BTW - ignoring the vibration at low RPM is like ignoring an out-of-balance tire on your car just because you can't feel the imbalance at the speed you usually drive. The tire is still just as out-of-balance as it was at the speed when you felt it, and the imbalance is still doing just as much damage to the tire & suspension - even though you can't feel it. Same thing is true for the tail. The tail fin vibration disappears as you spool up simply because the period becomes shorter than the resonant frequency of the tail & fin assy. The vibration is still there, hammering away at the bearings & raising the FBL unit's noise-floor. Remove the main blades, then carefully spool the bird up on the table> Keep the tail at zero pitch. (Be careful to not over-rev with the mains removed!) Feel the tail-case. It should be nearly silky-smooth. If not, the tail assy is either out-of-balance or the tail-shaft isn't square - or both. Anything that turns 20,000 RPM is supposed to be as close to perfectly balanced as possible. It is simply considered good engineering practice.

Joel

Originally Posted by turboparker

BTW - ignoring the vibration at low RPM is like ignoring an out-of-balance tire on your car just because you can't feel the imbalance at the speed you usually drive.

But, I've read where people on the forums (even HH employees, including the designer) say it's not an issue. Just spool up and blow through it because it's supposed to be normal. They can't be wrong or would never try to mask the issue, right?

Originally Posted by sgoodmeyer

But, I've read where people on the forums (even HH employees, including the designer) say it's not an issue. Just spool up and blow through it because it's supposed to be normal. They can't be wrong or would never try to mask the issue, right?

As I said - it is analogous to the out-of-balance car tire scenario. Physics is physics.

As I also said - simply remove the main blades, spool the bird up until it's past the resonance point, then feel the tail-case. If you can feel it vibrate, it is too far out-of-whack for anything that spends most of its life at 20,000 RPM. For instance - your Dremel tool doesn't vibrate - even at 30,000 RPM.

Joel

I was being facetious.

Every heli RTF is perfect out of the box. Everyone knows that right? LOL I have about 60 flights without doing a thing to mine. ( after changing out the tail hub.) It's just now starting to do the dog shakes in FFF, and sound a little loud. Time for some maint.
Garry K.

Originally Posted by sgoodmeyer

I was being facetious.

I know. I just thought I'd take the opportunity to hammer on this nail a bit more. It's not quite bent all the way over yet.

Gotta love the 'spool-up quickly' "fix". I prefer to do scale takeoffs, so that was simply not an option. Besides, I am not one who is typically satisfied with 'just good enough to get by'. I'm more of a 'take the time to do it right' type. I'd rather get the full performance that I paid for. I expected that I would have to balance the rotating assy, as one is expected to do with any RC aircraft. My only complaints are the very poor quality tail-case bearings and that I had to go through a handful of tail-shafts just to find one that was square. Once I had that sorted out, dynamically balancing the tail was a simple matter, and the bird has performed flawlessly ever since.

That said - I love my 130X! I progressed further in the first few hours of flying the 130X than I did in a year of flying my mCPX, plus another year of chasing the mushy-marshmallow BSR around the parking lot before that.

Joel

Originally Posted by turboparker

BTW - ignoring the vibration at low RPM is like ignoring an out-of-balance tire on your car just because you can't feel the imbalance at the speed you usually drive. The tire is still just as out-of-balance as it was at the speed when you felt it, and the imbalance is still doing just as much damage to the tire & suspension - even though you can't feel it. Same thing is true for the tail. The tail fin vibration disappears as you spool up simply because the period becomes shorter than the resonant frequency of the tail & fin assy. The vibration is still there, hammering away at the bearings & raising the FBL unit's nose-floor.

When my truck has out of balance tires it becomes more noticeable with increased speed. Last time i had a weight slip i didnt know until i got on the freeway on my way home and got up near 55. Everything above a certain speed and the vibes would only get worse.

Same goes with vibes on my helis...increased rpm doesnt seem to hide vibrations and instead amplifies them

Landed a little hard (on carpet indoors, have landed much harder before) and tail stops controlling. No problem with tail drive but no tail control after spooling up. rear tail servo moves when main motor stationary, but not far to control cw heli rotation. Then blue bind light starts flashing and have swash control but no main motor drive. Battery ok. Disconnect, rebind, blue light solid, main motor drive and swash control ok but tail control still problem. Main board or tail servo problem?

I asked this question on the Phoenix sim thread. Just wonder if anyone here has tried the 130x sim yet? I use a dx6i as the controller and fly several models on the sim. Tried the 130x and it has many problems.
Does anyone use throttle and pitch curves on the sim. It appears they are not recogonized or I have done someting wrong. Throttle takes 90% for takeoff and 100% to stay in the air. Drop throttle a bit and the model drops out of the air. Right now it is almost uncotrollable. At least for me.
Other models I can handle. Both FP and CP.
Any comments?

Just got my Lynx metal main blade grips installed and they are nice! I'll fly with them tomorrow, but they look very well made and the bearings are butter smooth. Absolutely no adjustments to the TX needed to be made to keep zero pitch at 1/2 stick. Everyone says these grips fly great and they should for almost $30. Did I need them? Nope. Just wanted some metal bling. Well, one justification was to dump the M2 locknuts I'd been using with the plastic grips because the blade bolts strip out so easily and I don't like super loose blades.

Turboparker,

I have been thinking about your commits on tail balancing today. +1 on holding the tail-case at high RPM to check for balance. I have been balancing by just stopping the fin from vibrating. This will not do much for the tail at normal operating RPM. Not at all fixing the problem only treating one of the symptoms.

Thanks for that post?

I crashed my 130X today.
I was flying and it went on piro once.
Decided to keep going and fly inverted. Then, it went on piro again...
To regain control, had to go upright but heli is a bit far by then.
Went to go get the heli and decided to fly it, on the way back.
Got a tail vib. Bad idea.
Well, I guess I broke the tail blade grips, so the blades flew off mid air, and crashed @ low altitude.
NOW, no beeps, and motor not working. All servos responding good.

I guess I now have a broken board?

- Spyro

Originally Posted by freezywilly

I asked this question on the Phoenix sim thread. Just wonder if anyone here has tried the 130x sim yet? I use a dx6i as the controller and fly several models on the sim. Tried the 130x and it has many problems.
Does anyone use throttle and pitch curves on the sim. It appears they are not recogonized or I have done someting wrong. Throttle takes 90% for takeoff and 100% to stay in the air. Drop throttle a bit and the model drops out of the air. Right now it is almost uncotrollable. At least for me.
Other models I can handle. Both FP and CP.
Any comments?

Just downloaded 130X for Phoenix to check, and used DX6i which I have setup for SIM on model 1 (totally standard, as set up with Phoenix). No problem at all, works fine. SIM behaves differently to model which is more stable than SIM, but otherwise pretty ok simulation. Try and redo your transmitter setup with Phoenix. Throttle and pitch curves straight 0-100%, just dialed in 20% expo to get a little more control around center stick

@deonjams Ok I used the full 130x setup as in the manual. This apparently is a no no. In the manual the pitch is reverse this will bite you fast. Will set a new model up as stock and try again. I am stll puzzled why on my dx6i I needed full throttle to get up and less than 90% throttle it just drops out of the sky.

Originally Posted by egaus

I just got my 130x the other day, been doing some reading, not sure if people were trying to fix that specific problem as it really isn't a problem since I won't be flying the heli at low throttle. Kinda dumb for HH to let that issue go to production. Their fix is in the manual I guess, quickly move throttle to 50%.

e

+1