Anyone with this experience, My 130x flies and all of sudden looses power and Im forced to land., I see the blue light is flashing. Its not the lipo they are new and its not low in voltage. Do I have a bad board. Also any mods for the tail gears, really getting old when the gears need to be replaced. I know why i havent flown this in years.

Originally Posted by tkoguy

Anyone with this experience, My 130x flies and all of sudden looses power and Im forced to land., I see the blue light is flashing. Its not the lipo they are new and its not low in voltage. Do I have a bad board. Also any mods for the tail gears, really getting old when the gears need to be replaced. I know why i havent flown this in years.

Three likely possibilities that I can think of (in order of probability).

1. Battery. I know you say the battery is OK but do you know that for sure? Sounds like LVC is triggering. It will produce the symptoms you report.

2. Connector. The red JST connector can become flakey with poor connection / high resistance as it gets older. This will produce the same symptoms as a bad battery. I despise those red JST connectors and replace them on ALL my helis and airplanes. They are usually OK when new but as they age they get worse and worse. You can try contact cleaner and see if it makes any difference, but it would be a temporary solution at best.

3. Overheated motor. The 130 motor runs very hot in normal use. As it gets hot, the wire resistance increases which in turn increases the dissipation and motor temperature. At some point, the situation runs away. Above a certain temperature the magnets start to lose their magnetism which further adds to the dissipation. I don't know what that temperature is, but don't overlook the possibility. My 130 runs about 80 degrees C (too hot to touch) and there have been a couple times where in a hard maneuver the head speed dropped and didn't recover much (if at all) even when I landed and ran at zero pitch (ie., lightly loaded) for a bit. I can't say for sure that the drop in power was due to a hot motor but if it was the battery it would (I think) have recovered while sitting on the ground t zero pitch. Note that this scenario would probably NOT trigger LVC (flashing blue light) until the magnets got hot enough to lose magnetism.

One other possibility that might trigger a flashing blue light would be momentary or sustained loss of contact with the transmitter. I'm not sure about this one and would have to test it to see if the blue light flashes when the board loses contact with the transmitter. Do you still have cyclic cyclic and rudder control immediately after this happens?

Paul

Originally Posted by pgoelz

Three likely possibilities that I can think of (in order of probability).

1. Battery. I know you say the battery is OK but do you know that for sure? Sounds like LVC is triggering. It will produce the symptoms you report.

2. Connector. The red JST connector can become flakey with poor connection / high resistance as it gets older. This will produce the same symptoms as a bad battery. I despise those red JST connectors and replace them on ALL my helis and airplanes. They are usually OK when new but as they age they get worse and worse. You can try contact cleaner and see if it makes any difference, but it would be a temporary solution at best.

3. Overheated motor. The 130 motor runs very hot in normal use. As it gets hot, the wire resistance increases which in turn increases the dissipation and motor temperature. At some point, the situation runs away. Above a certain temperature the magnets start to lose their magnetism which further adds to the dissipation. I don't know what that temperature is, but don't overlook the possibility. My 130 runs about 80 degrees C (too hot to touch) and there have been a couple times where in a hard maneuver the head speed dropped and didn't recover much (if at all) even when I landed and ran at zero pitch (ie., lightly loaded) for a bit. I can't say for sure that the drop in power was due to a hot motor but if it was the battery it would (I think) have recovered while sitting on the ground t zero pitch. Note that this scenario would probably NOT trigger LVC (flashing blue light) until the magnets got hot enough to lose magnetism.

One other possibility that might trigger a flashing blue light would be momentary or sustained loss of contact with the transmitter. I'm not sure about this one and would have to test it to see if the blue light flashes when the board loses contact with the transmitter. Do you still have cyclic cyclic and rudder control immediately after this happens?

Paul

After the blue flashing light, sometimes I loose rudder control, I throttle down and the flashing stops and I am able to hover again for 10 or 15 secs and it does it again. I have an outrunner motor from wowhobbies that is in the bird and it never overheats. It flew perfect several years ago before i shelved it. I bought new batteries and try fly it again and, this happens. Any after market parts for the tail for this bird, I already have all metal gears in it, was wondering if anyone came up with a better solution.
Here is a video of the heli when it flew great.

Blade 130X with a mishap (4 min 49 sec)

Well, I hate to say it but your symptoms exactly describe a bad (ie., high resistance) battery or connector. And my money is on the battery.

When you lost rudder control, did you notice if the head speed had decayed? As the head speed decays you increase collective pitch to compensate. But the higher collective pitch at lower head speed is less efficient and requires more tail thrust to counter the increased torque. At some point as things decay the tail rotor is no longer turning fast enough and even at full tail pitch it can't counter the mainshaft torque and around it goes.

Of course, it could be something entirely different like a bad board, but that is a lot less likely than a bad (or perhaps "insufficient") battery. Your non-OEM motor is an unknown.... it may pull more current than the stock motor and exceed the battery's discharge capacity. Do you have any idea what your head speed is?

The only way to know for sure is to monitor the battery voltage under actual flight load while it is losing power. Measuring the voltage after you land does not tell you the whole story. A high resistance battery can drop to LVC levels under load but recover to a much higher voltage on the ground.

Paul

Originally Posted by pgoelz

Well, I hate to say it but your symptoms exactly describe a bad (ie., high resistance) battery or connector. And my money is on the battery.

When you lost rudder control, did you notice if the head speed had decayed? As the head speed decays you increase collective pitch to compensate. But the higher collective pitch at lower head speed is less efficient and requires more tail thrust to counter the increased torque. At some point as things decay the tail rotor is no longer turning fast enough and even at full tail pitch it can't counter the mainshaft torque and around it goes.

