MidnightSunRC

Turnigy 6S Mini Lipo Battery Monitor

2011-08-21T12:47:00.000+02:00

Have you run into the situation where you have a couple of LiPo's of the same brand and size and you got them mixed up at the field so you don't know which battery that is used and which is fully charged? Well I have and that is why I found it necessary to get a LiPo tester into my field box. Even more as I recently have expanded my stock of LiPo batteries and also tried to streamline it the necessity of this purchase grew.

Turnigy 3S Mini LiPo Battery Monitor

A LiPo tester, what is that?
Well to start with a "LiPo" is a Lithium Polymer battery widely used in the R/C hobby today. These batteries have commonly 1-6 cells adding about 3.7V each (actually it is 4,2V/cell but 3,7V/cell is the nominal value). So a 2 cell LiPo is marked as 7.2V and a 3 cell LiPo as 11.1V and so on. You want all of the cells to be balanced so that you have pretty much the same voltage for each cell in a healthy LiPo battery (that's why you should use a charger with balancing when charging your LiPo). There are of course LiPo batteries with more than 6 cells but I think 1-6 cells are most common.

Ok, back to the LiPo tester. When you're at the R/C field and you have your LiPo's all mixed up you don't know which one that is fully charged and which one that's not. This is where the LiPo tester come in handy. The LiPo tester is a small device that you connect your LiPo battery to and then it will tell you if it is charged or not. Commonly the LiPo testers will tell you this by showing the voltage of the LiPo on a small LED screen. Another nice feature that is common on LiPo testers is that they show you the status/voltage of each cell.

The Turnigy 6S Mini Lipo Battery Monitor
My LiPo tester is a Turnigy 6S Mini Lipo Battery Monitor bought from HobbyKing.com for 8.89$. I prefer these small and "minimalistic" LiPo tester just because they are small and easy to bring to the field.

Cycling through all cells and total

This particular LiPo tester measures in 0.01V steps which is nice (some others measure in for example 0.03V steps = less accurate). It is also very simple to use. Just plug the balance connector into the LiPo tester and it starts to cycle through each cell and also shows the total voltage of the LiPo. The correct way to plug you LiPo into this particular LiPo tester is shown below.

How to connect the battery to the LiPo tester using the balance connector

This LiPo tester also has an alarm feature where the LED will show the first character on the screen flashing, that is the cell number character. This alarm will be triggered if the voltage of any cell is below 3.4V.

The LED display shows the voltage in a bright and clear way and the figures are about 10mm high on the screen. This combined with it's weight of ~6g makes it a good option for you to attach it more permanent to a plane/heli to measure and monitor the cell voltage.

I know that some people have had problem with the accuracy of the measurements of some LiPo testers but I haven't experienced that problem with this tester. (Just as a note, even if it would not show the voltage exactly correct you will still see if it is a fully charged battery or one that is already used. I'm not saying that you should accept inaccuracy but I just want to mention that from my opinion you'll still be able to use it at the field.)

Specifications
Below are the specifications of this little fellow.

Battery type	Lithium Polymer battery (LiPo) with balance socket
Cells	2S - 6S
Voltage	2.7V ~ 4.5V/cell
Accuracy	0.01V
Current	50mA max
Dimensions	48x18x8 mm
Weight	6g

Where to buy?

Turnigy 6S Mini LiPo Battery Monitor at HobbyKig.com (this is where I bought mine)

Below is also a list with a selection of other LiPo testers that friends have used

Last, a link to a search on Amazon.com that results in a good set of LiPo testers

Lipo testers at Amazon.com

Would I buy this product again?
The answer to this is Yes. I would buy the Turnigy 6S Mini Lipo Battery Monitor from again because it has a good price, it's accurate, has a good display and spans over the number of cells that I have use for.

Regards,
MidnightSunRC

HD Wing camera 1280x720p 30fps from HobbyKing.com

2011-08-04T15:56:00.005+02:00

In an order that I made recently from HobbyKing.com I decided to order the HD Wing camera. This is my first camera for RC purposes but I am quite familiar with other kind of cameras from another hobby that I have. After this order I have had some time experimenting with the camera and tried it in different situations.

