Price As Tested: $222 ($181 + $41 shipping)

Flight Log: ~ 25 Flights

Repair / Maintenance Costs: ~ $13

Introduction To The Walkera 4G3

The Walkera 4G3 is classified as a micro class helicopter and is currently the smallest, fully functional 6 channel RC helicopter available.

I got one of these a few weeks ago and even though I’ve only got 25 flights on it – it’s on great little heli. It also lives up to the manufactures claim of a small size helicopter but with the full functions of big one.

Winters up here in Canada are cold and I haven’t had a heli in the air for over a month and was suffering from withdrawal, so I wanted one of these for the simple reason is that’s it’s something that could be flown indoors, even in your house.

Though, if you have a small apartment or a tiny house, there’s not going to be much room for flying indoors though. Despite its small size, it’s a quick little bugger and you’ll need a decent sized open area – at least 10ft by 10ft if you want to do anything more than hover.

And 3D flight indoors is pretty much out of the question unless you’ve got a large open area, high ceilings, are an expert pilot or don’t mind replacing a lot of broken parts.

Here’s the specs on this little heli:

1. Main Rotor Diameter: 302mm
2. Tail Rotor Diameter: 58mm
3. Overall Length: 273mm
4. Total Weight: 68.4g (battery included)
5. Servos: weight - 3.5g, speed - 0.12sec/60o, torque - 0.2kg/cm

It tiny and uses mini LiPo batteries to match. The 400 MAh single cell 3.7 volt LiPo batteries actually live up to the manufacturers claims and will give you flight times up to 8 minutes in normal mode with easy flying, or 5 minutes of 3D flying in idle up mode.

The only battery problem I have is that the battery keeps falling out and the battery holder will break easily in a hard landing. A little superglue as added reinforcement helps to told it together.

Also, the battery connectors were very tight and difficult to pull apart. Some people were sanding them down a little, but I found that after a few flights they loosened up a bit and fit quite nicely. The people who sanded them ended up having to hold them together with tape, so I wouldn’t recommend doing it.

What’s In The Box?

The Walkera 4G3 comes with a 6 channel 2.4 GHz radio, the pre-assembled 4G3 heli, a battery charger, a 3.7 volt 400 MAh LiPo battery, an adapter cable for a flight simulator, a plastic screw driver, and extra set of main blades as well as the instruction manual,

Everything was packaged well and nothing was broken or not as it should be.

Was it really ready to fly (RTF)? Yes and no.

Yes, it was ready to fly out of the box and would work ok, but no, it wasn’t completely set up and trimmed for flight.

The swash was level and just needed a little trim to the right, though the tail trims and gyro weren’t set up properly and the tail was drifting significantly.

A few tweaks here and there and things were working much better and it flew around quite well.

Even though Walkera claims that it was test flown at the factory and the store I got it from said they test flew it twice, it wasn’t tweaked for flight.

It’s not a big deal and any RTF RC helicopter will never come really ready to fly. I was happy with how it was… you can’t really expect a factory worker in China to spend the time and TLC to get it spot on anyways as it takes a significant amount of time and testing.

Flight Testing

Hovering

Despite its small size, the Walkera 4G3 actually hovers quite well.

It isn’t anywhere near as stable as a larger heli and is a little twitchy, but isn’t that hard to control once you get the hang of it.

It also won’t hover hands off and requires constant micro inputs to keep it stable, but I had no difficult holding it still in the air.

Because of the ground effect caused by the rotor wash, you’ll want to be at least a couple of feet off the ground when hovering as it is sensitive to any disturbances in the air due to its light weight.

If you’re a beginner and don’t have RC helicopter experience, you might find it a little difficult, but for someone who does have previous stick time, they shouldn’t have any issues at all.

This Walkera 4G3 is also great for practicing hovering orientations - if you learn to nose on the Walkera 4G3, anything much larger should be a piece of cake.

Flight

It’s definitely very light on the sticks and not needing much input to get it to react. When you hit idle up, it was really impressive and while you can’t do hard core 3D, loops, flips, rolls and inverted flight are no problem at all as long as you have the space.

For the size, the servos were quite fast and performed well, though they could use a smidge more torque on the extremes.

Forward flight is nice and it flies good and straight, though it looses a little torque on tight or whip like turns. There is a little slop in the head – but it should be fixed by the aluminum head upgrade that’s just come out.

Because of it’s extremely light weight, it’s very susceptible to wind and can only be flown outside on days where the wind is under 5mph. If it’s blowing harder than that or there are gusts, you should keep it indoors.

The tail motor is driven by a separate brushed motor and doesn’t seem to be able to keep up all the time with the heli. When doing figure eights, it would sometimes lag a little on the turns and because it works by speeding up and slowing down, it overcorrects then need to fix itself.

Also, if you pump full collective, you’d end up doing a piro or two on your way up – it’s just not fast enough to keep up.