Of course, it could be something entirely different like a bad board, but that is a lot less likely than a bad (or perhaps "insufficient") battery. Your non-OEM motor is an unknown.... it may pull more current than the stock motor and exceed the battery's discharge capacity. Do you have any idea what your head speed is?

The only way to know for sure is to monitor the battery voltage under actual flight load while it is losing power. Measuring the voltage after you land does not tell you the whole story. A high resistance battery can drop to LVC levels under load but recover to a much higher voltage on the ground.

Paul

I have 4 brand new Nano packs and they all do the same thing. And the headspeed is pretty high, I dont know if you saw the video, but you can hear the head speed. The batteries are the same ones used in the video but new lipos. Maybe a loose connections somewhere. Any aftermarket tails stuff in the last couple of years, like a belt drive or something for these.lol

Don't know what else to tell you. If the head speed drops and the blue LED flashes, it hit LVC voltage. The reasons would be what I outlined earlier. Either something is causing the current to be higher than expected or there is a high resistance element in the circuit.... battery, connector, wiring. I mis-spoke earlier.... I thought the 130 used the red JST. However, I would also suspect the connector the 130 uses. Is the battery connector warm immediately after a flight?

Try reducing your head speed? Very high head speeds are less efficient and require more power for the same lift vs. lower head speeds. Your head speed does seem very high in the video.

Try putting the OEM motor back in?

Paul

Ill try the OEM motor and see what happens. Anything on the tail upgrades? Thanks

The only tail mod I know of that actually does something useful is the center bearing mod. Most of the other stuff is (in my opinion) mostly bling.

And we're really just guessing here. Without some instrumentation and data, that is all we can do. You are reporting that (I think) your head speed drops and the blue light flashes. That sounds like LVC. The next step would be to measure the current and voltage as it happens and see what the weak point is. Your head speed sounds pretty insane to me... my motor gets too hot to touch flying my stock 130 at a very sedate 3600 RPM and I get three minutes on a stock 300mAH or older TP 450mAH down to about 25% remaining . And I'm pretty certain your setup draws a LOT more current than mine.....

Paul

I remember with the stock motor, it just didn't have that pop I like. It was difficult to do tic-tocs, maybe it was all in my small head.lol Felt like trying tic-toc with a MCPX stock.

Originally Posted by tkoguy

I remember with the stock motor, it just didn't have that pop I like. It was difficult to do tic-tocs, maybe it was all in my small head.lol Felt like trying tic-toc with a MCPX stock.

Have you checked for any resistance in the gear mesh? is everything turning smoothly ?

After several months not flying my 130x I decided to repair the tail gearbox and go flying. I had most of the parts I need and the repair went slowly but smoothly. However, I have a stability issue with the heli.

When powered up and light on the skids the heli suddenly looses stability and tilts over rapidly either forwards or to the right. I have changed the onboard circuit board but it is doing the same thing.

Originally Posted by GrahamWilson

After several months not flying my 130x I decided to repair the tail gearbox and go flying. I had most of the parts I need and the repair went slowly but smoothly. However, I have a stability issue with the heli.

When powered up and light on the skids the heli suddenly looses stability and tilts over rapidly either forwards or to the right. I have changed the onboard circuit board but it is doing the same thing.

Sounds like the swash is not level, either statically or after the motor is running. The 130 gyro system is in rate mode at zero throttle and transitions to heading hold when you throttle up. At zero throttle the swash will respond to the sticks like an airplane... it will follow stick inputs and return to center when the stick is centered. But with the main motor running, the swash will tilt off center and stay there if the sticks and trims are not centered. Observe the swash at zero throttle.... it should be exactly level. If not, adjust the linkages so that it is. Now spool up with the blades removed and observe the swash. If it tilts off level with the motor running, you either have a bad board (which it sounds like you have eliminated) or more likely, your transmitter is driving it off level. Your trims and subtrims should all be centered. You might also want to calibrate your sticks if your transmitter has that function. If all that checks out, check yourself.... are you by chance trying to "fly" it before it gets light enough on the skids to respond to your stick inputs?

And of course you could have a dead servo. Do they all move together with collective input?

You didn't swap two of the servos when you plugged them in did you? Easy to check.... move the right stick and make sure the swash follows your cyclic inputs in the correct directions.

Paul

That you for your informative reply. I will check all of these points.

Originally Posted by pgoelz

Sounds like the swash is not level, either statically or after the motor is running. The 130 gyro system is in rate mode at zero throttle and transitions to heading hold when you throttle up. At zero throttle the swash will respond to the sticks like an airplane... it will follow stick inputs and return to center when the stick is centered. But with the main motor running, the swash will tilt off center and stay there if the sticks and trims are not centered. Observe the swash at zero throttle.... it should be exactly level. If not, adjust the linkages so that it is. Now spool up with the blades removed and observe the swash. If it tilts off level with the motor running, you either have a bad board (which it sounds like you have eliminated) or more likely, your transmitter is driving it off level. Your trims and subtrims should all be centered. You might also want to calibrate your sticks if your transmitter has that function. If all that checks out, check yourself.... are you by chance trying to "fly" it before it gets light enough on the skids to respond to your stick inputs?

And of course you could have a dead servo. Do they all move together with collective input?

You didn't swap two of the servos when you plugged them in did you? Easy to check.... move the right stick and make sure the swash follows your cyclic inputs in the correct directions.

Paul

You can also take the blades off and with the motor running make sure that the swash moves in the correct directions when the heli is tilted.

After cruising on this thread, I'm tempted to start fixing my old 130X ,lol!

KBDD Chipped main blades & tail blades 130x flight MUST SEE :-) (3 min 8 sec)

= Back in the day, not the craziest 3D but funny, I thought :-)