Originally Posted by patchman61

Sorry, I meant the receiver. Yes all surfaces do move as they should. I have noticed by adjusting the trim on the elevator it can be made to stop the tone. But as you control any of the surfaces it will restart. Not Extremly loud, the motor at an idle and you will not hear it.

Have not flown it as just not too sure on this one.

Thanks

I'm a brand new pilot and ended up buying 2 Apprentice 15e's to get me started in this hobby (one flew great until I had a bad takeoff - and worse landing - in gusty wind) and then purchased a second while waiting for parts. Both of them make this same whine when you first hook up the battery, but I ignored it, and the plane flies great. I haven't ever pinned it down to figure out if it was a servo or the ESC that makes this noise.

My second Apprentice did have several manufacturing defects, all of which have been taken care of promptly by the fine folks at Horizon. The transmitter arrived with the elevator stick non-functional - thankfully I had the DX5e from the first one available. Then, the ESC went out in the second plane's maiden flight after only 2 minutes of flying, but this plane is so easy to land it made it back to Earth safely even without power.

The AR500 receiver, however, was a problem. After replacing the ESC, on its second flight, the receiver went into brown-out mode after about five minutes of flight. I just barely got it back to the ground safely, being novice and having almost no control. Thinking I had a bad battery, I went home, charged them back up, and tried again the next day, but had the same experience - brown-out in mid flight and just barely landed it.

Though it never affected my flight, I discovered that the charger on the 2nd Apprentice was bad. It won't charge anything.

So far Horizon has been excellent and shipped out all new electronics promptly, although it took a couple of weeks for a replacement engine mount and cowl for the first Apprentice.

Replacing the ESC was tricky. The leads from the ESC to the motor are hard to plug in as they connect just behind the firewall, and I just couldn't figure out how to get at them easily. I ended up removing the motor, plugging in the ESC, and passed the ESC through the front of the firewall into the compartment where it mounts. At that point, I discovered that the screw heads for the factory screws are soft and easy to strip, even with the correctly sized Phillip screwdriver. I bought 4 new screws from my local hardware store that work a lot better.

In summary: whines gently when battery connected. Apprentice #1 was flawless; #2 had a bad transmitter, ESC, receiver, and charger, but flew great after these were all replaced.

Very easy to fly, even for a novice. I hope the flaws in Apprentice #2 are an isolated problem. Excellent support from Horizon.

- Tony

Originally Posted by patchman61

I just received my new Apprentice and setting up the DX5e. When the power is connected I get a continious tone from the receiver. Is this normal??

,

Thats the digital servos.it does it on all my planes with these digital servo installed,there is no problem with them it just that they whine,

Ron

On further tinkering I found by unpluging the elevator servo the tone quit.
On repluging the servo, the tone starts. Can not be sure if the sound is being emitted by receiver or servo but am thinking servo. (My hearing is not great)By wiggiling and/or apply pressure with my thumb to the servo the tone can be made to start and stop. Removing servo arm makes no change. Do you suggest a faulty servo or is that the nature of the beast?

According to the manual it is an EFLR7140 13g sub micro servo.
Does not say if it is digital or analog. How would one tell that??

Sorry did not see the above post.
Thanks.

OK, early Christmas for me, a DX6i and an Apprentice.

Build goes OK except
1 - the tailplane clearance is insufficient for full down elevator (as remarked earlier),
2 - the 2mm gap in the wing join (due to the spar holder not being flush with the wing centre).
3 - Also the AR500 didn't want to let go of the bind plug - lesson learned, bind plugs need all other adjacent servo cables removed.
4 - Dang that battery connector is stiff too - need some tape / ribbon on its central gap to grip when disconnecting...
5 - The aileron hinges seemed to be giving away too - needed some tape to keep them together.

So far, 8/10 - great design, some niggles.

Observations:
1 - This is my first nose wheel trainer (past "trainers" have included an EStarter and SlowStick). Rudder and nosewheel authority were a pleasant sensation.
2 - Plenty of power - I actually poodled around in a fair breeze at 33% throttle or thereabouts.

I think an instructor would have failed my flight on 3 points:
a - I totally forgot about checking CoG. Luckily everything was stock so it flew OK (possibly a little nose heavy).
b - I got a little distracted when some learner lost control flying over the car park but the Apprentice was stable enough I could afford a quick look over my shoulder
c - Crosswind landing seemed OK - seemed to want to float but I cut the throttle a way out - but I flared high and did a big bounce - the plane had pretty much stopped when the wind blew it over onto its nose.

So - an excellent trainer then! The wheels were big enough for the gravel at RSA, but they seem a bit soft in terms of foam so may not last long. The prop clearance seemed a little low but there were no problems flying off.

New score: 9/10

Mods: apart from the aileron tape mentioned above, I hotglued the gap in the wing halves and added some strapping tape top and bottom - to avoid any "wing integrity in flight" issues.