You can change the gyro sensitivity, as well as the tail mix and compensation, but I can’t seem to get it to hold in the same way a larger heli would.

They gyro is decent for the size of heli, but doesn’t seem to be quite sensitive enough and as the head speed drops, the tail starts to drift some.

That coupled with a driven tail, means that you need to change your flying style a little and correct for it with the rudder stick some.

Also, the headspeed throughout the flight changes by at least a couple of hundred RPM, so the zippiness will subside a little as you’re flying.

The only other characteristic I didn’t like was its tendency to rebound from stick inputs. For example, you give a left cyclic input, then stop the heli with a right cyclic input and bring it to a hover and it bounces some to the right.

This is obviously because of the proportionally heavy flybar weights, which I’ll probably move in or remove all together for crisper 3D flight.

While I though it flew pretty well and would hover and flip over without too much of a problem, it did take a little bit of getting used to. Though, once you master this tiny thing, you should not have any issue flying anything larger.

Also be sure to order some extra parts with your purchase – you’re going to break things more quickly than you would with a full sized RC helicopter.

Here’s what I’d recommend:

• 3 - 5 sets of main blades
• An extra tail blade or two
• Flybar
• Linkage set
• Screw kit
• Battery holder
• Extra batteries for more enjoyment

If it’s in your budget, get a few of everything minus the electronics and main frame so your down time is limited to almost nothing.

Upgrades

As of this writing, an aluminum metal head upgrade was just released that includes blade grips, mixing arm, rotor housing, linkages and swashplate. The metal design is a lot more precise than the plastic parts and takes away a lot of the slop making the cyclic more sensitive and snappy while only adding 1 gram to the overall weight of the Walkera 4G3

The aluminum head upgrade will run you about an extra $50, so if you’re just flying around your house, it’s not really needed for anything, but if you’re going to do a little 3D with this heli, it would probably be worth upgrading.

There are also supposed to be scale canopy bodies that will be out at some point for the 4G3 if you want to go for the super micro scale look.

There’s also a brushless upgrade that’s rumored to be out soon – this is one I’ll definitely want. With a little more power and the metal head, this heli will buzz around like a humming bird on crack.

Other Things You Might Want To Know

• The skids are made out of a thin wire which pretty much made flying on carpet impossible as they’d keep getting caught. I guess it depends on the type of caret you have, but for mine it was a no go. Hard wood and tile though are no problem at all. The skids also bend easily so order a second set.
• Also, the tail blade is prone to picking up hair and winding it around the motor and gears, so if there are any long haired people where you’re flying, you should check it every few flights.
• The heli needs to be ‘bound’ fast when you turn on the transmitter and plug in the heli battery, in around 5 seconds or so or it won’t bind.
• The 4G3 handles crashes quite nicely. If you happen to land on carpet or grass, there’s a good chance you can hit without damaging anything and if you do, parts are quite cheap, though really only available by ordering online.
• The main blades are made out of hard foam and take a beating quite well – you can usually survive a few run ins with the wall and keep on going without swapping them out.
• It looks like the main blades come balanced as a set - in the 5 or so crashes I had around the house, I busted two blades and when I tired to swap the broken one with one from a new set, the tracking was way off and there was major vibrations. But when you put a matched set on, everything was smooth as glass.
• I found 12 degrees of pitch (both directions) works best for 3D, so you’ll need to adjust that to get the best performance from the 4G3.
• When switching from idle up to normal mode, the heli will jump in the air because the blades are at 5 degrees pitch in normal mode at center stick, where it’s 0 degrees in idle up.
• The instructions don’t mention a lot of details concerning repair or reassembly or the Walkera 4G3, not mention what maintenance to do.

  As for maintenance there’s not really too much do to. Every few flights, you should give the 4G3 a good look over and make sure there are no bent / broken parts or loose screws as well as checking the tail and main rotors for hair. It also wouldn’t hurt to lube the swashplate once in a while.

  If you need to repair something, note the steps you take to disassemble it and follow them in reverse. Taking a few digital pictures helps if you’re relatively new to the hobby.

Overall, for about $200 this little heli is extremely entertaining and also a lot of fun to fly. It might not perform quite the same as a larger 600 sized RC helicopter, but for its size it’s a pretty incredible piece of work and a heli I’d recommend for beginner and expert pilots alike.

It’s simple to use, works with a wide variety of analog and digital servos and has a very attractive price point.

Did I also mention that it does a great job at being a gyro and holding your heli’s tail rock solid?

I’ve used it on everything from .30 sized RC helicopters all the way up to .90 sized birds – and if you check any of the popular turbine RC helicopter sites, you’ll find that a lot of the much larger turbine RC heli’s use them as well.

Because of it’s popularity, the GY401 is often the first gyro many beginner RC helicopter pilots get their hands wet with, which is the reason for the GY401 ‘how to’ article. While this how to article will be specifically for the Futaba GY401 gyro, similar principals can be applied to almost any heading hold RC helicopter tail gyro.

