JPEE

Hey Glenn,

Thanks for the condolences but this too shall pass as they say. I have to look it like this, I flew that heli for two years and three month before I crashed it. I had a lot of fun with it forsure.

This is not say her life is gone. I have some things in the wind working right now. I am looking at a 550 airframe complete less electronics, I am looking at buying a new HK 600 for $180.00 delivered

and my buddy wants to buy the head and tail box both of which I do not want nor would I fly them. Then I would have a new CF fame complete! and related parts. Then everything would be Align except the frame.

And on the note, I have now broken 1 ea. 450 pro frame, 2 ea. 500 frames, and now the 600 frame. I think the CF story everyone is passing around is bunk! They are so strong and light, buck I say!

They fracture and come apart and I don't see anything really exceptional about them except they are EXPENSIVE. Then just today I missed an "align 600" complete air frame exactly like mine for a $150.00[X(].

So there are deals and more deals out there. I have all of the time in the world to wait. I still have my Pro and 500's, which by the way I PMed him today and he said I should be seeing it soon as

he mailed it last week. so I am not totally grounded.


Nick,

Its good to hear school is coming along, I know it isn't easy. Thank goodness you were able to pull your self out on the biology test too. You will find that you laptop will become your very BEST friend

in the days to come. If your hand wirting is really that bad and chicken scratches..........perhaps your going to be a MD DOCTOR someday?

John

rotarydoc

Mark must be busy building...

JPEE

10-4 on that!

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Aw, you got me pegged! Been building a little bit. Will post some pictures a bit later but didn't want to put them up so early to John's pictures.

JPEE,

I kinda knew that was going to be an expensive crash, sorta been there just a short while ago. Was the FlyPark where you did your last aerial video from? If so, that terrain doesn't look very forgiving...meaning all the rocks in and around the riverbed. I don't think any kind of frame would have a good survival rate with that. But still, CF is expensive no matter how you look at it.

As you said there are options out there...not to mention decent deals to be found. Just keep checking the classifieds here, and on RCgroups, Helifreak, Craiglist, etc. and something will come up. HC seems to have the best deal on replacement parts for your 600 if you go that route. Also check out [link=http://www.ac-rc.com/index.php?cPath=56_68_88&osCsid=biu09fmlnci5mp5q8s s65vd282]AC-RC.com[/link] for Tarot 600 parts...they may have a deal where shipping is free which may offset the price a bit.

Glad to hear the Neu motor survived. What about the ESC...that looked like the entire heatsink came off? If that was your Kontronik you may want to contact them to see about having them do a systems check on it to make sure it is A-Okay use.

Take care...maybe jump in the car and take the wife for a drive and enjoy some of that Cal-I-Forna sunshine and air!

Mark

jroo

JPEE,
Man sorry for the expensive crash; that sucks.

Lets see some build pics of the 550!

Took the 450 out for a spin last night. It seems every flight is getting better and better. I had the video camera strapped to it and did get some video, but I'm not sure it's worth it to post just yet. I think I will attach the camera to the bill of my cap next time. My flying has just progressed so much, i love it!

again, 550 pics!!

jroo

so are we moving or not. I vote we go over to helifreak and just make a completely new topic of our choosing. Our final post here can just be the url to the new place.

jroo

A plus with helifreak is they have an forum app for iPhone/IPad as well!

JPEE

Jreue,

Thank you for your position on a relocation, I too like HF because, lets be honest most of here travel there often so why not go there for a new home. When you said they welcom iPhone and Ipad NOW you gonna pull Glenn in forsure. Mark sold his 500 there, not on RCU.

If you ever look at the ads here they are weak to say the least. We could go there and give it a whirl, I just don't see any down side at all. Yes the 600 is a mess to say the least. Last night I bid on a 550e air frame complete with two extra main frame sets and some other

parts as well. I thought $350.00 was a but high even though it has never been flown. It was complete and ready for electrics to be installed and ready to fly. Oh, it came with a tote bag too! But another 550e had just sold for $300.00 and two used 600 airframes sold

$200.00 and $250.00. Then to make it worse you can buy a 600 Super Combo for $399.00[X(] http://www.helicopterfly.com/trex-el...er-p-1422.html So I am still figuring. I might place a WTB ad on a few sites and see what hits.

