evdreamer

John,

I had a pretty uneventful New Years. I worked on my Servo tester some more. I added one new feature and some User interface stuff. I am almost ready to add some code for 760uS servos(Futaba tail servos). It sounds like you had some really good food for New Years day.

That is good you had nice weather to fly.

Nick

evdreamer

Guys,

I ordered the last of the stuff I need for the Whiplash. John I decided to go with the Gen Ace batteries.

I also finished up the programming for my servo tester last night. It can switch between 50Hz, 250Hz, and 333Hz frame rates. It works with 760uS and 1500uS serovs. It centers the servo, moves the servo back and forth automatically with an adjustable speed, tests the deadband, moves the servo with a pot., measures the pulse width from a receiver, and measures the input Voltage. Right now it only works with a 2S LiPo, but I would like it to work with 4S and 5S NiMh batteries. Soon I can start working on a circuit board for it.

JPEE

Hi Nick,

I must say your servo tester has really come along way from where you started. You should be tickled with what you have accomplished

You will be happy with your GEN ACES to. Be sure to check them for charging and discharging. Remember one of mine would not charge past 3.9, but they replaced it at MY frieght charge back to them.

Bob my buddy just had to send a Turnigy 5000 back to HK and that cost him like $14.00, he was really POed.

Supposed to fly tomorrow, we shall see. My truck is still loaded from Tuesday, that makes it a bit easier.


Hi Mark........... Hi Glenn

Aframomum

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Hi guys,

Got some unfortunate bad news for the new year...I was informed that for my New Year's gift I got laid off. I can't go into it as I am currently fighting it but suffice it to say it's been a stressful week. One glimmer of light is that I do have an interview for Monday morning with another facility - so feeling hopeful for that. Just not the way I was planning on ringing in a new year. []

Sorry for having to share bad news but just wanted you to know that I didn't just disappear.

Mark

JPEE

Mark,

I am so very sorry to hear this news. This IS no way to start the new year. I will put you in my nightly vespers that your job will come back with the action your taking or......... the interview next week will be a slam dunk for you.

I wished there was something I could say to make this better, I do feel for you, sincerely I do!

John

evdreamer

Mark,

Sorry to hear about that. I hope you get hired at the other facility.

John,

Yeah, I will check if all the cells charge all the way up on the Gen Ace's. I should get by batteries by Tuesday.

Did you fly yesterday?

I got my Scott Gray regulator today, so I spent all day setting up the electronics. It took a long time learning how to setup the Vbar again. I was watching Mr. Mel's Vbar videos and he mentioned checking if the precomp was correcting in the right direction. I never did that on my 600 and Velocity, but now I know it is correct on the Whiplash. Now the Whiplash is flight ready except for the batteries.

Nick

JPEE

Nick,

I hear you on the V bar and the set up, you've got to take your time.

Yes I flew yesterday, I got in four packs on the 700. Still working on my inverted horizontal circles and they're getting better with each pack. We have major wind coming again to Southern California so I probably won't fly until next Wednesday. 0 By the Way there is a Bluetooth that works with your telephone for programming your V bar so you do not have to take a laptop to the field. They cost about 10 or $12 and everybody is using them here because it's so much easier.

Forgive the incorrect grammar and misspellings this was all dictated through the iPhone 4S voice recognition take care bye

evdreamer

John,

Sorry you have strong winds again.

I have a Motorola Razor, so I can't use the bluetooth feature.

I forgot to mention in my electrical engineering magazine they had an article on single seater electric helicopters. One is kind of like the quad copters, but uses a lot more RC motors, RC LiPo's, and a RC transmitter. There is a Youtube video of it flying. Then there was a Co-axial that gets 6min of flight time. There was one by Sikorsky named the Firefly. There are some Youtube videos of that, but they have never flown it yet. Then it mentioned one helicopter company making a hybrid to use at the bottom of an Auto to make it not so rough to land.

Nick

JPEE

Nick,

Sorry you don't have a Android or iPhone because they are pretty cool to use with the blue tooth.

Wow those helis beig enough to rise must be a hoot!

I listed my 600 for sale to day on Craigs. I included the 600e, DX7, TP 1010C charger and balancer. I hope I get a bite, I listed it for $700.00 I made a slide show and flying/hovering videos and posted them in the ad, so we shall see. Holy cow I just ran all the main Forums and 500ESPs with radio are $400.00 YIKESSSS. 600's are running at $550-$700.00 which shows me the market is EXTREAMLY depressed.


