Aframomum

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Hi JPEE,

I have to tell you - I am absolutely enjoying this cooler weather we have been having!! I know you can completely understand and have to say 66 sounds just fine.

Happy to report that everything is good with my car again - no issues since replacing the strut/tie rods and doing the alignment.

I'm glad to hear you have been having a good time following the ISS. Its also good that your times are in the early evening so no waiting needed. I did the tracking a few years ago and it is amazing to see that bright spot racing across the sky. It is very bright and moves fast - definitely cannot mistake it for a satellite! Did you hear they are currently doing filming for a movie up there? Here's the link:

Soyuz arrives at space station for out-of-this-world film shoot – Spaceflight Now

Mark

Aframomum

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JPEE - got a surprise for you...

Here's a recent video of how the layout looks now. Enjoy!


Mark

JPEE

Good Saturday morning Mark,

You’ve really made to some striking progress on your layout. For me, the changes are big because I am not there daily. You might miss that change because it’s lost with you looking at it daily. It’s like when you haven’t seen your nephew in six months and the little boy grew up to be a teenager and then you say holy cow is that kid grown! That’s what it is with your railroad when I get the opportunity to see your videos. I think you’ve really got the speeds set at a scale rate because of the trains were just zipping around the track it would lose that part of the scale achievement. Your rail yards look great too and boy oh boy have you made the most of every square inch of the layout board itself. On the matter of intermittent places in the track can you solder a 1/4” copper jumper across the trails to bond them so there’s no dead or spots of hesitation.
Glad to see your diversified and working on your 500. I brought. 600, 500, 330 heli’s to AZ and my Mavic, plus my T 28. Don’t know if I will fly and Phil my friend moving out Nov 1 and moving to Kingman 2 1/2 hours away. He is the only guy I ever fly with here without him it’s kind of no fun to go out to the desert and fly all alone, still working on that new one.
getting ready in the next couple of days to train a wrecked my two antennas for my ham radio set ups but there of been so many things to repair after not being here for two years. In the summer heat things really let go.


Take care a Job Well Done on the trains.

JPEE

Aframomum

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Hi JPEE,

Hope you have been enjoying the wide open spaces out there in the desert. I'm sorry to hear about Phil moving - I know you guys had great times flying. I didn't think you were going to make it out this year - glad to hear you did.

I'm happy you enjoyed the update on the trainset. I have slowed down doing anything with it now that the weather has started to cool down. We just run trains now and I don't concern myself with trying to do any work on it - just have fun watching the trains go around and around.

I was able to finish up work on the 500 and did a spool up in the garage yesterday. It was almost a disaster! I think when I did the FBL setup, specifically the gyro correction part, I was a bit tired and didn't realize I had it backwards. So the heli tipped when it got light on the skids. Hit TH but not before the blades scraped the garage floor. Ugh. Luckily the damage to the blades wasn't that bad, a bit of epoxy on the scraped tips and rebalance and they were ready to go. I also corrected the gyro correction and redid the spool up. Everything worked. Next I need to get to a flying area and get a HS reading and then a maiden.

Mark

JPEE

Hi Mark,

The air is clean and the skies are blue and………watching the ISS go over is much brighter than at home.

I haven’t flown but….. I did take a newbie out to teach him how to fly my Mavic. One of the guys here that I got started a few years ago bought one used it twice and it’s been sitting on the shelf for two years. When I opened it up to go through it I found one of the three was batteries bloated, what a shame for $100 to be gone like that! And check in the other two batteries one cannot be recognized and has no lights that flash on the pack and the other one did charge up. But it took a couple of three hours to get it woken up to charge. So where we stand now his controller took a charge one bloated and one won’t take a charge so it has one good battery. So we move on from there to let them hammer out a deal. I will be taking him out to fly again this time let him take pictures and video in a more open area so he really gets the feel. The day we went it was quite windy which is still doable but as he would go across the sky he would be climbing because the air would get under him and lift him and he didn’t realize it. So the wide open spaces and calm day will be much better for him not to mention using the cameras.

Boy did I enjoy the train set videos excellent excellent!

Sorry to hear that you got that rocking on the skids and a bit of a blade tip scrape but you knew what to do to fix it properly and……. we have ALL DONE THAT A TIME OR TWO! I’m excited it’s done and can’t wait for you to find a zone to fly in to give her a spin.