By the way, if you have a GY611 gyro, you can read the GY611 setup article here. Or if you need the manual for the GY401, you can grab that here.

Also, before we get stated, make sure you’re tails pushrod and tail slider moves smoothly and there’s no binding. Also, it would be a good idea to check that your ball links are on snug, but not too tight and can move freely.

Pre-Setup Setup

Plug the gyro’s main lead (black with 3 wires – black, red, green) into the rudder channel on your receiver. This is channel 4 on most receivers, but consult your radio’s manual if you’re not sure.

Then plug the other lead (red servo plug – yellow wire) into the gain channel in your receiver. This is normally channel 5, but can be also be set to any aux channel. Again, if you’re not sure, check your manual.

Since there is only one wire on this channel, you need to make sure you plug it in correctly. The yellow wire should line up with the other lighter colored wires in the receiver. Depending on the servos and other electronics you’re using, these could be white, orange or yellow.

And finally, plug the other servo lead (black female lead) into your rudder servo,

Warning: If you have DS (digital servo) mode enabled and you’re using an analog servo, there’s a good change you’re going to burn out the servo motor. If you’ve got analog mode selected for a digital servo, you’ll want to get it switched around, but it’s not likely to cause any immediate problems. Check the switch on the gyro and make sure it matches the tail servo you’ll be using.

You’ll also need to mount your gyro to your helicopter using the foam mounting pads that come with it in a place where it will be secure and stay relatively safe in a crash.

Radio Setup

Step 1 – Set ATV’s, Reset Trims, Disable Mixing

Set the endpoints or ATV’s on your rudder channel (usually channel 4) to 100% each way. This number doesn’t affect the actual servo throw, but piro rate which I’ll explain later on.

Make sure all trims and subtrims are set to 0. There is no need to veer use trim on the rudder channel. If your tail is drifting, you’ll need to check your gyro gain or mechanical setup.

Also, make sure that there is no revo or any other mixing on your rudder channel.

Step 2 – Check Rudder / Gyro Direction

Check that your rudder and gyro channels don’t need reversing.

When you spool up and input right rudder, the nose of your heli should move to the right and the tail to the left and vice versa. If the nose moves to the left when you input right rudder input, reverse the rudder channel (usually channel 4) in your radio.

To check that the gyro is working in the right direction, push the rudder stick to the right and note the way the tail servo moves. Then take the tail of the heli and yaw it left. If the rudder moves the same way both times, then your gyro direction is set correctly. If it moves in opposite directions, then you need to reverse the gyro using the switch on it.

Step 3 – Set Gyro Gain

Setup the gyro gain in your radio. Here’s how:

The different modes (heading hold and rate mode) are controlled by the gain setting in your radio transmitter. If you’re not sure how the different modes affect flight, you can read more about it here. Though, for a beginner (or almost any RC heli pilot except scale), you’ll almost always want to fly in heading hold mode.

Please note: Heading hold mode can also be referred to as AVCS mode and rate mode can also be called normal mode.

If you’re using a JR radio, heading hold mode is set when the gyro’s gain is set to 50% and above. Conversely, rate model is when the gain is set at less than 50%. On Futaba radios, 0 to 100% gain is heading hold mode and 0 to -100% gain is rate mode.

Therefore, a gain setting of 42% (heading hold mode) on a Futaba radio is equal to a gain setting of 71% on a JR radio: ((42 / 2) + 50) = 71%

Or a gain setting of -42% (rate mode) on a Futaba radio is equal to a gain setting of 29% on a JR radio: (50 – (42 / 2)) = 29%

Or 77% gain on a JR radio is the same as 54% gain on a Futaba radio: ((77 – 50) x 2) = 54%

Or 24% gain on a JR radio is the same as -52% gain on a Futaba radio: ((24 – 50) x 2) = -52%

Anyways, that’s enough math for this article.

To make it simple, if you’re starting on a Futaba radio (or any other that uses a similar gain structure) you might want to start with a gain of around 40% - 50%. If you’re a JR person, that’s 70% - 75%.

How do you know when you’ve got the gain right?

If the tail is wagging, you’ve got it set to high. If it’s drifting or doesn’t snap to a stop after a pirouette, then it’s not high enough.

Quick Tip: When I’m setting the gain for a new RC helicopter, I like to use the idle up switch to try different gain settings. For example, normal mode (Futaba radio) might have a 40% gain, idle 1 would have 45%, idle 2 at 50% and idle 3 at 55%. The pitch and throttle curves would all be the identical.

This method allows you to fine tune the gain fairly quickly and try different settings with a flick of the switch without landing, powering down and changing your radio programming.

Once the mechanical setup is complete, you may need to come back to this step to get the gain setting fine tuned. Ideally, you should get it set as high as possible without it causing your tail to wag.