The camera was bought for 35$. Since I ordered other stuff at the same time the shipping, customs and tax was divided upon many items. But still the price of this camera was really good.

I have to say that I was a bit worried after reading some comments about this camera but this far I can't say that I agree with those comments. I don't say that those comments are wrong or anything like that but those things just haven't happened to me.

Included HW:

HD Wing camera (with built-in 850mAh LiPo and microphone)
USB cable
AV cable

Not included:

Micro SDHC memory card (e.g. Transcend 8 GB microSDHC Class 6)

Facts:

Size: 74mm x 28mm x 15mm
Weight: 29,4g
120 degrees wide angle lens
Video resolution: 1280x720 with 30fps
Photo resolution of 2560x1920
Motion detection (video or photo)
Battery: built-in 850mAh LiPo

Picture quality:
Not excellent but good enough. You won't get professional quality on your videos/photos but I think this is enough at least for my purposes and for this price. The camera should have a video resolution of 1280x720 with 30fps and a photo resolution of 2560x1920 (about 5MP).

Below are a couple of example videos from YouTube:

In low light condition there are a lot of artifacts in the picture. The camera also have some problems an a situation with a light sky and a darker ground. Flying towards the sun is not handled good but I think this is a situation that many cameras have a problem with.
I would say that the camera is handling situations mostly good and that there are a few exceptions where you would have been glad if it had done something else.

Handling:
There are a few things to say about the handling of the camera. To start with I can't say that the user interface on the camera is less than intuitive. Further on the manual in the form of a picture with a "legend" on is not the easiest to follow. There is also a pdf manual for a camera that does not look the same as this one but I think it is the same inside. Also notable is that the camera is delivered without the manual. Instead the manual can be downloaded from the "Files" tab of the product page at HobbyKing (direct link to picture here and direct link to pdf).

I had a lot of trouble understanding how to handle the camera and I've seen that others also have had trouble understanding what the different buttons do so here is my attempt to describe it:

HD Wing camera - button side (also up)

Button 1:

Power on (push and hold for a second or two and then wait for camera to initialize - vibration)
Mode selection (you cycle through the modes by quickly pushing the button, pay attention the the led lights to know which mode you are in):

The camera starts in manual video mode - blue led
Manual photo - push once after the camera is initialized, red led)
Motion detection video mode - push twice after the camera is initialized, blue and yellow led
Motion detection photo mode - push three times after the camera is initialized, red and yellow led
TV mode - this mode is initialized when the AV cable is connected and used for setup, red and blue led

Move selection up in the setup menu in TV mode

Button 2:

Push once to start/stop recording
Use for selection in setup menu in TV mode

Button 3:

Move selection down in the setup menu in TV mode
I haven't found any other use for this button

Reset button:

Press and hold for a couple of seconds to reset the camera

The other side of the camera does not have any handling functionality but you can find the microphone and battery there.

HD Wing camera - battery side (also down)

The microphone may be somewhat obstructed by the plastic shrink tube and you might wish to do something about that. Also the battery is charged via the USB cable which is not the best way and I have seen some guys doing some modification to put another charge cable in there. My knowledge those things is not that good that I start to do to heavy modifications on my own.

Charging:

The camera has a built in 850mAh LiPo battery and charging the HD Wing camera is done via the USB connector and your computer. Plug the included USB cable into the camera and your computer and a red led will show next to the USB connector on the camera. Now the camera is charging.

Motion detection:

You get into the motion detection mode as described above. There are motion detection modes both for video and for photo. n the setup menu on TV mode you can choose between 10s, 1 minute, 5 minute and 10 minute recording after motion detection.

Memory card:

The type of memory card used for HD Wing Camera is a Micro SDHC.

The memory card that I am using is a Transcend 8 GB microSDHC Class 6 . This card has quite good read/write speed and I don't feel that I have any problems with this card. Also according to my calculations the estimated amount of memory consumed is ~1.87MB/s or ~112MB/minute for recorded video. So the bigger memory card the better. I would say at least 8GB and that's why I can recommend this memory card.