Thanks for checking in, it’s always good to hear from you.

JPEE……OUT!

Aframomum

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Hi JPEE,

That's a shame that your friend lost 2 of 3 batts for his Mavic - at least you were able to gently coax 1 of them back to life. Hope you were able to get a good flight out of it.

I have good heli news - 4 successful flights this morning!

Let me back up a bit...I don't know what type of tail slider you have on your 700 (or even your 500) but Align morphed theirs into a really complex PITA bit of engineering that uses 3 points of pivot and uses 6 tiny button socket bolts. Yeah, trying to loctite them and not fouling up the bearings is fun. You also can't tighten them down as it interferes with the movement of the slider. So you have to have enough loctite to hold the bolt in place but not have it too tight at the same time. (I so miss the simplicity of the sliders on my Goblin and even my old Outrage Fusion 50).

So, I was going to do some test flights yesterday but doing my precheck I discovered one of those tiny bolts was missing. Ugh! Looked in the garage but no Bueno. Nadda. Bolt is a M2X4mm. Luckily I had my leftover 450 from days past and was able to find a M2X6 and was able to make that work. When I was disassembling the slider I discovered 2 other bolts loose and ready to fall out. So I did something evil last night and broke out the RED loctite and yes, those puppies are never coming out. E V E R... And my slider is smooth as silk, and secure.

If I crash I may or may not have to replace the whole assembly, but I'll deal with that when the time comes. I don't want to lose my tail b/c of a simple tiny bolt.

On to my flights...

It rained all last night, and early this morning was breezy and cloudy. I still charged my batts as the weather report was to be clearing up later in the AM. Still stayed cool at 64 and the winds died down when we left at 10am. When we got to the flying area the sun came out and it was absolutely beautiful! My first flight was in normal mode and basically hovered and dialed in the tail gyro. Second flight was in idle 1 and adjusted the throttle curve (had to lower it a bit as the HS was too high) and the gyro. Third flight decided to finally do some flying. I think I was shaking a bit with that flight. Fourth flight was great and I was getting more comfortable with the new heli. It is smaller than I'm used to. Coming from my Goblin 570 - its going to take some adjustment. Mini Auto's with the TT - nice hang time and very controlled. I was flying without the canopy so that was a major factor for the size difference for me.

All in all - I'm very happy with this new heli. Plus, getting 4 flights verses 2 (with the 12S Goblin) are very nice. I don't know if I mentioned but I decided to keep the Goblin afterall. One night when I was finishing up the 500XT I was looking at the Goblin and thought how nice it would be to have both a big heli and a smaller one. It is practically rebuilt from the earlier crash so I just need to get another FBL for it and finish the setup. And get lipo's for it. I guess I was getting a bit sentimental over it. Funny how things turn out.

The 500XT after todays flights...


Mark

JPEE

Hello Mark,

I see that your Space X most recent launch was scrubbed due to weather, sorry about the that.
I was able to bring back the one pack and it flew well, not like new 24 min, she came in at 18 min.

Congratulations on your good Heli flights, that had to bring a smile to your face! To answer your question no…..I’ve got the old standard sliders on my tails with the two elbows. I tried to blow up your heli photo to see what you’re speaking of with this new tail box and slider, I still couldn’t make it out. You saved the day by checking all the screws and catching which could have been catastrophic. I too carry blue Loctite in my RC to carry. Here’s a tip you may or may not know, if you ever have to break the Loctite loose you take a soldering iron and put it on the head of the screw and that’ll heat that screw up and soften the Loctite and let you back it out. I agree don’t put the cart before the horse, fly it worry about what you could need to be replaced at a later date…… maybe never hopefully.

Sounds like me, I flew my T-28 yesterday for the first time in two years. I had forgotten on that spectrum DX-9 radio you can set the clock to run every time you open the throttle. Put in the second pack with timer use and did a little better but was having trouble because there was a stiff breeze and the plane is very light. While making my turns and got disoriented twice and almost darted in. So I sat down and rested for a few minutes trying to let the adrenaline get out of my system and then went back up for the third and final flight, so all went well in the end. I do have three helicopters here, a 600, 500 and the little 320 or whatever it is.