Slideshow link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veOHqM2XI0I

Video link: http://youtu.be/TvwaLoyBjHM

JPEE

Nick, Mark, Glenn,

Your gonna love this!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2xnWYx8YK8&feature=youtube_gdata_player[/youtube]

evdreamer

John,

Good luck with the 600 sale.

I never saw that coming at the end of the video. I got a good laugh out of that.

Nick

evdreamer

Guys,

I got an interesting call today. There is a guy that wants me to film all the golf courses in Lincoln with my Whiplash this spring. They are going to use their GoPro camera and pay me $100 a day to fly.

JPEE

Nick,

Dang dude, you stepped in a bucket of poop game came out like roses. Hundred bucks a day for flying you are so lucky!!!! Now you just have to consider how you intend to mount the camera on the whiplash and not get the Jell-O affect? I can tell you I flew my 700 E with the sling that I used to use on the 600 and it hovered okay over the house but was still a handful even with the V BAR! I didn't get a chance to take it out and really fly it. From past experience I know it would fly easier than trying to hover it. With the hovering, the heli stayed where it was "except" it kept losing altitude causing ot me work the throttle contantly. Out in the open will be my next try. And that Jell-O, yes I had some on the side of the frame.

We can talk about possible mounts and what I have tried and that failed in the past if you like so your not covering the same ground.

Congratulations again Nick

Aframomum

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Hi gents,

Nick...that's awesome that you are being sought out for aerial photography work. And, you have JPEE's trial and error experience to really help you along. I guess your going to be needing some more batteries b/c I don't think a 5 minute flight is going to cut it. Just how many golf courses do they have in Lincoln?

JPEE,

That was a very funny video...I could hear a heli in the background but didn't expect that. Don't think they are going to get many paid fines if they keep blowing up the offenders car.

Any news on the 600 sale? I hope it works out for you...esp with the tx and charger although you may have to resort to piecing those two items out separately just in case you don't get any bites.

Well guys, my interview got moved to tomorrow (that's alright as it gave me a bit more prep time) so since I was feeling in a much better mood I finished up the Protos's tail and did a test hover this morning. So yes she flies!

However, I did get a few wicked static hits and so the hover only lasted a minute...I need to add a few grounding wires. A bit of a PITA since I got the conductive boom mount and used static guard spray on the belt. Oh well...I suppose its something to deal with when having a belt. At least I got her in the air finally.

Mark

JPEE

Hey Guys,

Mark, it sounds like your were not dissappointed that your interviews were pushed off a day. As you said, more time to relax and connect to the real job at hand HELIS! I am glad to hear you did not sustain damage from the static strike's, that could have been wicked! A for the most part successful maiden.

Well the 600 TT went bye by today. I gave it away so to speak. But the kid that bought it was like seeing a kid on Christmas morning. He wants it for aerial work, gonna trick it out he said. I let him have the whole banana
600TT
Thunder Power Charger and balancer
DN charger for the rx battery under the belly
DX7
1 new 5000 pack
1 new extra canopy

A truely RTF for only $600.00. Trying to sell off that stuff on the Forums and shipping would have been a killer. Craigs List hit is again!

Next, the DX6i transmitter and the 400s-450s-and one 500 and I am good and will be down to 2 helis.

JPEE

evdreamer

Mark,

I might pick up one more set of batteries. I might order a 1000W Hyperion charger to do a quick charge at the golf courses. I only know about one golf course in my neighbor hood, but there are probably a few more in the rich part of town.

Congrats on the Protos maiden.

Today was my first day back at school. My workload is going to be a lot higher than last year.[&o]

Good luck tomorrow.

Nick

JPEE

Nick,

Sorry about how hard your school load is going to be, man the pay off in the end will be great and this will have all been worth it.

For the iCharger, go to EP Buddy. They are back by you and give you a free parallel board that will let you charge 6 packs at once!

http://epbuddy.com/index.php?main_pa...roducts_id=106

evdreamer

John,

Congrats on selling the 600.