As I wrote above I could just buy a HK 600 and sell off the other parts I dont need. In the words of Vinne Barbarino, "I am so confused" from welcome back Kotter. You kids are all to young to remember that show LOL.

Such good news to hear your skills are on the rise, that's when it becomes fun to fly, not having fear over your shoulder.


Mark, to answer your question, yes I was flying in the riverbed. That is what wrecked the heli, it came down on two bolders the size of small water melons. The one was right under the belly of the frame, I should have taken a picture with my iPhone,

but to be honest my breath was kind of taken at the time.

No the ESC was the Align thank goodness! The back plate will be an easy repair "I think", there wasn't much that held that back plate on. The heat sink is still there on the front.

My wife! you had to mention that didn't you (just kidding)..........well she is in Costa Rica for eight days! She was to go with a freind as I am not a traveler, but at trip booking time her friend fell through. So what does a good dad do? I called my daughters and asked,

how would you both like an all expense paid trip for 8 days to Costa Rica with your step mother (who they love)? You can imagine what their replies were........they are with her! Meanwhile.... their husbands are home with two children each for 8 days LMFAO....

This will show them what their wives do in a day ha, ha, ha, ha,

Thanks for that website I am going to over there now to peek a bit and here is your California morning pic out my window.


JPEE

rotarydoc

Hey guys,

JPEE,

Looks like you are weighing your options carefully...

I have heard the term "rekit" used before, basically it's sometimes more effective to just buy another kit than to repair the helicopter when there is extensive damage.

I see you haven't been having any problems uploading pics...I wonder if my trouble ticket got some attention to the right people?

Mark,

Yeah, take your time with the pics, but they would be interesting to see....that kit is all new to me...

Guys,

As for relocating to HF, count me out....I've been here since I first got my CP Pro, and the place (with it's glitches and all) has sentimental value to me...and my 4700 or so posts....and alot of them helped build it to one of the largest, longest running threads on RCU...

If you guys go, I'll come and visit once in a while, but I'll always call this thread home..

Glenn

JPEE

Glenn,

Thank you for your sentiments on the thread. As I said, it was a suggestion and "All for one and one for All", or as the Marine credo reads, " Leave no man behind"! So we stay here.


I got a reply for my WTB a 600e air frame tonight. The guy is back east so I have to call him in the morning. He was brief but did say, he is not giving it away. Again running the facts and numbers in the my head, I can buy just an HK CF

frame done deleiverd for $70.00. If I buy the whole heli that runs $180 delivered, but that gets so close to the market price for a used Align 600 I might as well spend another $100.00 and keep my head and tail as backups. Oh beans, no my

head is spinning again. Enough of this helicopter stuff...........


John

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

What a night building...think I'm going to hit the sack now. Just going to post the build pictures of what I have for now.

Want to say more on the various topics but that will have to wait 'till tomoroow.

Night all,

Mark

rotarydoc

Hey Mark,

Brings back old memories, I see you posted at about 2:30 AM...I remember staying up until like 4AM a couple of nights building my 500..[X(]

You are much more organized than I...my building table is usually a mess.

Was the head pre-assembled? Seems to be the way Align is going lately, but of course you still have to take it back apart anyways to check loctite...

Looks great!

Totally off topic...is anyone going to watch Jeopardy tonight? I NEVER watch it, but tonight there is a special guest...WATSON...an IBM supercomputer that is going to go head to head with a couple of the all time champs at Jeopardy, should be interesting to see how it turns out...

Glenn

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Glenn,

Not quite an all nighter...I can only make it to about 2AM now...must be getting older.

The head doesn't come together...it comes in pieces in separate bags...but as you said you have to clean all the oil from the threads and apply loctite so no use in doing double work.

One thing I did differently with this build was to install the servo's and run the wiring in the framework before actually assembling the frame...I saw a picture on HF and thought what a great idea. Makes installing the elevator servo much easier and I was able to route the servo wires exactly where I wanted...well, almost.