All‘s well that ends well, you had great flights and a maiden and everything was great, I‘m happy for you!

Take care.
JPEE

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Hi JPEE,

That's great news that you were able to get some flights in with the old trusty T-28. Glad you were able to finish up with no mishaps despite the wind and loss of orientation.

I hope you are able to make new acquaintances out there - I know the loss of a good friend due to a move can be difficult.

I have been getting more flights in with the 500. Getting more comfortable but have to catch myself as I want to do things I used to do but am not ready for yet. I'm also still dialing in the tail as with certain moves I can lose it just for a brief moment. Not fun. I am certainly enjoying the auto capabilities of this one - it does it almost effortlessly. I can really keep it hanging for a good few seconds just before touchdown. Mind you, these are mini auto's only but still lots of fun.

One thing for sure - its smaller than the Goblin, and faster. I'm also flying higher so I can practice inverted stuff and have a buffer zone. I do notice sometimes the heli can get away from me and at times I have found myself losing orientation with the colors of the canopy. Good thing somewhere along the line I learned to use the main blade disc for my orientation as it has helped get things under control again.

One other thing...I feel as I am at the mercy of the wind again with this smaller heli. With my Goblin I could fly in some stiff breezes but this one gets tossed around so keeps me on my toes. I really noticed it this morning when doing big air loops and at the top I could see it slipping out of the curve so had to concentrate on how to correct it in the right direction so it wouldn't come out of the loop in some weird direction. All part of the relearning process...

I also picked up 4 new 6S 3300 lipo's from Amain - they had them on sale for $74.99, usually $94 - so didn't want to miss out on a nice deal. So this will give me 3 flights for my 12S Goblin when I have the repairs finished and 2 flights for the 500 (when I take both heli's with me). But for now, I am getting 8 flights with the 500 each outing. WOW! My usual is 4 - 5 so this is quite a lot for me. My son is loving me flying a heli again!

I also got to take my dad to watch me fly and run our remote controlled cars last Sunday. He had a great time with this last visit, and got to spend a lot of time with his grandson, esp. with the trainset!

Mark

JPEE

Hello Mark,

Yes we are thank you. Of course we have had other Acquaintances here over the last nine years. But they were casual and now those are growing into bonding friendships. So we are doing well and have decided not to liquidate this year and see how it goes and see what next October 2022 holes. One upside is on my toy hauler trailer they wanted $4500 to put on a new roof. That’s take off the plywood take it and install new over what you would call a rafter or a ceiling joist and then a vinyl membrane to share the water. Long story short I found a guy here that I know that has connections and we brought him with a friend and they re-coded both trailers the 40 footer and the 24 footer with a roll-on membrane made by Henry’s the maker of you know roof patch and it’s white and has the ability to reflect light and also make the trailer cooler. $650 and we are done and both roofs are good!

It’s nice that you can evaluate yourself and realize you might be getting a little too brave and catch yourself and saying with your inner voice….. rein it in a bit…..don’t do that with the new 500! Please explain, dialing I the tail? You can changer the pitch of course so at full stick you can have more less speed for snap movements, is that what your speaking too?
Back in the day I would auto my 700, 600, and tried the 500 with ripping head speed but to me….I didn’t feel the control for a soft landing auto so I stopped. That sound like fun, “perhaps” (which means maybe) lol next time out since my last plane day I do an auto from 6’ or so. Thanks for waking up my juices.
I too use the disk. Back in the Blade 400 first heli I painted one side of the canopy white and the other orange and that helped a green kid….ME. But on occasions when I do lose orientation on any of my helicopters I take my stick and go left and right so I can see the disc then I know where I’m at like you.
Good dealing getting the feel of the 500 in the wind, each Heli’s reacts differently. I fly the same battery too.
So glad your son is with you and the BONUS of having your dad is WOW great. He must be impressed with your skills.

JPEE

PS: Happy Thanksgiving!

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Hi JPEE,

I'm glad to hear things are going well for you and some of those casual acquaintances are becoming lasting friendships. Those are some crazy numbers you gave for the cost of work to redo the roof on your trailers verses how much you saved by doing it with a local connection. Good job!