Step 4 – Assign Switch To Gyro

If you haven’t already done so, setup a switch in your radio so you ca switch between heading hold and rate mode in your gyro by either assigning a switch or using the idle up switch I mentioned above. We’ll need this for the mechanical setup that’s coming up next.

Mechanical Setup

Step 1 – Install Ball On Servo Arm

Consult your helicopters manual for where the ball needs to go onto the servo arm. For most RC helicopters, this is anywhere from 14 – 20mm out from the servo. This is usually the 2nd or 3rd hold in the servo arm.

Step 2 – Center Servo

Before we can install the servo arm, we need to tell the gyro where neutral is. To do this, put the gyro in rate mode (change gain setting) and toggle the rudder stick on your radio left to right a few times, then let go. This centers the servo to a neutral position.

Once it’s centered, install the servo arm so it’s as close to 0 degrees to the tail pushrod as possible without using any trim or subtrim.

Step 3 – Setup In Rate Mode

Once you get the servo arm installed at 90 degrees, you need to adjust the tail linkage length until the tail holds in rate mode without any rudder input. You should do this with a gain setting of about -37% (Futaba) or 32% (JR).

Power on the gyro in heading hold mode and wait 5 – 10 seconds for it to initialize and the red light is solid. If you move the helicopter during the gyro initialization, it will disrupt the process and cause it to not set properly which can cause the tail to drift.

Switch the gyro to rate mode on your radio.

Spool up your heli and bring it into a low hover - you’re going to need to provide left or right rudder input to keep the tail steady. If you don’t want to hover your heli, you can spool it up and get it light on the skids on a very smooth surface until it’s just about to take off – though the rotor wash can come into play here. Make a mental note of which way you need to apply rudder input, land your heli and adjust the pushrod length to compensate for the rudder input you had to give.

Keep adjusting the length of the pushrod until your heli will hover and the tail will hold without any rudder input.

Also, instead of adjusting the pushrod length, you can also slide the tail servo along the boom (depending on your heli and where it’s installed) until the helicopter will hover without any rudder input.

Please note: It is not imperative that you get this step perfect or even complete this step.

If you adjust the pushrod so it’s just off center a bit (to compensate for the main rotor torque) and go from there without completing this step, your helicopter will fly fine.

Though if you want a perfect mechanical setup, maximum throw in each direction for your tail and more tail authority, you should complete this step – in fact, I’d recommend that you complete it either way.

Once you get the heli setup, the GY401 will memorize the rudder trim / subtrim setting as rudder neutral anytime you initialize it in heading hold mode. Since you shouldn’t be using any trim or subtrim, this doesn’t matter, but if you do have it set, it won’t make any difference and the gyro will assume that it’s 0 putting the rudder at it’s neutral position.

Alternatively, you can also set the rudder neutral for position for heading hold mode by switching between rate mode and heading hold mode 3 or more times at intervals of less than one second ending in heading hold mode with the heli powered on. You can do this using the switch that you set up earlier.

Once the tail’s set up in rate mode, land your heli, power down and change to heading hold mode. The red light should come on the gyro and the tail should hold like a rock (assuming your gain is set right – see above). If your tail is drifting or wagging, fine tune the gain settings as per the instructions above.

Step 4 – Set Travel Limits

Once you get your gyro setup in rate mode, you’ll need to adjust the throw of the tail servo.

What you want to do here is get the most travel possible in each direction without it binding. You’ll be able to tell if there’s binding by listening to the tail servo – if it’s making a buzzing noise, it’s binding. You should also be able to tell visually by looking at the tail pitch slider.

Power up everything and move the rudder stick on the radio left to right to see how much throw you have. If there’s room to spare and no binding, then adjust the limit pot on the gyro until you get the maximum throw possible in each direction without binding, but so it right up against the tail case.

You might be able to get more throw in one direction than the other and that’s ok – because you set up the gyro in rate mode (you did didn’t you?) you’ll have a perfect mechanical setup and don’t need to worry about that unless there’s a large difference in the travel – and there shouldn’t be.

Ideally, your limit pot should be around 100 on the gyro. If it’s less than 80, your ball may be too far out on the servo arm and should be brought in a hole. If you’re not getting full throw and it’s up over 120, then you might want to bring the ball out a hole on the servo arm.

Step 5 – Adjust Piro Speed

This couldn’t be easier.

To adjust the pirouette speed of your heli, you simply adjust the endpoints or ATV’s on your rudder channel.

If you’re a beginner, you might want to go with a lower number like 70% (each side) for a decent tail response that’s not too fast, or if you’re into more advanced 3D flying, you might wan to go with something around the 125% – 130% mark for a faster pirouettes and more tail response. The default value of 100% is good for your average pilot, though you’ll probably want to fine tune it to your personal preference at some point.

Whatever number you go with, it should be the same in each direction for consistent piro speeds either way.

Please Note: There’s another adjustment on the gyro for delay. This is not something you need to worry about and should be set to 0. Some scale pilots using slower analog servos may use it for more realistic flight, but you can set it to 0 and forget it.