Nick

evdreamer

Guys,

My batteries came today. I got the connectors on and made the Y-adaptor. The batteries are on the charger now. In a couple of hours I will get to maiden the Whiplash.

evdreamer

I just finished the maiden of the Whiplash. It was really loud. I didn't notice any drifting in a hover and it was very stable in a hover. It seemed as quick on the cyclic as my 450. I managed to get it balanced out. That is great, since a lot of people had tail heavy problems. I just need to set the HS and fine tune the Vbar at the field. This is going to be a fun heli to fly.

John,
One of my cells was severely out of balanced out of the box. I had to charge it separately, just to get it at the same Voltage as the others. It was still having a hard time charging to the Voltage of the others afterwards. After the maiden it seemed to balance with the others. Now the cell seems to be playing nice with the others on the charger now. I will just have to keep an eye on it.

Nick

JPEE

Hi Nick,

First, congratulations on the maiden! I am very glad all went well. Of course there will be that tiny bit of tweaking to do but that is expected. So she is fast hey, cool.

When you speak of the batteries are they GENS 5300 right? I kind of tried that with mine, the one with the cell that would not charge up past 3.9. I did 3 or so charges and discharges to no avail so it went back for exchange. I am glad yours worked out.

Today almost was catastrophic for me[X(] as I nearly planted the 700.......via a dumb thumb. I was flying across the sky and wanted to piro as I fly in a horizontal plane. Well instead of pulling to the side with the rudder I pulled the cyclic aileron to the side and the heli rolled over and that caught me off guard, like big-time off guard.[X(][X(][X(] I heard the blades fluttering from me trying to save while I kept struggling to save her, in my mind I was saying "today is the day I crash the 700". However, once I got the heli where the sunlight hit her right, the white blades showed up very well and I got my orientation back just before hitting the ground[sm=greedy.gif] Even now as I write this I think to down a heli with batteries at a total cost of $2,500.00 make me shutter and wonder what the heck am, I doing even flying the dang thing, I must be nuts[sm=spinnyeyes.gif] I took her around the field and made two lazy level circles and then had to land because I was shaking so bad from the adrenalin. All in all I still got my 2 packs in and that was good enough, I came home.

evdreamer

John,

Yeah, I have the Gens Ace 5300 batteries for the Whiplash. The heli has plenty of power during a punch out. I can't wait to see how it does during 3D. At first I was thinking I had a bad cell like yours when I barely saw it going up with the others. Then I felt better when I saw it hit 4.2V when I charged it by itself. It is sure tedious trying to install the batteries without a tray like your heli has.

That is good you didn't crash the 700. Hopefully you never crash that heli.

Nick

Aframomum

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Nick,

Congrats on your Whiplash maiden...I see the January cold didn't hold you back. Got any pictures of your newly finished fun heli? Glad you were able to save your battery.

JPEE,

Sorry to hear of your close call...aerilon roll instead of a rudder piro? Yeah, that would catch me off guard too! As Nick said...hope you never crash that heli. I know a close call like that pretty much ends the flying day for anyone...just on nerves alone.

Good deal on Craig's list working out for you...and someone got a great deal on some new loot for sure. Hope the other heli's sell just as quickly for you.

I finished adding my grounding wire so will try another hover tomorrow morning and see if I get any more strikes. I checked for continuity between the boom and frame and got exactly what Finless got in his video so hope things go well.

Mark

BTW, the interview went extremely well today and I have a second one scheduled for Thursday, so it's looking good.

evdreamer

Mark,

The temp wasn't too bad today. It was perfect timing for the maiden. I will try to get some pics up tomorrow of the finished Whiplash.

Hope the grounding wire helped out on your Protos.

That is good your interview went good and things are looking better.

Nick

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Guys,

I'm very frustrated right now...

I did a 4 minute hover earlier this morning and had no issues, seemed the ground wire was working perfectly. Charged up the battery and went out for another 4 minute hover and had a massive hit which caused a crash. Really disappointed as the time and money I have put into this heli to have this kind of problem. I don't want a heli that I can't trust...a flight on this day turns out okay b/c the weather is perfect, but the next isn't b/c the weather is cloudy, or its too dry, etc.

Thinking of fixing up the damage parts and selling it off as a barebones kit, then just go back to a TT heli and use the existing electrical components. I know many people have good luck with theirs but I just don't have the time to chase down static issues, esp. now that I see what it can result in.

Need some time to cool down after this...

Mark