For more information on speed classes etc. for Micro SDHC (and other) memmory cards here are two links that you can dig deeper into:

Save your videos/photos:

There are two ways of saving your videos or photos to your computer:

Connect the USB cable to your camera and computer and the camera will appear as a removable storage on your computer. I have tried this on Mac OS X 10.6.8 and on Windows 7 without any problems. Then just start to copy your files in the usual manner.
Remove the memory card from the camera and plug it into you memory card reader (this one for example: Transcend P8 15-in-1 USB 2.0 Flash Memory Card Reader TS-RDP8K (Black)). With that one connected to your computer copy your files in the usual manner.

The FPV trick:
Press button 1 and wait until the camera is initialized (blue led and vibration). Go into motion detection video mode by pressing button 1 twice (blue and yellow led). Insert AV cable. Now you (in rapid succession) unplug the AV cable, press button 1 twice until you are in manual video mode (blue led) and put the AV cable back in. If you fail the camera will shut down and you will have to start over again. Now you can just press button 2 to start your recording as usual.

If you run into the problem with the camera not responding to anything:
A couple of times I have run into the problem with the camera not responding to anything. I have used the camera and the turns it off. Then when trying to turn it on again nothing happens and no led's are showing anything.
Solution: Try to push and hold the reset button for a few seconds. The reset button can be found beside the memory card slot. Because it is inside the plastic shrink tube it can be tricky to push this button.

Recommendation:
Would I recommend this camera? Yes, if you keep in mind that you get what you pay for. In my opinion 35$ is a good price for this camera. The HD Wing camera is a simple camera with no fancy packaging or features. The image quality is OK if you remember to get a good fast Micro SD memory card. You can use it for FPV which I think is positive for a lot of guys out there. The fact that you need to connect it to your TV for setup is a bit disturbing but from my point of view but since you only need to do that once that's not a too big issue. Of course there's no LCD screen incorporated in this little fellow so you need to connect the camera (or at least the memory card) to your computer to be able to see what you have recorded.
All in all - I have never had any problems with my camera BUT I have had a lot of fun with it. I would buy another one if I crash this one to hard ;)

Pros/Cons:
+

Size
Price
FPV compatible

Does not work without Memory card (not included)
Need to connect to TV for setup
User interface
Manual

Hope this was useful,

MidnightSunRC

Get yorself a LiPo safety bag NOW!

2011-07-30T15:52:00.001+02:00

As you might know LiPo batteries can explode while charging them (or by physical force). Yes you will get some notice before it happens because the battery will puff-up and start to smoke. But if you have left the batteries unattended while charging you won't see that and the catastrophe might strike down. Now, you should never leave your LiPo's unattended while charging them but who can sit and watch the batteries for a whole charge cycle?

What you should start to use is a LiPo safety bag!

A LiPo safety bag is a small bag made out of a fire retardant material. You place your LiPo battery in this bag while recharging the battery. It is also good practise to use the LiPo safety bag when you are storing or carrying you LiPo batteries. Usually you seal the bag with velcro and only the charge cable is sticking out of the bag. If the worst should happen you have a good chance to dramatically reduce the damage.

Warning on the front of my LiPo safety bag

In the link to a YouTube search (below) you can take a look at various videos of LiPo explosions, with and without LiPo safety bags:

YouTube - LiPo explosions

As you can see LiPo's can really cause a real mess so make sure you are protecting yourself and your home when charging LiPo batteries.

My LiPo safety bags are bought at HobbyKing (LiPo Charge Pack 18x22cm Sack) for 1.99$ each. Prices may vary and the size of the bag may also vary but they all do the same, reduce the damage if the worst should happen. The particular bag that I have will hold ~2-3 3S LiPo batteries at the same time. Of course this is dependant on the size of your LiPo sack. Mine is 18x22cm (or ~7x9 inches). I find this particular bag quite good because it has a good opening for the charging cable and you will be able to have more than one LiPo in the bag. The velcro used to seal it is robust and the price is really affordable.

LiPo safety bag

I think this is a cheap insurance so if you don't use such a LiPo safety bag when handling your LiPo batteries make sure you consider buying one (or more) bag(s).

Below is a selection out of many places where you can buy your own LiPo safety sack (different size and price):

Hope this post was useful and that you really consider buying atleast one for your LiPo batteries.