You are right in having to reign in myself with my flying - while doing my stall turns I want to hold my piroette for several turns before finishing my downward leg and have to remember I botched my old Fusion 50 by doing one too many piro's and letting her get too low to the ground with not enough time to pull out of the dive. I have also caught myself getting a bit too low in my inverted practice and know that I'm not that confident with my orientations yet to be that close to the deck.

Dialing in my tail - I am still adjusting my gyro in small increments so that I don't get any tail jitters from too high a gain. Many complain that Align went with a poor tail ratio so the tail spins a bit too slow to hold very well. To compensate, you can either up the headspeed (less flying time, nope) or put larger tail blades on. Stock ones are 78mm and I put on KBDD 84.5. Of course this means the tail will scrape unless you land with some forward elevator to keep the tail up. I decided to put a larger tail fin on. Tried the one for the 550 but it was too large and heavy so tried something a bit unorthodox - epoxied a tail fin from a 450 onto the 500's tail fin. Not the best looking but is functional, protects my tail blades, and doesn't cause any unwanted behavior in flight. I just need to trim off the excess to make it look nicer. Sometimes you just gotta make slight mods to make things work.

I also included some pictures of the annoying tail slider that Align is now using. I haven't had any screw loss issues so the red loctite seems to be working. And all the joints fully move and pivot so I'm happy.

A few weeks ago I noticed I was having some issues with my charger - it was giving me a low voltage error message during charging. I was like WTH! Plus with Revolectrix now out of business I didn't want a dead charger. Turns out my problem was one of my powersupplies was going bad. I noticed one of them had a yellow LED lit up instead of green. When checked with a voltmeter I was getting 12V and not 24V. I separated the 2 PS and ran them individually and one was working fine, the other nothing. Not producing any voltage. The fans were running on it but no output. So for now I have just one working and will make due with that for my charging needs. I just needed to adjust the voltage input on my charger for 12V and know that my 6S lipo's will take a little longer to charge up.

I am still making progress on my Goblin rebuild. I purchased new blades and went with a pair of RotorTech 580 blades and KBDD 96 tail blades. I also picked up a Microbeast Plus FBL from HF. I decided to forgo the stretch as I don't trust the belt and don't need a crash from a belt breaking in flight.

Turkey Day...10 days and counting!

Mark

JPEE

Hi Mark,


To be clear, the differential in the roof quotes is like this. What I had done was a rolling out of a rubberized membrane over the existing roof, after it had been scrubbed and any little tears held down with a patch material they make.
The $4500 bid was to take off all the air conditioners, vents and stand pipe covers, tv antenna and everything that was protruding through the roof. Then pull off all the plywood sheathing on the roof 8 feet wide 24 feet long and re-sheet, new one piece sheet membrane and seal. That’s because there is a soft spot in one place where there is some dry rot because there was a pinhole in the original roof membrane and water (morning dew) would leak through that little hole and get under and dry rot out the plywood. That one little area was left that way (soft) with the application of the new roll out material. The soft spot is the size of my fist, I know where it is and I would not walk up there so it’s a non-issue because I know where it is.

I’m embarrassed to say this because all of the helicopters I’ve built the four 5500 the 600 and the 701s built have not had to have any adjustments. When I asked you about your tail issues I had totally forgotten that you can adjust the adjustment of the picture of the tail blades with your Gyro and transmitter throws. DUH! I did the same thing on my 600 and put a longer tail blades because I had a wobble that I could not get out of it. Then I wound up with the same issue as you with anything less than a perfect soft set down the tail blades would drag the asphalt. So what I did was elevate the helicopter off the skids with 1 inch nylon threaded screws nuts and washers. NowI am not stick banging like you, awesome rolls in a little bit of inverted and loops and cork screws but nothing quite as violent as you’re flying. And that’s worked real well for me leaving the landing gear a little further away from the main helicopter. Again, I just can’t believe that I had forgotten the adjustments you can make on the tail. It’s been better than two years since I’ve flown a Heli…… So cut it cut an old timer some slack lol. In your case with your custom tail vertical then once you dress that up it’ll look fine and I’ve done the same thing with my 500 back in the day and what I wound up I think I did without looking was put a 550 or 600 tail fin on it to get that elevated. If I remember I’m gonna take a look tomorrow.