That’s it – your GY401 gyro should be set and if you followed all the steps, you should have a tail that holds like a rock.

Price As Tested: $212 (includes sensors and LCD PowerPanel)

If you’re a guy (or a gal) who likes to have all the latest gadgets and get the most from your RC helicopter, airplane, car or boat, then you’ll definitely want to check out the V3 data logger from Eagle Tree Systems.

The Eagle Tree data logger is an in-flight data recorder that can record all the vitals of your RC helicopter and is jam packed with features, options and available sensors.

The V3 data logger will work with anything that’s battery powered, though data loggers or eLoggers like this one are primarily used for electric powered RC vehicles, though they can also be used for nitro, gas and turbine powered birds.

The unit is small and portable and will fit on pretty much anything (except for the most micro mini RC toys) because it’s small in size and weight – only a mere 20 grams.

It’s also extremely portable – just stick some Velcro to the back of the Eagle Tree and you can easily move it around from model to model.

In stock form, the Eagle Tree’s main function is to measure and record your battery voltage, current and compute the wattage used. All data is stored on the logger’s internal memory and can be downloaded to your computer via USB and viewed live on your PC or the available PowerPanel LCD display for analysis.

Tricked out with the available and affordable sensors, it will measure and record other things like temperatures and RPM’s all the way down to altitude, speed or GPS coordinates.

The V3 Eagle Tree Data logger comes in 3 available options.

1. 100 amp version with integrated deans plugs – street price: $70

2. 100 amp version with wire leads – street price: $70

3. 150 amp version with wire leads – street price: $90

My suggestion, get the unit with the wire leads – it will be easier to plug in and move from model to model. Plus you can solder on whichever type of leads you’d like.

I also went for the 150A logger because some of my larger heli’s have brushless motors that can spike at 100A+. Even though the 100A logger is rumored to be able to handle spikes well above 100A, it wasn’t worth risking it and the welfare of my heli to save $20.

Here’s the specs:

Dimensions: 2.25″ x 1″ x 0.5″
Weight: 0.7 ounces (20 grams)
Voltage: 5 to 70V
Amperage: Up to 100 amps
Temperature: 0 to 424F
RPM: 100 to 50,000

Why would you want a electronic data logger anyways? There’s a lot of reasons actually.

Maybe you want to measure your headspeed on your heli to make sure it’s not bogging or know how hot your motor is getting.

Maybe you just want to see how many amps you’re pulling to make sure your ESC and battery are up to it.

Or maybe even you want to test the efficiency of different pinions to see what gives the longest flight times.

Whatever the reason, if the eagle tree has something to measure it, it will do it for you.

Another reason I like this Eagle Tree data logger is because it’s so easy to use. Just plug it in, and that’s it. In fact, each time you connect the power to the data logger, it creates a new session which is nice because you can use it on back to back flights and easily differentiate between them.

Everything plugs into logical places which are easily labeled and most of the sensors can be used at the same time. Fot example, you can have 3 temp sensors plugged in, a RPM sensor, a throttle sensor and the LDC display as well as the GPS sensor at the same time. Though to use two RPM sensors at once, you needed to make a small modification to the orientation of the servo pins by swapping the position of the red and black wires going into the servo plug.

The only thing I didn’t really like about the V3 data logger is that it didn’t come with a printed manual. There was one on the included CD that you could print out, but it’s nice when things come with a hard copy. Not everyone may have access to a computer or printer and it’s always nice to have a hard copy that you can browse right away instead of having to print out your own. All of the sensors I received did come with printed manuals.

The V3 data logger has 4 times the logging capacity of the former V2 Eagle Tree Data Logger which is retained to a permanent memory so it’s not lost when the power is removed and you want to take it home for analysis on your PC.

PC Software

The Eagle Tree can be used right out of the package without any setup necessary, though it is best to configure and customize on your PC using the software that comes with it. The software is fully compatible with Windows Vista, 98SE, ME, Win2K and XP.

For ease of use, I installed the software on my office PC as well as a laptop I can take to the field if I wanted.

Once the software is installed, the wizard will guide you through the configuration and allow you to setup which parameters you want to view and how you want to view them.

Once the data is collected, it is extremely easy to extract. Downloading the data from the logger over the USB link takes just a few seconds and can be saved for later comparison or viewed in real time or show maximum values on your computer.

The desktop software can be used in playback mode to play back a previous flight, in peak mode to display peak value or in live mode, where all parameters are displayed in real time on your computer.

All recordings can be graphed for visual analysis. The graphs can also be easily customized and you can choose which parameters you want to graph

You can setup which parameters you want to record and how often to log them (from 1 - 10 samples per second). Your available recording time will depend on how many parameters you’re logging and how often you’re recording them per second.