/MidnightSunRC

Blade mSR throttle problem - SOLVED!

2011-07-27T00:01:00.019+02:00

In an earlier post (here) I wrote about my problem with the throttle on my E-flite Blade mSR getting stuck on full speed and then after a couple of seconds it went down to zero without me being able to do anything.

Now I think this is solved :)

It seems as if it was my LiPo's that wasn't good anymore. I just received an order with some hobby items today and among other stuff I had ordered Turnigy 1S 160mAh 30C 3,7 V LiPo's (from HobbyKing). I ordered four of them since the price was only 1,69$ each. After plugging the batteries into the charger (that was included with the Blade mSR bnf kit when I bought it) and charged them fully I crossed my fingers and plugged one battery into the little heli and - YIPPEE! - everything was back to normal again.

Turnigy 1S 160mAh 30C

Places where you can find "mSR-compatible" batteries:

Lesson learned: If you encounter the problem that the throttle just locks on the Blade mSR and then goes back to zero after a few seconds make sure to check the batteries. Go for 150mAh batteries or more if you intend to purchase new ones.

Building the RCPowers F18 easybuild v2 - a 4 part mini series

2011-07-26T15:22:00.001+02:00

After buying the ultimate RC course from RCPowers.com I decided to immediately start to build one of the planes from the bonus pdf-plans that I received with the course. The decision fell on the F18 v2 and I will cover my process from printed pdf-plan until the first flight.

(As a disclaimer I do not claim that this is the correct, best, most accurate or fastest way to build this plane. It is just my way of building this plane this time in order to get it up in the air and have some fun with it. Also, I don't have any connections to RCPowers so I think that I will need to limit the photos on my progress not to reveal any specifics of their designs. I find their work in RC exciting and the planes they create to be thoroughly designed.)

I will do this as a mini-series in four parts. Each part will include some specific steps and show my progress towards the maiden flight.

Part 1:
Include why I decided to start with this plane and what I have done up until the point when all the different parts are traced out from the foam sheets.
Part 2:
This is where all foam parts are put together into the final model.

Part 3:
Painting and installation of push rods and electronics.

Part 4:
Maiden flight

/MidnightSunRC

My R/C gear (the electic gear)

2011-07-25T22:38:00.001+02:00

During the time I have been active in this hobby I have bought some various "electric" equipment. When I started to think about this, after listening to the RCPowers audio course, I can see that I have not been that focused. If I should start this hobby today I would focus to buy equipment that I can reuse in (almost) all my setups. Looking at my small "collection" I now see that I only have two items that are identical, two 3s 1550 lipos. Well OK, I actually only have one kind of servos, HXT900's.
Motor:

Turnigy 28-26 1650kv
Turnigy 28-36 2350kv
Brushed motor included with the Easy Star (don't know brand or size)
2212-6 2200kv (looks exactly like turnigy but no name)

ESC's:

HobbyWing Pentium18A
HobbyWing Pentium 30A
Brushed included with Easy Star (don't know name or size)
20A (looks exactly like turnigy but no name)

Lipo:

LM Fast charge 2S 1300 20C
LM Loong 2S 1300 25C
LM Loong 3S 1300 25C
Gravity 3S 1550 30-40C

Transmitter:

Spektrum DX6i
E-sky (included with Lama v3 heli)

Receiver:

AR6100 (included with the DX6i transmitter)
OrangeRX 6 channel DSM2 receiver (works great with the DX6i)
Corona 4 channel synthetic receiver (works great with the transmitter included with Lama v3)

Servo:

HXT 900

Lessons learned: Be more focused when buying RC equipment in the future. This would save me money and I will always have spare parts if something breaks.

/MidnightSunRC

Bought the ultimate RC course

2011-07-24T18:14:00.001+02:00

I went and bought the RC Powers ultimate RC course yesterday (you can find it here: RC Powers). I bought the master version where you get almost three hours of material and four (4!) of their pdf plans as a bonus. After looking/listening through the first few modules I really see that this is a good thing to buy. Even though I would say that the biggest audience for this course are the RC hobby beginners I would also say that this is a gem for those that has been into the RC hobby for a while. Actually, I really believe that I would have saved quite a lot of money if I had had the opportunity to buy this when I first started.