Thank you so much for including the photos and they’re very sharp clear end of size making it very easy to see the new tail linkage and pitch arms. There must be a reason that they went to that new style but I would go ahead and order some extra parts get them now while you can and just have them in a drawer. I won hundred percent doubt one of those screws will never back out after the Loctite is on there but it’s some thing that unfortunately he’s going to nag you and you’ll have to keep your eye on it to feel confident. But then again we always do a preflight check of our aircraft before we take them up so you should be good to go.

The charger lol I run into the same problem I was charging 25 V battery and I smelled things kind of running hot and I was doing a couple of success batteries. Long story short the charger was red hot and one of the plugs end of the power supply, one of two had backed out and had started out on 25 V and head back at self out and I have been charging that heavy load on 12 V and then having it step up the charger to 24 V. I sense took the end of those like a computer cord I’m sure they’re the same on your power supply that I put them in and I fixed them permanently so they can never come out.

You got a handsome bird there my friend you enjoy it.
JPEE

JPEE

Hello Mark,

I may have told you we watched
the ISS go overhead two nights ago. I get an email every morning that they’re going to be in my proximity with the date time and degree that they will be appearing in the sky so you know where to look. I was showing that to one of the other guys here and he gave me the link to Vandenberg launch schedule. I have attached a photo to show you that Vandenberg is going to launch in the next few days of course weather permitting and no delays to send that falcon nine up to collide with an astroid to see if they can knock it off course. Enjoy JPEE

Aframomum

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Hello Mr. JPEE,

Hope you and your Judy had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day!!!

Mark

JPEE

Good morning Mark!

Thank you for the Thanksgiving salutations and we hope yours was a great one too with family and good food all in one place at one time. For the obvious reasons we stayed home here and went up to the local one of three restaurants serving turkey dinners complete and took two to go and came home and enjoyed them here and the Covid free zone. The numbers are starting to climb as we expected. 80% of the people here do not wear masks unless a particular store has a sign on the door. I’m sure a lot of it’s got to do with ignorance as well as all that have been vaccinated think they can’t get Covid not really understanding what their protection is and is not. But all in all we had a wonderful dinner more food and we could eat actually, so we’re going to eat the other half today at lunch.

Our very best to you and yours and hope you had a pleasant day and………….. I hope some good leftovers at your house too!

JP

evdreamer

Hope you guys had a good Thanksgiving. I need to read the old messages when I have time. I am moving to Ohio because my wife got an amazing job opportunity. I got a Prius with 245k miles, so it is a project car for me to work on. I might finally get to fly again once we move to the country.

JPEE

Hello Nick,

Congratulations Nick, good jobs don’t come easy for anyone so I am glad your wife grabbed it. I have been to Columbus and to Lima Ohio, what City are you landing in? So we’re you or are you off loading the condo and closing that door in your life and the suite is complete? Oh, can your job let you transfer to Ohio?

Our Thanksgiving was a nice one and we hope yours was the same. We are not home right now but if you think about it you’ll know where we are, don’t want to publish that info.

Take care JPEE

Hope you both and families are getting the COVID mess. We have had our three shots but act as well never got one and are extra extra careful being around others and always wear a mask. Numbers are starting the climb again.

Once your relocated I hope you find a close fly area! ! !

evdreamer

John,

Her job will be out in Loudonville, but we are looking for houses in the surrounding towns right now. I plan on selling our current house. The drains need constant attention to stay unclogged and I don't want to manage that out of state. The lawsuit has been finished since the beginning of the year, but I still haven't been paid. I finally am folding and going to force their house to be sold to pay me. I think I have been generous enough and gave them multiple options on how to pay me. My wife is moving in January and I am going to wait till March to finish fixing up the house and hopefully get a little more money in the spring. My job will let me work remotely, so that is nice.

We are doing our best to stay safe. We always were our mask out in public, but a lot of people here don't wear masks even with a city mandate.

I saw some .5 acres for sale in Ohio that would make a perfect area to fly and live. We want to start a small farm also.

So far I have replaced the front struts, spark plugs, and a very rusted on rear wheel hub on the Prius. It hasn't been too bad to work on. I got a new exhaust today because there was an exhaust leak. The rear suspension area has a lot of surface rust. The previous owners must not have washed the salt away after winter. I still got a long ways to go before I am at Mark's level. I have been volunteering at a place called Charity Auto. It is a work release for inmates to get experience working on cars. I have learned a lot from them.