Things like engine RPM or your helicopter headspeed you may want to record 5 - 10 times a second to get the most accurate results because it’s constantly changing, but then other things like battery or engine temperatures can be recorded just once per second since they’re slow to change. As a minimum, you should get at least a half hour of recording time no matter how you set things up.

PowerPanel LCD Display

The PowerPanel discplay is a super thin LCD display that lets you get your peak and live data displayed without a PC.

It’s fully programmable on your computer and has the ability to display four sets of information on two different pages which alternate every two seconds for a total of eight parameters. This includes things this like voltage, current, wattage, RPM’s, temperatures and so on. It comes from the factory displaying volts, amps, milliamp hours and temperature.

It’s small and light enough that you can attach it right to the side of your helicopter, or bring along in your field box instead of lugging around a PC.

When the V3 data logger is coupled with the PowerPanel LCD display it will easily and conveniently replace your old clunky watt meter and/or voltmeter.

The PowerPanel sells for $40 and is an indispensable tool and upgrade for your data logger.

Sensors

There are a whole bunch of sensors available for the Eagle Tree V3 data logger and are new ones being developed all the time.

While the Eagle Tree works great on it’s own to record things like volts, watts and amps, you won’t get to brandish its full functionality without some of the additional sensors.

Additional sensors include things like RPM sensors, temperature sensors, GPS modules, servo current loggers and so on. Some of these extra options go for as low as $5 and as much as $150 for the GPS module.

Though, if you’re on a really tight budget, you don’t need to get any of the extra options, though they are certainly nice to have and allow you to utilize the full functionality of the logger..

RPM Sensors

There are three different RPM sensors available for this system.

The first is a magnetic unit which requires the installation of a sensor and magnets on a spinning surface (ie. Your rotor blades)

The second RPM sensor uses an optical sensor which reads alternating light / dark areas on a spinning part. I thought this would work similarly to a handheld optical RPM sensor that I use for my heli, but it needs to be within half an inch of the spinning surface to work, so you won’t be able to use to measure your heli’s headspeed.

If you want to measure you’re RC helicopters headspeed, you can use the third type of RPM sensor. This one works electronically and connects to one of the wires going from your ESC to your brushless motor. If you use the bullet connectors, you don’t need to strip any wires or do any soldering – just stick it the female end of the bullet connector and sandwich it in with the male counterpart.

It measures the signal from the ESC and when you input some info on your computer (number of poles in motor and gearing ratio) it will calculate the headspeed of your helicopter. This is especially useful to see if your head is bogging or your governor is working as advertised.

Temperature Sensors

You’ve got two to choose from. One is a loop that can wrap around your inrunner brushless motor, LiPo battery or ESC – just make sure it’s touching the surface. The other is just the sensor at the end of a wire and can be taped down in a more permanent position.

The temp sensors are a nice feature to make sure things are keeping cool and within their operating range, though they can’t really be used with an outrunner brushless motor. An infrared temp sensor would be nice to see in the future.

Other Available Sensors

In addition to the sensors mentioned above, there is an altimeter, an airspeed sensor, a servo current meter, a GPS module and a Spektrum / JR interface cable available.

The only one of these I got was the servo current meter, so I could see how much juice they were using.

While an altimeter, airspeed sensor and GPS module would all be nice to have, they wouldn’t really serve much of a practical purpose. It would be sweet to see how high I’m flying or how fast I can go, but it’s not necessary for any functionality other than curiosity – maybe something to upgrade to at a later date.

I also don’t fly with a Spektrum / JR radio or receiver, so the interface cable wasn’t necessary. If you do fly with Spektrum or JR receivers, you’ll need to make sure it has a data port to use the interface - it will record things like failsafes, lost frames, antenna fades and so on.

The GPS module will track the coordinates and plot a course as well as allow you to calculate other things like the ground speed or GPS altitude. It can also be used in conjunction with Google Earth for lifelike plotting.

The altimeter sensor will calculate the altitude in 4 ft resolution and save it to the logger.

There’s also a Wireless Seagull Dashboard available which will transmit all the data (up to a mile) which can be viewed in real time either on the LCD receiver or on your laptop. If you already have the Eagle Tree data logger, you can upgrade to the wireless option for $200, or buy the pro version of wireless dashboard which includes the logger and a bunch of sensors for $500.

Overall the Eagle Tree V3 Data Logger performs as advertised and compared to some RC things I’ve used in the past, it’s quite easy to use. In fact, you can take it out of the package, plug it in and it will do its thing. Though of course if you choose to, its options and available customization will fit almost any project and I’d highly recommend it as a welcomed addition to any modeler’s bag of tricks.

It also makes a great gift for the RC heli flyer who has almost everything.

So what’s a flybarless RC helicopter you ask?

Simple answer: A helicopter without a flybar.

Instead of a traditional flybar, flybarless RC helicopters use as series of gyros and software controlled mixers to take angular momentum measurements and replicate the feel, control and stability of a traditional flybar without the extra parts (more on this in a sec).