This build reminds me so much of the 450 Pro...just without the servo/bearing block unit headache. But having the tail servo situated in the frame, and the anti-rotation bracket...almost identical to the Pro. I like it a lot!

Funny on the organization...don't let the photo's fool you...they were set up that way on purpose. lol. My builds usually have me spending more time looking for a missing part then actually building.

I have a feeling I will have this heli finished before I get my batteries...I won't be able to order them from HC until Friday (payday ). I am waiting on my EC5 connectors and BEC from AMainHobbies - has anyone done head setup using a receiver pack from an airplane? I believe they use 7.4V and are much easier on the ESC/BEC then using the voltage from the lipo's. Will have to double check HF to see where I saw that thread.

About the move...I'm glad that we are staying. I too am used to RCU and kind of like the overall feel of it.

One note on loading pics I did last night...use the BETA:Multi-File Upload and you must do one picture at a time otherwise you only find one picture loaded after hitting the OK button. IE: Upload image, click done. Then go back and do it again for each picture. At least that was the way it worked for me.

Interesting about the Jeapordy game tonight...I do believe the computer will win hands down...ever try playing chess against the older Window's computer games? The computer almost always won.

Mark

evdreamer

John,

That is good you have a lot of choices to fix your 600. It is not fun fixing a crashed 600. My two little crashes were pretty expensive too.

I found out today that my biology teacher scaled the tests, so it bumped me up to an A.

Glenn,

I probably won't watch Jeopardy tonight. I wonder how long it took to move a super computer?

Mark,

Your 550 looks good.

Are you talking about a NiCd or NiMh receiver battery? Those are down at 4.8 and 6V. If you use one of those you could just bypass the BEC/regulator. If you are talking about a LiPo you are correct. Most BEC's in ESC's step the Voltage down by heat. The smaller the Voltage you put in it the less heat it will have and the more efficient it will be.

If you are going to use a receiver pack you can't use the BEC in the ESC. You would need an external BEC or a regulator.

Nick

rotarydoc

Mark,

I think you are asking if you can temporarily use a battery pack to setup the head/servos, etc, until you get your main packs?

I have a 4 AA cell battery holder that I got from the LHS just for that, to power up the RX for head setup...and it worked out real well.

I just plugged the battery holder (6v with 4 AA's) into the battery pins on the RX (watch the polarity!) and then I was good to go with head/servo setup.

You can also still bind the RX (I was confused, on my AR6100 the battery and bind are the same pins) by using the bind plug on another set of pins since they are on a common bus...you may want to double check, but I think I am recalling correctly...

I would have replied sooner, but we had high winds here, and another 8 hour power outage...[&o]

Glenn

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

That is what I was wondering, Glenn, if I could use a receiver pack I have laying around to do the setup while waiting for my lipo's to come in...that way I can get to a maiden sooner. I think Nick was thinking I was going to use a separate pack from the lipo to power the servo's/receiver/gyro and the lipo for the motor. Nothing that complicated right now.

Funny about breeding mice during your snake days...during my college days I worked part-time at a medical research lab doing diabetes research...and yes they used mice that were genetically engineered to not have an active immune system so they were in an isolation ward and we had to completely gown up to work on them - just like the IBM computer commercials with the techs completely covered. There were easily over 100 mice that we would have to check the sugar levels on by bleeding the tail, well, enough of the details but during their breeding if the young were not separated you got to see the effects of cannibalism. I quickly learned how to properly hold a mouse so that you could work on it and not get bitten...those suckers were fast to chomp a finger!

Ah, college...Nick, definitely enjoy these years. You will look back on them as great times. Try Corona w/ a slice of lime...not your typical 'beer taste'. And don't forget the liqueur mixers...lots of websites with drink recipes on them for your enjoyment. Just don't go crazy b/c you can find yourself paying as much for a night to buy a 250 heli if your not careful! [X(]

JPEE,

Any concrete decisions on the frame repair/replacement dilema? BTW, when does the wife and daughter return?? Oooh, that was a mean thing to do to their husbands.

Got the 550 tail done last night...finally found a heli with a decent amount of loctite on the tail grip screws and all the tail case screws were firmly loctited so that was also a nice find. Going to finish the TT and boom placement tonight - they even included the boom pin screw with the hole already drilled in the boom (to pin the boom) - that was very nice to see Align has started to include that.