JPEE

Nick, that great that your looking for a new home. Don’t forget the well known, Licensed Home Inspector. Also read your Discloser’a in the sellers paper work. Also in your note you said you house has an on going plumbing issue, you should disclose that in some form so YOU don’t get sued after the sale with the neighbors saying……..yes Nick has had plumbers over there all of the time.
That’s wonderful that you’ll be able to work from home, that's just great!
Boy oh boy, your own flying area right there at home WOW that would be sweet. Just tonight 2 took two newbies for their Maiden Flights with the pair new DJI Mavic S2 drones. I had trained one guy with my Mavic so he did very well.
Cool on the new Prius! Yes indeed, Mark is a Mustang Qualified mechanic after all of the work he has contended with his car. Your really lucky to have the opportunity to collaborated with the Charity staff.

Best to you my friend, JPEE

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Hi guys,

Nick, nice to hear from you again - welcome back!

You definitely have some busy times ahead with the move to Ohio and selling your house. I wish you good luck in this very active market.

I think you will enjoy Ohio - I spent 6 years there (Cincinnati) and do have nice memories of it.

I hope you get a property with a garage - that way you'll have a comfortable place (out of the sun and weather) to work on your Prius. What year is it? I know with the newer cars they are so electronically controlled that it makes doing work (and diagnosing) on them more difficult.

As an example, my wife's 2013 Kia Soul had a knock sensor go out while she was driving it on the turnpike. The car suddenly dropped all rpms and speed dropped to 50. Scared the hell out of her. Apparently the cars EPU has this 'limp return to home' mode that can be enabled if the car detects a serious issue with the engine. Hooked up a reader to see what code was issued. Got the problem fixed but still, the whole limping home having rpms limited to 2500 was a mess. I'm sure with my Mustang I could have a cylinder go dead and the dang car would still go full tilt.

JPEE,

I sometimes catch the ISS going over just by random - if I'm outside while at work or in the yard after dark. Its bright enough to not mistaken it. I'm sure where your at with the very dark nights it must be amazing to see! I'm going to have to resign up with the NASA site so I can get updates on when it'll go over.

I'm glad you were able to get a nice Turkey dinner to enjoy at home. I was fortunate to have the day off this year so got to work on the stuffing and turkey when I got home that morning from work (had to work the night before). Got the turkey in the oven and went to bed while it was cooking. Woke up later in the day and enjoyed all the goodness of our meal.

I did watch the DART launch from the computer - it was a good night launch.

Mark

JPEE

Mark,

Some years ago 2004 I drove to Columbus Ohio to visit a life long friend. What a difference it was compared to Los Angeles here. But the snow NO THANKS.

A few nights ago with the recent lunch from your place went up Judy and the gang still back in AZ said it was spectacular and that is was the bright "the satellite train" and Judy sent me a photo!

Glad to hear Mr. Chef Mark you had it all under control. It's nice to look forward to every year for us.

Take care and I am sure we'll chat one more time before Christmas.

JPEE

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Hi JPEE,

I'm glad your Judy was able to see the Starlink 'train' pass over. Last year we were out looking through the telescope when a 'train' of them came over. They were much more spaced apart, so one would pass every few seconds. It was very amazing to see in person and actually took a few moments to figure what was going on. She got a good picture too!

I'll have to sign up for the updates on spot the station so I can find out when it'll be coming our way. Been having lots of nice clear nights so perfect for star and station gazing.

For the past month or so I've been getting my old Goblin 570 back together. Got it almost all finished up, need to do the FBL setup and finish the tail grips.

I've had quite the battle with the tail grips - both had bad radial bearings so I purchased new bearings thinking I could remove the old ones and pop in the new ones. Um, nope. Not going to be that easy says SAB. Apparently the bearing retainer they use is some real nasty stuff. I literally heated the grips in the oven at 500 for 30 minutes and was only able to remove 1 bearing. And that still took some pounding. Plus the amount of bearing retainer residue left over...probably would make getting the new bearings to sit flush a problem I could see as a future headache. So I decided to bite the bullet and just purchase new grips with the bearings already installed. The price difference wasn't all that much. Now waiting for them to get delivered by the post office.