Sometimes called a virtual flybar system, the rotor heads on flybarless RC helicopters are much simpler than flybared rotor heads and have a few less parts. For example, flybarless head designs don’t have the flybar, cage, mixing arms, carrier, washout and paddles.

(Flybarless rotor head)

(Flybared rotor head)

Do you even need a flybar anyways?

While it is possible to fly an RC helicopter without a flybar or a flybarless system – scale pilots have been doing it for years – it’s not something that is easy to do or is recommended.

The purpose of the flybar is to do three things:

1. Provide gyroscopic stabilization. When a RC helicopter moves due to an external force like wind, the flybar resists these forces due to its angular momentum. Since the flybar is spinning out of a plane parallel to the main rotor, it applies cyclic adjustment to the main rotor so that the main rotor comes back to the plane of the flybar keeping the helicopter level.




2. The flybar paddles also provide force amplification that reduces the cyclic load on the servos. When a cyclic swash movement is applied to the flybar, the flybar paddles use aerodynamic forces to change the spinning plane of the flybar which changes the main rotors cyclic pitch. This means that the cyclic load seen by the servos is only from the flybar, not the main blades which means a lot less wear on your servos (though the servos still have to deal with the full range of collective pitch loads).




3. And lastly the flybar compensates for the pitch up effect of a RC helicopter in fast forward flight. In fast forward flight, the advancing paddle creates a slight tilting of the flybar, which acts as a slight elevator down command which eliminates the pitching up effect which is created because of the extra lift caused by the advancing blade.

So, without a flybar or electronic virtual flybarless system, the controls will be hyper sensitive making the heli difficult to control and you’d have pitching problems. Scale pilots who have done it have successfully usually have very slow moving helicopters with small cyclic inputs. A lot of them also use multi-bladed rotor heads which offer more gyroscopic stability that traditional two bladed rotor heads which inherently make the helicopter a lot more stable.

Also, without a flybar or flybarless system, you can’t do any type of 3D and will experience pitching problems in forward flight.

There’s a ton of upsides of a flybarless system which is in part why they’re so popular. For example, flybarless systems can be set up so it will pretty much over hands off when there’s no wind. And because there’s less parts, no flybar or paddles, there’s less weight and less drag which translates to more power and faster cyclic inputs.

The only real downside is that flybarless systems are a little more expensive than a non flybarless system, but depending on the tail gyro you’re using and the flybarless system you choose, the difference might not be that big.

For example, before I went flybarless on one of my larger heli’s, I used the Futaba’s GY611 tail gyro. The price difference between the GY611 and a flybarless system like Mikado’s VBar that includes the tail gyro (which is better than the GY611 in my opinion) is just a couple of hundred dollars extra and the benefits are well worth it.

Prices are also coming way down and one day, flybarless heli’s may be cheaper than flybared ones because the electronics are getting cheaper and mechanics are getting more expensive.

Another minor downside is that flybarless helicopters are bit more complicated to setup than a flybared RC helicopter, but, because there are so many setup options, the performance is insanely tunable to suit any flying style.

Pros Of Flybarless

• Increased flight time
• Increased power
• Increased maneuverability
• Less weight, less drag, less vibration
• Crashes are cheaper (less parts)
• More customizable to flying style
• Looks better
• Sounds sweeter

Cons Of Flybarless

• More expensive to purchase
• More complicated to set up
• More servo load means servos can wear out faster

Flybarless RC helicopters have a slightly different feel than flybared RC helicopters… they feel more quick and precise like an extension of your hands. If you’re a newbie pilot though, at first you may find that a flybarless RC helicopter can be slightly more sensitive and jerky because they’re quicker to react and every movement is almost instant (this of course depends on how you set it up) and more noticeable. In the hands of a skilled pilot though, they’re very smooth and precise machines

How Do Flybarless RC Helicopters Work

Flybarless systems replace the flybar and instead using the flybar as a mechanical gyro, use electronic gyros and a mxing control software. The sensor unit must include at least two gyros, one for pitch and one for roll. Some also include a third gyro for the tail rotor.

On a flybared system the response is influenced by the paddle weight and Bell-Hiller mixing ratio. On a flybarless system, this done electronically and mixed into the control inputs which are sent to the servos giving you the same feel as having a flybar.

Because the signal is mixed by the controllers software, the flybarless electronics unit goes between the output from your receiver and your servos. They work by taking the raw output from your receiver (usually non mixed, non CCPM signal ), mixing it as a CCPM swash input and adding the feel, control and stability offered by a flybar.

Without the electronic mixing software (and a flybar) the helicopter would be hyper sensitive to control so the electronic stability software built into the mixer compensates for that.