The last thing I will do is the head build and making the links...of all the build making the linkages is the one part I cannot stand. [:'(] My fingers and hands are always sore afterwards just from holding the pliers so tightly and twisting those ball links on. I have yet to find a simplistic way of doing it.

Hope everyone is doing good...

Mark

P.S. - Glenn, hope things didn't get too cold during that 8 hour power outage. Yikes, its one thing after another for you guys this year. []

rotarydoc

Mark,

Ask and you shall receive....

http://www.heliproz.com/prodinfo.asp?number=LINKMAKER

Kinda expensive, but saves the wear and tear on the hands!

That is interesting on the mice, I never learned how to properly handle them, and yes, they can chomp ya pretty good, I was more afraid of a mouse bite than a snake one...with snakes though, you have to try not to jerk away, or you can pull some of their relatively fragile teeth out, stuck in your wound...[X(]

Needless to say, my mouse raising days were very limited....I later resorted to just buying them at the stores...

I am hoping the worst of the weather here is over for now...in fact, it's supposed to be nearly 70 by week's end!

I had to replace the power supply in my PC at work today...I think it got zapped by the power outage yesterday. I tried to post about the battery pack thing, and the PC just shut down, right in the middle of typing the post, not once, but twice!! It was not a good day! I fiddled with it for a bit today, and eliminated some things, and came down to the power supply and took care of that...maybe I should consider an occupation change over...lol...

Good to hear that someone over in Taiwan has finally told the assembly line workers what to apply loctite to on the heli kits...long overdue! Only problem is, you still have to check each part to be sure!

Glenn

JPEE

WELL I JUST LOST MY POST AGAIN BUT I HAD BEEN PREPAIRED

Hi guys, I have so much to share.

Mark,

Your build looks really nice and your layout looks as anal as mine. I had a table to build upon and a table with parts and a table for tools-glue-loctite and such set up like a U in the room. My builds take more time than you and Glenn and no doubt Nick. I work until I dont feel

fresh and feel might make a mistake so that's when I quit for the nite. I like the three canpoies to show off exactly what the different sizes are. OBTW I tried that setting the elevator servo in both my 450 pro and the 500esp all of the servos like you in th frames. You have to rememeber

I have replaced in total now 4-5 frames on all for my CF fleet so after that you start to see these little short cuts (expensive short cuts lol) My DX7 came with a receiver pack so that has always made it easy for me to align servos and do a bench bind and work my servos first.

That was really critical on the 450 Pro. As you all know those servos arms are a B to mess with once in the frame.

Regarding the uploads Mark. I have found that I can upload large mega pixal pictures at a one each and generally they go right in. However, if I take those same pictures and try a multi load they KICK OUT. So what I did was to go down from a 14 mp pictures to a 5 mp and those

load pretty fast under the multi-loader.

Ball link loader. You can take a wood dowel and cut a slot in the bottom of it. Then you hold the rod with pliers. The wood is about 1/2" in dia. and you have great leverage with that. If you have a small battery drill you can chuck that wood dowel up and go slow but the dowel has

to be no more than about 1/4" to chuck up in those little drills.


Nick,

Does "scaled" the test score mean the same a graded on a class curve? Sounds like.



Glenn,

When I remembered Jeopardy was on I ran to the TV and it was 7:35 and over! But I did see a brief update on the news this morning that said Watson held his own! Man sorry to hear the wind knocked out the power again for you, that's no fun at all.


JPEE:

Today I bought a 600 and of all places Orlando Florida, sound familure to anyone here MARKKKK.

