Archangel

I have recently built a JR Voyager E and am having troubles setting it up. I have set up the Throttle and Pitch curves as per the manual, but when I bring it up into a hover, it becomes uncontrollable, with violent up/down pitching that gets more severe the longer I hold it off the ground.

If I leave one skid touching the gound, I can slide around the driveway perfectly stable, but the moment I pick it up, it goes out of control.

I can stabilize the heli slightly by greatly increasing the rotor RPM, but I have to run it almost at max power and very low pitch. There is no power/pitch left for forward flight and the heli sounds like it is about to explode. I tried replacing the servos (thinking they were not powerful enough to hold the heli stable) with no change. The helicopter is in stock configuration (engine and blades).

One other point of question is the tension of the T/R Belt. The manual says to tighten it to the point that you can't touch both sides of the belt to each other. This seems too tight to me. Might the belt tension be part of my problem?

Can anyone advise me on these issues? I have seen the reviews on this model and really want to get it working as a park flyer, or a driveway flyer.

Thanks in advance.

YOGIGURU

What kind of gear (servos, gyro etc) are you using. Did you balance and track the blades? Belt needs to be tight enough not to slip on pully, but not so tight as to put strain on tr system.

Archangel

Thanks for the reply;

Servos are 3 new Futaba 3003s. The blades are the stock ones and are tracked and balanced. I will double check the strain on the T/R, I have not tried to run the ship at different belt tightnesses (If that is a word). The gyro is a 401 with a high speed servo. Motor is stock. I am running 7cell nimh batteries.

Den

My Feedback: (4)

You might have miss matched servos , the travel must be perfect and also are you running PCM or PPM you will need PCM in my opinion. I had a voyager it was a poor flyer for me . I replaced it with a corona and a brushless. Which put the voyeger to shame. Mind you I do not give up easy but after 7 crashes and gobs of doe I wised up. When the head speeds up or slowing it will also vibrate and I'm told thats the way it is. The gyro your using? If it is near the motor like where they sugest you put it . Some gyros are bothered by the interfierence. One more thing many times loaded antennas like deans do not work well in this application run a full antenna. I'm sure people will disagree but these were my expierences and I dumped my voyager like a bad girl friend.

Simbo

I would try a 8 cell battery.

I have a VE also, 7 cells just don't seem to have the power for a stable flight with stock motor and ESC ( though the paper work says it should), it would wobble alot, bought some 8Cell GP3300 and it's a lot more stable

rscamp

I've heard of this before. I think two solutions are normally used. One is to run a higher head speed as previously suggested. (7 cells is inadequate anyways). The other is to change the o-ring dampers on the feathering spindle (I think you want to go softer).

Like I say, I'm going from memory...

Rob

Archangel

Thanks for all the suggestions. I am hearing (from these posts and from others that I have talked to) that a major component to this problem is head speed. My experimentations also lead me to believe that the rotor is not spinning fast enough. I am really disappointed that JR would sell a kit that is unflyable out of the box.

I am having problems with a new Hummingbird that are along these lines. From what I can gather off of the web posts is that some people like their helis and others find them unflyable. I find it hard to understand why I have been able to set up and fly 20+ helicopter kits over the years and fly them all directly out of the box while I can't get this Voyager E to hover in my driveway.

With electric technology changing and improving so fast, I must remember that the Voyager E is still powered by a stock-ish !QUOT!can!QUOT! motor that has !QUOT!been especially tuned for use in the Voyager!QUOT! to provide the !QUOT!best compromise between power and battery duration!QUOT!. When all E-Helis were powered by !QUOT!can!QUOT! motors, power was marginal at best. Could a small flaw in construction cause this marginally powered kit to be unflyable?

The only conclusion that I can come up with is there is something different with my kit. That a manufacturing defect or some anomalous planetary alignment has caused my helicopter !QUOT!especially tuned motor!QUOT! to be not-so-capable of providing the !QUOT!best compromise between power and battery duration!QUOT!.

I know, rationally, that if I change the power to a brush-less motor I should be able to fly this helicopter and have it work as advertised, but, since my house seems to be in a cosmic vortex of anti-electric flight, I am a little leery of burning up a couple of hundred dollars to buy a really expensive R/C powered ceiling fan (which is what this model would be reduced to).

Is the change to brush-less technology worth it? Is the power output that much better? Is this the solution?

Please comment...

DrSup

You are right the head speed is the problem but before jumping to brushless you should 1) set up the pitch curve and throttle curve to make the head speed faster, at the hovering point pitch should not more than 5 degree 2) move to 8 cells batt(3300 mAh) and take care of charging to get full capacity

rwainw

DrSup is correct...head speed is the culprit here...you want a MINIMUM of 1500 with a target of 1700 for normal flying. First change to make is the upgrade to 8 cells. Setup the throttle curve for 85% at mid stick and 100% at top stick (all assuming your using the stock motor/esc combination). This will allow the motor to do it's job in it's most efficient power range. I flew mine for several months in that config. Pitch curve from the manual should be fine.

If you want to really improve the performance of the VE, then a Hacker C40-8L will really do the trick. That being said, make sure you have the heli flyable in it's stock configuration before you drop a bunch of cash making upgrades. Get it working, then upgrade..that way you won't be disappionted in the results and you'll have a much better flying heli in the long run.


Voyager Extreme aka "FrankenHeli"[:-]
VE with:
CF frames
C40-8L
Hacker HeliMaster 40-3p ESC
Quick 15 Head assembly
Long Tailboom
470mm mainblades
KSJ tail assembly
75mm CF MAH T/R blades
Thunder Power 3s4p 8200mah battery

rvnrcer

My Feedback: (4)

archangel,

I hope you have been able to correct your problem by now. Just wondering, probably dumb question, but have you set it up with CCPM. If so, does it react to inputs, IE collective up/ down whole head moves, left/right fore/aft holds collective but tilts Left, Right or fore, aft?
I had a similar problem with the first gasser that I set up for CCPM. Found that the head would move up and down when left/ right was input.

rvnrcer