I think I will come back later with a small review of this course when I have listened through all the included material but just because of the good deal together with those bonus pdf plans I would already now recommend a buy.

Blade mSR throttle problem

2011-07-24T17:51:00.003+02:00

Solution to my problem here!

Ok so my Blade msr has started to have a bad behaviour. I am flying around in a normal way on a fully charged battery, nothing fancy, and suddenly the throttle locks and I can't do anything. After a few seconds (maybe 5?) the throttle goes down to zero like the battery is dead. I have no idea what the problem might be but I suspect that it might be the 4-in-1 that is dying on me.
Has anyone had the same problem? Are there any solutions?
Cheers

Camera with OSD for rc planes - TX61 from RC-Tech

2011-07-24T17:49:00.002+02:00

WOW, look at this! Camera with OSD for rc planes
This is what I want. The only drawback that I can see is that it uses the 2,4GHz band so you can't use your 2,4GHz radio to fly with.
Here is a link to a clip on YouTube where they are using this equipment: YouTube clip
I will get back with later posts on this topic because I find this as a "next step" with this hobby.
/MidnightSunRC

Blade msr advanced settings

2009-12-27T21:42:00.005+01:00

The E-Flite Blade msr is a fun experience for both the beginner who want to try the challenge with a r/c heli and for the more advanced pilots who want a small and fun heli to relax with during the dark winter months, or at least I believe so. To clarify my current position on the beginner-advanced-scale I have an overweight to the beginner side. That much said I am now about to show how to set up the Blade msr in "advanced" mode.The heli comes with the "beginner" settings as default. This setting is shown as "A" above. The two different possible settings achieved through switching the lower rotor head links (connected at "A" in the picture above) between the two sets of swashplate control balls. There are one set with shorter shafts and one set with longer shafts. The ones with the longer shafts are used for the advanced settings. When I switched between the two settings I used a small flat screwdriver to pull the links from the swashplate control balls. Then gently attached them on the swashplate control balls with the longer shafts - "B" in the above picture. The first link is the trickiest to attach. Just be gentle and patient and you will work this out.

After finishing this adjustment you have set the heli in the more aggressive advanced setup and you will find your heli much more responsive on pitch and roll.

After I made these adjustments to get my heli into "advanced" mode I experienced that the heli started to wobble when hovering. It was as if it wasn't as stable any more, although I didn't do any input. I didn't like this behaviour so I switched back to the "beginner" mode and I am happy with that. Try it out and see which setting suites you the best! Maybe the swashplate calibration tool could have solved this?

(This procedure is also explained in the Blade msr manual on page 33)

/MidnightSunRC

Useful Blade msr link

2009-12-27T02:27:00.002+01:00

Here is a useful troubleshooting guide posted at helifreak.com by the nick briangp:

Unofficial Blade msr Troubleshooting Guide

/MidnightSunRC

Easy Star crash

2009-12-23T02:50:00.001+01:00

Noooo, I crashed my Easy Star! The body broke at the end of the "cockpit". This was what happened. I turned on my DX6i and made sure that I had selected the right model. Then I plugged in the battery and waited until binding finished. Throttled up and threw the airplane into the air. Now I applied some elevator to gain som hight, but here is where the error occurred. When I applied up elevator the plane went straight down into the ground. What was wrong. Well obviously for some reason my servos were reversed. But I had used this model before with this radio! What was wrong? Then I remembered that when I added the Blade msr to the DX6i I accidentally started to edit my Easy Star. During the excitement to get the Blade msr into the air I didn't make sure that I had the Easy Star model setup correctly in the transmitter again.

Lesson learned: Always check that your servos are moving as intended before flying your aircraft!

As a note the Easy Star will be easy to fix with some hot glue and toothpicks.

/MidnightSunRC

Trouble with Blade msr rudder trim

2009-12-20T22:40:00.002+01:00

I have noticed that every time I plug in a new battery into my Blade msr I have to trim the rudder. It always starts with a counter-clockwise rotation on a fresh battery. After a while I have to trim it back a few ticks. I have only seen a few posts on forums where this issue is mentioned. Is it something wrong with my heli?

/MidnightSunRC

E-Flite Blade msr for beginners?