I had one guy that had a 600 CF frame like mine for a fair price $250.00 but I was having trouble nailing him down on shipping and such. He was at work and it was tough to talk back and forth with him. Then my buddy texted late last night on this one

http://rc.runryder.com/helicopter/t631930p1/ Greg the owner was a peach of a guy and because I paid him so fast he wrote back with a bonus of a 5000 mah pack used and still in fair shape and a receiver Align pack too! I did not pay his asking price but a few bucks less but I

got a heli in very shape with other extras you can see in the pictures. Now lets talk about frames, FRP, FG, CF. When I looked at his heli it said it has G10 frames. I had never heard of that term in the three years + I have been flying. It is some kind of a reinforced plastic

by Align as I read it. I read some threads where the guys like them as they will flex to some degree and not shatter like the CF frames. Boys I had two broken frames on the wall here and this 600 makes three (I save CF for repairs and braces) and to be honest I don't

have much good to say about it. I spoke with an old timer like me yesterday lol on a possible sale of a air frame. He has 6 ea. 600 and 5 ea. 550 helis to name a few oh! and several 450s too. They are all set up a bit different and many more beyond that. He told me that

he has been getting two frames and setting them in epoxie and placing them in his 5000 pound press to make super frames which really helped when he crashed. MARK......he too uses the zip ties on the skids and all of his helis and that has worked very well for him.

Then to make it even more difficult CHOPPER (dave) sent me a link about these new helis I was not familure with but certainly worth the look. I will post the links but you can buy a 600 CNC air frame for $270.00 and they are supposed to be far better than any KH product.

They are located in Washington State.


These guys are top notch. They use the 7075 aluminum, same as Align.

Check out the Chaos 600 kits.

Here's there site:

http://www.scaleflying.com/RC-Helicopters_c_37.html

Here's a kit with free shipping and a Nano gyro, belt drive:

http://www.scaleflying.com/Chaos-600...ro_p_1317.html

Same as above, but Torque Tube jobber.

http://www.scaleflying.com/Chaos-600...ro_p_1315.html

A Forum of the guys that have purchased them and their "liking" opinions http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showt...1308295&page=2


MEANWHILE, still no 500 in the mail yet. I will wait until this Thursday and try another PM to the seller and try to see what's up? He said he mailed last week but from Mexico I am sure they work far different than here in the USA.

Boy's I am gonna do a copy and past on this baby, this was work to put together LMAO.

JPEE

JPEE

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

How's it going guys?

Glenn, that is a very ingenious device but its the little main grip to mixer arm links that are a pain...when you get both links on you only have mm's worth of space to get a hold with pliers so I don't think that nifty device would work in that case. But cool none-the-less.

John,

Sounds like you finalized your decision on the 600 - that was a very good price he listed. Let us know how things look when you get it.

Any news on the 500? Yeah, I'm sure Mexico is a bit different when it comes to shipping - the guy didn't use UPS or FedEx I guess?

Finished up the tail section a few nights ago (took last night off from building )...looks like the boom pin that Align drilled into the boom was slightly off and so when installed the tail was not perpendicular to the main shaft. Not really that much of a problem as I just drilled a new hole on the opposite side after aligning everything. At least Align is making an effort right now for the boom pin and I'm sure in time it'll be spot on.

Right now waiting on my BEC and lipo connectors...hoping they came in today that way I can do the soldering tonight. Then all I have left is to finish the head before doing the setup. And oh yeah, I ordered a couple of batteries from HC US warehouse today so maybe I can get everything by next week for a maiden!

Mark

JPEE

Hello Mark,


What great news to hear your progress on the 550. You must be getting very excited now hey? I hear exactly what your saying when you mention those tiny link rods. Honestly I had forgotten what a pain those were, but thank goodness

there are only two of them. Regarding pinning, I had to pin my boom into the main frame head boom box. I have heard countless stories of guys literally blowing the tail off their bird in flight! OUCH[X(] If I may, I think you made a

very smart move in laying off the 550 for a night or two. Sometimes you just need to step back and clear you head a bit. And waiting for parts is fun in itself........it's like your birthday and gifts are coming!


I just got an email from the Greg who sold me the 600. He said he dropped it off and he gave me the tracking number, and he insured it for $300.00! What a nice guy he has been on this deal. I just sent a letter to the 500 owner saying

was concerned as it has been 9 days since he said he mailed it from Mexico. He asked me to wait until March 10th and if it has not arrive he would refund the my money. I have my fingers crossed.


