. I have another bnf V911 coming from Banggood. I also have a V939 I purchased today in NZ so hoping it may be here for the weekend. Now I have a set of rules. ONLY fly indoors. If outside I will go to my friends farm just down the road where I can't lose it.
However. If I can't fly I'm fixing it. Which is fun. But I want something more than a toy now. Skyartec Wasp Nano CP is battling with Super CP. I feel Wasp Nano is winning because of the NASA701 and the X3V. Also because of Skyartecs offer for spares for a vid on youtube and the support they offer on this site. Compared to Walkera's terrible and absolutely zero support of any description. I would like to continue to support WLtoys with the V922 but from what I can make out it's one of the hardest micro CP's to fly. And there is no bigger model as there is with walkera or Skyartec. It's a hard choice.. feel free to tip the scales with recommendations

SkyArtec has been very aggressive in trying to establish local market presence in a number of countries. They have improved their products a lot in the last year or two. They always had pretty good electronics. I'd say stick with them. However, no matter what you choose in a micro CP heli, you don't have the experience to fly it indoors. Their headspeeds are all over 4000 rpm. They move very quickly and cover a lot of space.

I'll stick with the v911 and my quad indoors - I have 45 acres of flat paddocks minutes from my house for outdoor flying. Which is where all outdoor flying will take place from now until I have control over my helicopters

Originally Posted by Balr14

SkyArtec has been very aggressive in trying to establish local market presence in a number of countries. They have improved their products a lot in the last year or two. They always had pretty good electronics. I'd say stick with them. However, no matter what you choose in a micro CP heli, you don't have the experience to fly it indoors. Their headspeeds are all over 4000 rpm. They move very quickly and cover a lot of space.

I hovered my first micro cp (my very first cp) indoors. Then I began to fly it around indoors, with no outdoor practice. It's possible. In the beginning, I wore my woodshop safety glasses and a thick jacket for safety reasons. But yes, it can be done.

Hi, im in NZ ( Hawkes Bay ) been flying for a few months . Started with a Blade MSR and its a great heli! parts are easy to get too.
Now have a 450 and can fly that around but I sweat bullets and drop to my knees and say a little prayer every time I land it :-) took me about 3 months to get to the flying around stage , I think 20 years plus with planes helped a little.
Try Wattsup in Hastings or Hobby Hangar or Hangar one for micro helis and parts , they all do quick mail order .
I think a Blade MSR x may be the next step for you or a good sec hand MSR ( much like your V911) if you can find one on Trademe . They will handle a little bit of a breeze outdoors but not a lot , Once you can manage one of these then a 450 may be the next step.... with tuition and guidance, then I guarantee you will be dreaming of flying all night ... it becomes an obsession!!
I have a thread somewhere here with my exploits into helis
Good luck with the flying :-)

ps: a Spektrum DX6i is a great TX and has all sorts of functions to set up and adjust your heli.

Grant.