2009-12-16T20:57:00.001+01:00

As a proud owner a E-Flite Blade msr and a beginner at r/c heli I thought I should write something about this heli. OK I have some r/c heli experience but that stops at 4ch co-ax helis. I've had much fun with my co-ax Lama v3 and I think that I got some basic understanding of maneuvering a 4ch heli from that.

But now back to the Blade msr. I have the bind-and-fly version of this 4ch fixed pitch heli with main rotor and tail rotor, it is not a co-ax. I use my own drm2 compatible transmitter, the Spektrum DX6i.

First of all this heli is really palm-size so there is no problem flying in your livingroom. Second the heli is really durable. I lost control and flew into a wall and dropped to the floor and the heli was ok afterwards. Third, the heli is really stable. When you got it trimmed and in a hover you can (almost) leave it there without any input. And as a last thing it is possible to do some adjustments to the swashplate in order to make the heli more responsive. This could be fun once you've learnt how to handle the heli and want something more challenging.

I would say that the E-Flite Blade msr is suitable for a beginner at r/c heli who want something durable and small to start with. I don't know if it is the best beginners r/c heli out there but it is fun and has good qualities. Some r/c simulator is always good before starting with a real heli just to get the touch of how the heli reacts to your input.

/MidnightSunRC

Blade msr nose-in training

2009-12-15T21:50:00.000+01:00

With r/c planes I have almost no problem flying towards myself but with a heli it's a completely different story. I find it very hard. Partly I believe it's due to the fact that I am flying in my livingroom next to my new TV but that does not explain it all. I have to learn this so I thought that I should dedicate this week for nose-in flying, more precisely hovering nose-in. Hovering tail-in is ok since I have practised this pretty much.

Tonight was lesson one. The heli was my new Blade msr 4ch fixed pitch micro heli and I flew through my two lipos (about 8 minutes each). I saw some improvements but still I can't switch my brain from tail-in to nose-in. Am I moving to fast forward? Are there other steps that I should practice first?

Here's what I did. I started to hover tail-in and when I was stable I rotated 180 degrees. In this position (nose-in) I tried to maintain a hover. Pretty soon I lost it and had to cut the throttle. This is where I'm glad that the Blade msr are really durable! The exercise with these steps repeated for about 16 minutes. Now the lipos are charging and I'm writing a post and trying to figure out if there is a better way to learn this or if it is just exercise exercise exercise.

Do you have some links to good information about learning to fly a helicopter please post them here. I'm only flying a 4ch micro heli at the moment but my goal is a 6ch 3D heli.

Happy flying,
MidnightSunRC

My new r/c gear

2009-12-10T22:22:00.007+01:00

It's been a while since I did any updates now and a lot of stuff has happened since the last time.

In an earlier post I described some r/c gear that I was looking at and here is the outcome:

Transmitter: Spektrum dx6i with AR6200

Plane: Multiplex Easy Star

Heli: E-Flite Blade msr (bnf)

Below are som quick comments:

The Spektrum dx6i transmitter will cover all my needs considering planes and helis. This transmitter fits me just right :)

I'm really glad that I bought the Easy Star because that plane is a true beginner. I find it so easy to fly and it can take some bad landings as well. The kit I got was a ARF kit with servos, speed control and motor included. I just had to glue the tail parts in place, insert my receiver and go out flying. All in all it took me about two hours or so from unwrapping the box til I was out on the maiden flight. In a later post I will do a review of the Easy Star.

My latest purchase is the E-Flite Blade msr bnf. bnf is the bind-and-fly version where you are supposed to have a drm2 compatible radio, which by the way my nice new radio is :)

In upcoming posts I will review my new gear.

/MidnightSunRC

Foam plane revisited

2009-08-07T14:06:00.007+02:00

So I've been flying my home built foam plane a couple of times the last few days but it didn't turn out that well. Oh the plane flies but I think the body isn't stiff enough because it is twising around its own roll axis. This behaviour made it really hard to fly since the rudder input I made had to twist the body back before the actual turn started...if you know what I mean. It was like the body not stiff enough added some serious lag to my roll inputs. And yes, I went pretty hard down into the ground...:( But all the electronics are still ok but this plane has to be seen as a prototype. I wont fly this one any more so all the electronics are now removed from the plane. If I find myself some depron or something similar I will try this plane again but until then I'm thinking of buying a Multiplex Easy Star.