Future mods / shopping: another battery maybe, and probably a DX5-DX6i trainer cord.

Mysteries: the spare screw for the rear tail unit!

Here are my skis added to the apprentice they are dubro park flyer i had to buy 2 sets since they come 2 to a pack the first pack i found on ebay for 4 bucks 2nd at local hobby shop for 10,they take about 10 minutes to put on they feel cheap when you first feel them. they are a soft flexible plastic but i think they will be more than enough for apprentice and will do a good job,also are very light ,they come with collars for the wire but they are not big enough for the apprentice,i bought a pack of 1/8 collars and they worked fine for both inside and out using the screw that came with the skis on these collars also with the front ski i trimmed it bout 1/4 inch since the prop was just about touching so just to be safe i took a bit off,i just cut it with scissors and used a file to clean it up i am useing a 11X8e apc prop the stock prop did fit without touching and was not as close but i would still take a bit off just to be safe,did not test them in the air yet as we have no snow i tried them on the grass but they were to sticky and the plane just sat there at full throttle but did not tip over and felt very stable,hoe this helps
Ron

Nice Snoopy
How did you spray the surfaces?

I have a question about rudder servo, it is not metal gears version.
Could someone identify that servo? I'd like to buy metal gear set for it, or should i better buy new one? If yes, witch one (from hobbycity, if possible)

Originally Posted by alex.guzun

Nice Snoopy
How did you spray the surfaces?

I have a question about rudder servo, it is not metal gears version.
Could someone identify that servo? I'd like to buy metal gear set for it, or should i better buy new one? If yes, witch one (from hobbycity, if possible)

i painted the plane with kylon fusion based it with white then trimmed with red very easy did not take that long,I try and keep painting simple so when i crash its not that hard to match it back up.as far as the servo i am not sure if its metal gear,do a search,i use the old adage if its not broke dont fix it.mine works great so i never really looked into them that much

Ron

I've been flying my Apprentice quite a bit lately, love it! A couple of questions:

Anyone ever figure out what the plastic cut out on the side of the fuse is for? Can Dave at HH maybe answer this?

Anyone program spoilerons? - On my last few flights, seemed to float almost too much. Not a complaint at all - just a thought.

Tim

Originally Posted by whitehawk

Anyone ever figure out what the plastic cut out on the side of the fuse is for? ...

Tim

I'm pretty sure this is for a battery switch. Possibly some clubs insist on a "kill power" switch when re/moving planes to and from the runway - so simply put a switch in line with the battery +ve lead here to avoid fiddling with the battery hatch in the field.

Braver souls could also use this for a charge port

witch switch should i use, then? It should be capable of big Amps

Originally Posted by alex.guzun

witch switch should i use, then? It should be capable of big Amps

True. Some ESCs come with a switch to do the job at low voltage. I've heard others use a "circuit break plug" instead (consider an in-line deans female in the +ve wire located in this hole, with the male plug being just a connection. To break the power, pull the deans out from the plug. But the plug cannot come loose in flight nor be too difficult to extract on the ground...).

may i will intall just a switch for receiver
SPM9530 or SPM9531 or SPM6820

Picking nits-

After watching an Apprentice flying last weekend at the local flying field and being very impressed as a gentle trainer, I picked up one at the LHS this week.

As I started to go through the instructions and the assembly process, I did note several things that had me concerned.

As has been mentioned on this list before 1 of the 4 "T" posts that the rubber bands go over to hold the wing down was completely loose. Pulled off w/ my fingers. Easy enough to fix w/ some thin CA. And there was a addendum in the kit warning of this.

Another was the wedge shaped piece of foam skin w/ the three round vent holes on the underside of the fuse behind the main wing area and in front of the tail. This piece was +90% loose and could be easily removed w/ 1 finger. It did have a sticky substance around the seam area but it was never properly seated into the main fuse. I could have seen it peel off in flight the first time up. OK. Fine. Seat it properly and add more CA wicked into the seam to glue it back in.

The decals were REALLY wrinkled in several areas or just down right crooked. Lots of bubbles all over the plane wherever the decals were applied. Two 3+ inch long wrinkles around the ailerons were really unsightly and resisted any attempt to smooth out. Granted the foam underneath isn't a mirror finish, but my el cheapo Wild Hawk from Harbor freight I picked up two weeks ago had zero defects in the decals and were properly centered when applied. With what this plane cost I would expect a MUCH better decal finish than what I got.

The "crinkly" (for lack of a better word) hinge tape(?) on the ailerons was wrinkled and looked to be poorly applied. I'm almost tempted to remove it and re-apply w/ two directional gauze H/D packing tape. I'm not convinced that what was applied at the factory will last.

I am looking forward to see how this plane flies this weekend at the field. It should be a good aileron trainer despite the defects in workmanship and lack of Q.A. before shipping.


Dave

Has anyone added floats to this plane? It seems like it would hve no problem ROW. How much room is needed to fly it comfortably?