My other issue is with the FBL - I've always used Spektrum's AR7200 unit b/c it had a BeastX FBL combined with a Spektrum receiver - all in one nice little package. Very convenient and dependable. But they have been discontinued and everyone seems to be holding on to theirs, so I decided to go with the BeastX stand alone unit. It can use a separate receiver with all the wire connections or a new single wire connection using a remote receiver. I thought the single wire remote receiver sounded like a good idea but later found out you have to swap wires and fabricate a longer connector (4 pin to 6 pin), ugh - so just went with a separate receiver and used the included wire connectors (aer, ele, pit). Now that I have all that figured out I just need to finish the setup.

Other than that not much happening,

Hope all is going well with you. Take care,

Mark

JPEE

Hello Mark,

Yes, Judy was elated to see the heavenly spectacle to be sure! I haven’t seen it myself. Something to wish for now!

I will share some thing that I found out the hard way regarding the ISS location updates. When you sign up you will get emails which you can sit for at night or first thing in the morning, I do first thing in the morning so I don’t know I have my day and evening to plan. My friend called me and said don’t miss the ISSGoing overhead tonight and he gave me a picture of the schedule latitude longitude time etc. I was ticked off because I didn’t get notified. Looking deeper into the site it says, that they will not will not send you a notification unless it’s a prime viewing opportunity. That night as it came over with my friends advice it was like 20° above the horizon and as it went by the trees were covering a third of its float and it was not very bright. So that’s just a heads up. Secondarily once you have that site in your phone or your tablet you can just go there anytime and tap your city and location and touch the red flag and it will show you every time it’s going to come over you low and high giving you more opportunities if you choose to. The other night it was a 2 min fly over. The night before it was 7 min and that’s why I got notified.

Oh my goodness that project of your tail grips was huge! There of been times I’ve had similar projects and I plug in my soldering iron and crank it up all the way on the bench and then you can tap with a hammer and screwdriver sometimes and get those out.Either way you tempt and that works for you is where it’s at. They must’ve had some adhesive in there or lacquer that came off the bearing when it got hot, who knows but I’m glad you were able to just go ahead and say: please send me two new tail grips, smart move. Not that it matters now but maybe sometime as a test soak it in acetone the one that you still have left with the bearing in.

GEEEZ, what a project for the FBL. You have really showed your stuff on that project. Honestly I worry that when something wears out on one of my helicopters and after being away from flying for so long that I don’t even wanna consider having to mod some thing on mine or change it Gyro or it’s FBL.
I will this time big RED 500MD I have a Airtronics rx but I cannot recall FBL I have in there, can you believe that. Going back after the first of the year. I will take the 500 this time, I have there now, the 600/500/230 and MAVIC, lastly my OLD faithful T-28. What I did notice it that my batteries have lost some of their amperage. This is to say I charge them they show 4.1 per sale and I have them marked in my transmitter as to how long the flight should be for that particular aircraft. As an example, it might say five minute flight and I’m getting 3 1/2 before the alarm goes or I hear the blades slow down and get it down quickly but that’s OK. I’ll let these time out and next season I’ll just replenish with all new.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Years to you and your family.

Aframomum

My Feedback: (10)

Hi JPEE,

I hope you are gearing up for Christmas - in just a few days time!

I was able to finish up some last minute shopping and just have to finish wrapping a few items before the big Eve's night.

Thanks for the info on the ISS. The past week has been way too cloudy to see anything. Did you see the Starlink launch a few nights ago in your area? I heard the flight path hugged the Ca coastline to put the satellites in a unique orbit. I was amazed that they were able to launch the resupply mission yesterday morning, as the weather was super cloudy. But they found a part in the clouds at just the right moment and fired her up. Quite gutsy.

My son has rediscovered his interest in rockets this month so I had to do some reconditioning of the old rockets to get them flight worthy again. A trip to Hobby Lobby to pick up some new engines and we were back in business. Already had some nice launches the past 2 weekends. We also take our RC buggies with us to get some dirt mound jumping in. And I also bring along my 500 to get some flight time in. A fun time all around!

I decided that I'm going to pull the Spektrum AR7200BX off the 500 and use it for the Goblin 570. That way I can use the Microbeast with the stand-alone receiver in the 500. Yeah, I'll have to do the setup all over again but I will feel more comfortable with the AR7200 on the Goblin as I'm familiar with it. The 500's wiring is more simplistic so that is the reason I'm swapping FBL units - 6S and no separate BEC to wire up.