I have made some research on the Easy Star on the Internet and it seems like the Easy Star is a pretty good plane for a beginner. It is durable, self stabilizing and not to expensive, just the one I'm looking for. I'm going for the plane only since I already have all the electronics.

Also been surfing the Internet looking at r/c helis but I haven't found the one I'm looking for yet. Or more precisely, I haven't decided yet which one I should go for. My ESky Lama V3 has taken a few more heavy crashes and now it has started to sound a bit funny. I don't know if it is the motor or if it is the gears...but it is still flying. It feels like I'm ready for a more advanced r/c heli. Not an ADVANCED but a instep model for 6ch ccpm. In the post before this one I listed a few examples of helis I am looking at. Maybe I should add a T-REX 450S?

Anyway, in order to get a heli I have to get a new r/c radio...

R/C stuff to consider

2009-08-03T20:13:00.019+02:00

Tomorrow I will start to fly with my foam plane. Hopefully I will get more than one flight out of it so that I can get some progress on my r/c plane mission. I feel that I am postponing the r/c plane training all the time so now I have set a deadline for myself.

I also have made myself a list of r/c planes, r/c helis and a list of tx's that I'm considering. As for the planes I really want ailerons or the possibillity to convert to ailerons and with the helicopters I think I want a 6ch cp heli. As always I am looking for things that I don't grow out of the first year.

Any ideas, comments, pros & cons or other stuff that I should consider? Feel free to give me feedback on my lists or maybe more examples of good planes, helis or tx's.

The lists below give you a good idea of which budget range I'm looking for.

Transmitters:

Spektrum DX6i
Spektrum DX7i

R/C Planes:

Multiplex Easy Star (which I probably would modify to include ailerons)
Great Planes Seawind Seaplane
Formosa 2
GWS Slow Stick
Multiplex MiniMag
Graupner Electric-UHU
GWS E-Starter

R/C Helicopters:

ESky Honey Bee King 2
ESky Belt CP (V2?)
Blade 400

/MidnightSunRC

Another Lama V3 crash and mission update

2009-08-02T18:46:00.008+02:00

It seems like I'm just flying my little heli instead of r/c planes at the moment. I really has to start my sessions with my foam plane soon. I'm really exited to see if it will fly and if I will manage to fly it. Since I have been flying my Lama V3 r/c heli a lot lately I am starting to feel confident that I will manage my r/c plane. So I think I am still on the right path in my mission to learn to fly r/c planes/helis.

eSky 4CH Helicopter Co-co Lama Version 3 Micro Heli Radio Remote Control RC Helicopter RTF for $69.95

Speaking of helis :) I crashed my Lama V3 hard into the ground tail first. The tail part split into a couple of peaces but the rest of the heli was fine. I flew it a couple of times without the tail but it started to shake the big-shake. So I reattached the tail with some scotch tape and now it is back to normal again. As you might be able to see the tips on all rotorblades are scotch taped back on. Maybe I should replace them cause it is starting to make the heli a bit unstable and I have a full spare set. As usual, I am impressed with this little peace of plastic!

Lama V3 crash!

2009-07-31T19:57:00.002+02:00

My Lama V3 has been flown extensively the last couple of days and as usual I'm having a lot of fun with it. I'm really glad I bought it. So if you want a nice little 4 channel coax heli you really should consider The Lama V3. I wonder if there is any diference between the Lama V3 and V4?

eSky 4CH Helicopter Co-co Lama Version 3 Micro Heli Radio Remote Control RC Helicopter RTF for $69.95

Today I had the heli up about 10 m (about 32 ft) into the air when I had to "adjust" to not fly into a tree. The wind conditions was pretty close to perfect (almost no wind). It seems this heli can't handle too much roll cause when I tried to roll it away from the tree it just lost every bit of lift and crashed straight into the ground. OK it was on grass but I was pretty sure that this was my last flight with my precious Lama V3. But no no. The flybar came snapped off and that was everything. I just had to put the flybar back in place and then I was up in the air again :)

/MidnightSunRC

Moved to blogger

2009-07-27T22:10:00.003+02:00

I have moved this blog from wordpress to blogger now. All posts here on will be published simultaneously on both blogger and wordpress.