Wife comes home today after her and my daughters living wide for 8 days. Once the dust settles I have the shop cleaned up and ready to start my repairs on "my" 500. I was waiting for the 500#2 to arrive so I could work on them both

at the same time. Clearly that's off in the future. And just becasue I was board last night I bought a second Fatuba GY611 gyro off Ebay for $75.00 to keep in the drawer. Ya never know what you might need and those puppies are not

cheap over the counter.


John

JPEE

News Flash!

My 500 arrived today just as I walked it to my PO Store.

It is not damaged as bad as I thought it would or could be. I was SHOCKED to see he included neatly new and balanced 2650 mah 6S 30C pack. The other suprise was that it had a Fatuba GY 770 Gyro. I looked that up and they cost $189.00 crap and holy
molie that was a shocker. Pics tomorrow.
John

sent from my iPhone

evdreamer

I finally have time to post again. I have been busy with homework and studying for some tests.

Glenn,

Sorry you had a power outage a few days ago.

I saw a little clip of Watson on Jeopardy during my computer class. That was pretty cool.

Mark,

Is your 550 getting really close to a maiden yet?

John,

Yeah, I was talking about a class curve.

It sounds like you had a good experience with the new 600. The G10 parts are popular with the Outrage helis. I bought a G10 bottom plate for my Velocity. It was half the price of the CF piece. My only complaint is it is harder to clean the fuel/oil off than with the CF.

That is great news you finally got your 500. Have fun with the new gyros.

Nick

rotarydoc

Hey guys,

Not much new here, except weather related stuff....

I feel like I'm in SoCal with JPEE this weekend...we had some really bad BRUSH FIRES...which is really weird for here...anytime...the wind on Saturday was ridiculous, like 55 MPH+ gusts...and fanning the flames...

http://www.wbaltv.com/news/26926963/detail.html

Apparenly, the fires came very close to engulfing my plane club's field....

A note from the club's president;



Everything of value survived at the field, which is good.

Most of the over-fly area around the runway burned.

There are some ruts and tracks from fire fighting equipment on the
runway, so while it's flyable, you need to be extra careful.

Also, the fire department cut a fire break all the way around the
runway. As a result, missing the runway on landing, or running
off the edge or ends will cause a lot of damage. The break is
large chucks of dirt and sod that was bulldozed or plowed up,
and is quite hard and a foot or more high.

We are leaving the gate open and unlocked for a day or two for
now, since the fire department is still coming and going, and
may need to get in again to put out any hot spots that pop up.

If you want to fly, you can, but if the fire department is
in the overfly area for any reason, then no flying while they
are out there.

In the near future, we will organize a work party to get the
runway fixed up a bit better. Details to be coming soon


Sounds pretty bad, but it could have been worse I guess...crazy stuff!

JPEE,

Glad your 500 made it finally, I guess the mail service in Mexico is kinda slow...

Nick,

Sorry you have been so busy....but it's more important than posting stuff here...

Yeah, the Watson thing is pretty amazing/scary a bit...especially it's ability to speak and understand speech...

Mark,

You must be busy building again...

Glenn

JPEE

Nick,

It is good to hear that classes and your homework are coming along. Study hard, the more you know the more you will enjoy

the rest of your life. I "hate" to quote the adage, "knowledge is power" but that is the 100% truth, take it from an elder.

Thanks for the thoughts and opinions on G-10 too. I am really interested to see it. I may have seen that used in some of the Xheli

450 classes that my friends buy. It has the appearance of plastic with fiber.


Glenn,

Pack your Forester, it's time to come live in California! Forest fires, storms, snow, power outages???? And you mock my traffic,

crimes and earthquakes from time to time..........BAH I say! ! Sounds like the fire was a bit too close for comfort there to the field!

On the 500 the funny thing is, is was not postmarked from Mexico but rather the San Diego area. So him or his mail service must have

sent it north to be mailed?? And... there was only the charge of $8.25 but no postage date so I don't know when it "really" shipped.

But 10 days to get it...come on, it must have come by burro lmao.

Here are a few picks of the used 500 as shipped. I just need to replace the auto-rotation gear, rebuild two servos and replace all

blades and install a receiver she is set to go. Well RCU won't upload right now so I will have to come back to do so.


Mark..............MIA?