The new tail grips came in and I was able to get the tail put together - greased and loctited. I'll have to pick up some acetone and see if that dissolves the residue on the original grips. Thanks for the suggestion.

Will you be seeing your daughters for Christmas this year?

Mark

JPEE



Hello Mark,

I’ll bet there will be some bigeyes on Christmas morning or Christmas Eve. We got to open one present on Christmas Eve and the rest on Christmas morning. Those days of imagination and dreams were the best!

I hope you get some clear weather at some point where you can look up and see the ISS streak across the sky and at 6 to 7 minutes on its longest passes. There’s another star train going up tonight or tomorrow but we are already socked in since yesterday for the next four days of 2 to 3 inches of rain so it’s an impossibility for us. At least that’s what we were told by a friend of ours that watches launches of those starlight missions so if my quote is wrong it’s because I’m just quoting information that came to us this morning from him. Hey, you have to pass the buck wherever you can lol.

How wonderful Mr. G has re-discovered an old toy if you will or hobby and that it’s s still grabs his interest, that’s just great! I hope it’s as exciting the second time around for him and his dad too lol. That’s great you’ve got the dirt buggies to kind of spread out the time you’re there. And of course dad has to have a little helicopter time as well. I’m taking my MD 500 back. Last time I did a hover hear my packs are not getting what they used to and I think it’s just from sitting for the past two years where I really am unable to fly. But for this season I’ll continue using short flights or not and depending on how next year goes re-battery my fleet as needed.

As far as receivers and FBL’s you’ve got to go with your gut and if it doesn’t sit right then you’re not gonna enjoy it, you’re gonna worry. But you are building experience in the BX and the micro beast just doing the swap outs in itself because of their differences. I think I mentioned that Kontronic, ESC and my Align ESC’s once installed have never been touched in more years than I can recall.

Oh that’s great news that your new tail grips came in rather than mess with that one with a jammed bearing a race, now throw it in the box set it aside. Hopefully the Acetone idea will work out or something else you might think if that doesn’t work is some MEK which I hate all farmable chemicals around the house because of the dangers of fire. Perhaps a little bit of “paint stripper” put down in there with a Q-tip might get down in there and dissolve whatever they used to lock it into place? Lastly it may not even have anything in there holding it it was poor machining and the tolerances were too tight and the machines crammed that bearing or race down in there never to come out again? ? ?

Thank you for asking, yes tradition is, we go over to my youngest daughters house and she has the layout they can hold the family and their mother joins us and my other daughter of course and the grandchildren and it’s a grand day for everybody. The wife makes a jalapeño scrambled egg casserole, my daughters and their mother make tamales of three different flavors old style and then there’s just so many side dishes it should be a crime lol. Then before we fall asleep from eating too much we go to the living room and then open gifts. To back up a step, they get up with their families in the morning and have their Christmas. Then the family meets at my daughters house and then we all go home and then the next day my daughters and their friends get together and do their exchanges that they’ve known for years and grew up with. They draw it out for three days almost.

Bless your home and have a wonderful Christmas my friend.

John

evdreamer

Mark,

It is an '04 Prius. The engine bay is very cramped with all the hybrid electronics. My Yaris has plenty of room in the engine bay to work on it. I had to replace my blower motor and motor resistor because they stopped working. I have some corroded wire pins for a suspension sensor that I still have to figure out how to remove from the connector. I think the motor mounts are bad too, so that is on the list of things to fix. I have been volunteering at a place that allows inmates to get out and work on cars while low income families can get free labor to fix their cars. I have learned a lot. Sometimes we have to work on cars outside, so that isn't fun when it is cold. They are building a big three stall garage with lifts, but it won't be done until early next year because of part delays.

I am going to Orlando on Jan 26th to the 30th. My wife and I are attending a gala because her new boss is getting an award. Then she also wants to network with all the successful business people there. I am going to enjoy the roads in Ohio. There are a lot of elevation changes and curvy roads that will be fun on the motorcycle. It is very flat and straight in Lincoln.

Good luck fixing your heli.

John,

It sounds like you will have a good Christmas.

Merry Christmas to the both of you if I am not online.

Nick