/MidnightSunRC

Foam plane

2009-07-27T22:08:00.003+02:00

Meanwhile in the bat cave... I had to start out with something and until I can figure out what plane I want I started to build a foam plane. It is an Extra 300 and I got the plans from RCPowers.com. I will put up some more information on my progress on this one as well as what power system I will use.

That's all for now but I'm really starting to feel the air under my wings now :)

Back into r/c after a break

2009-07-27T22:08:00.002+02:00

Been away from the "r/c business" for a while now but today I dusted off my ESKY Lama V3 heli and took a trip. I really like flying this little heli. First I flew around inside but then I took it out into the backyard. The wind is really a problem for this one!

Some time ago I started to build a foam plane out of a foam sleeping roll (not sure if that is the correct name). The plans I used are the free Extra 300 from rcpowers.com. I believe you're supposed to use depron or something similar but I didn't have that so I used the only foam I had att hand - the sleeping roll. The plane is finished and I have to say that this is a really neat way to get yourself a r/c plane at a budget. I believe the actual building time was about an hour or two (with no electronics installed). I took the plane out on it's maiden flight and boy is this plane maneuverable! I tossed the plane up in the air and my pulse went up at 200 bpm at once. I made a few swirls, loops and other unmentionable maneuvers before landing the plane. During landing i broke the prop. Since this maiden flight I have made some modifications to it and put some landing gears on it and made adjusted it to be a little less touchy. Now I am ready to fly again :)

In earlier posts I've been writing about r/c simulators. Simulators are really good since you can crash your plane and the next second you are up and flying it again. But when I tried my plane for the first time I thought about crashing it pretty much all the time. I believe this made me extra nervous. But I truly recommend a simulator before trying your own plane for the first time.

Happy flying!

Lama V3 swashplate problem

2009-07-27T22:07:00.004+02:00

Inspired to fly from my trip to the local r/c field earlier today I brought my Lama V3 heli out into the backyard. Flew around for a while and then "landed" a bit hard. Started up again and when I got the heli up into the air it started to do the mighty wobble. Shaking and swirling around the helicopter hit the grass. I removed the battery cable and inspected the heli and couldn't see anything wrong so I connected the battery again and throttled up. Same thing - the whole helicopter just shaked uncontrollably (this time still on the ground). I disconnected the battery again and took a closer look and now I saw that the inner swashplate had separated from the outer swashplate. It was a but tricky but I managed to push the two pieces together again. In order to do this I had to adjust the servos to get the outer swashplate in the right angle.

After this happened the swashplate has separated a couple of times. But I don't want to glue it in place if I want/need to change it in the future. So now my standard procedure before every take off is to check that the two pieces are tight together. I don't know if it's common with plastic swashplate but I'm thinking of buying the aluminum swashplate for my Lama.

eSky 4CH Helicopter Co-co Lama Version 3 Micro Heli Radio Remote Control RC Helicopter RTF for $69.95

I also spent some time on the simulator tonight flying planes. Installed a new version of my r/c sim ClearView. My previous version was 4.98 and this version is 5.02. I don't know but I think the system requirements for this latest version is somewhat higher. I felt that I was experiencing lagging or something, I'm not really sure. There was some difference in the feeling. I have to try it some more to pinpoint my feeling. Maybe I also should mention that the computer that I have the simulator installed on is not the latest and greatest...Well well, that will be a later issue.

I want my own r/c plane now!

Trip to local R/C field

2009-07-27T22:07:00.003+02:00

Today was a beautiful day so I decided to take the long waited trip to the local r/c field. It was not exactly crowded out there but there were three persons flying. One was flying a pretty large gas Extra 300, one person had a couple of electric planes and one had some kind of home built gas plane. I hung around for an hour or so and felt that I have to start looking more actively at finding myself a r/c plane.

Here are my "specifications":

4 channels

Preferably electric

Something that I can grow into (by this I mean that it should be easy but being able to fly more advanced too)