Flybarless Systems

Most flybared helicopters can be converted to a flybarless model with just a few readily available parts and a flybarless system of some kind. There are a few different flybarless systems on the market which I’ll outline below:

Mikado VBar – First and most popular flybarless system. Includes awesome tail gyro and is setup on computer. Setup is extremely customizable, but is a little difficult at first. Street price: $450

Skookum SK 360 – Budget, but good flybarless system. Requires a tail gyro and is computer setup. Street price: $280

Captron Helicommand Rigid – Flybarless system and flight stabilizer. Uses triple axis gyros and an optical CCD sensor to provide a superb of hands off position holding stability. Includes tail gyro and programmable failsafe settings. Computer setup. Street price: $650

There are other systems available and there are more coming out all the time, but these are the most popular 3 as of this writing.

Should You Go Flybarless?

If you can afford it, I’d say go for it. The benefits of flybarless are overwhelming making it an easy decision and the feel of a flybarless bird in your hands is second to none.

Even though they can be a little difficult to set up, there’s enough information available online that it’s doable for almost any experienced RC helicopter pilot.

If you’re an absolute newbie to RC helicopters, you may want to start with a flybar unless there’s someone in your area who can help you with the setup of a flybarless unit.

Also, many of the flybarless systems like Mikado’s VBar have preset setting for some of the more popular RC helicopters which make it extremely easy to get started… so much so in fact, that there’s no reason not to.

If you’re still have trouble deciding, besides the increased performance and enjoyability, it’s an investment that’s going to save you money.

I don’t know about you, but when I used to crash with a flybar, it would usually wrap around and destroy the canopy and other parts of the head. With a flybarless system, not only is there no flybar to wreak havoc, but there’s less parts in general that could be destroyed, so crashes will be cheaper (just make sure that you don’t destroy the expensive electronics, so wrap them carefully and stick it in a location that offers some protection in a crash).

Warning: Once you go flybarless, you won’t want to go back. And if you own more than one RC helicopter, be prepared to convert it to flybarless.

Flybarless Is The Future

Just like brushless motors, LiPo batteries and CCPM have become standard for most RC helicopters, flybarless systems are going to be taking over.

The prices are dropping making the systems more affordable than ever before and as more people experience a flybarless system, either as a spectator or a pilot, more people are going to buy one.

There will still be lots of beginner non flybarless RC helicopters, but for the serious RC helicopter pilot, flybarless RC helicopters will be taking over much of their fleet – it’s just a matter of time.

The steps that you will need to take will in some ways be dependent upon where you live. Those that live in climates that have moderate winters will have very few changes that they will have to make. However, if you live in an area that gets extremely cold during the winter months, or experiences a great deal of snow, there are some things that you will have to take into consideration if you want to keep your heli flying at it’s best.

For many pilots, flying in the winter is the ultimate experience. The air is cool, which causes more lift. The blades seem to bite the air better, and the heli runs more smoothly. Batteries run cooler. It all makes for an exhilarating experience. But if the temperature drops too much, and you do not have your heli prepared, winter flying with your RC helicopter can turn into a disaster.

In extremely cold temperatures, battery packs can freeze. This is of course, something you want to avoid at all cost. In fact, even if the battery pack gets too cold, it can reduce the amount of power you receive from it, which can result in a damaging crash. In order to keep your battery packs from freezing, you should never store them outdoors when it is cold. When you are at the heli field and the battery is not in use, store it in a warm area to keep it from freezing. If the temperatures are too cold, you should avoid flying it at all. You’ll probably get less amps from your pack, so shorten your flying time a little.

If you fly a nitro helicopter, you will have to make a few tuning adjustments in order for your helicopter to fly at it’s best. During the winter, you may want to tune your engine so that it runs a few clicks richer because your engine will have a tendency to run lean because of the higher density of cool air.

Another important thing to remember is that you gyro is temperature sensitive. If you take your gyro from a warm temperature to a suddenly cold temperature and attempt to start flying, you can run into difficulties with it not functioning well. If you are going to be doing some winter flying with your heli, let the gyro sit outside for about 10 or 15 minutes to adjust to the temperature before flying. This will help to regulate the gyro’s temperature, and will help to ensure that it works the way that it should.

If you live in an area with lots of snow, you may want to consider putting water floats on your heli for taking of and landing. This will help to keep your heli from sinking in the snow which will help to prevent snow from getting into your heli’s electronics and melting. Keep in mind too, that if you fly while it is snowing, the snow can also get into your electronics and melt which can cause a short, which could ultimately cause a crash, so flying in a snow storm is a no no.

Floats can be a little unstable and slippery on the snow, so if you don’t want to use them, but don’t want to sink, bring a piece of carpet or plywood to land on or take along a shovel and clear a landing area.

Besides getting your RC heli ready, you need to get yourself ready as well. Put on some warm clothes, bring a hat and gloves for down time, maybe some hot pads and something warm to drink.

To keep your fingers from freezing when you’re flying, you can get a RadyioWarm glove like the one below. Your radio fits inside and keeps your fingers out of the cold and toasty warm.

If you don’t want to use a radio glove, a pair with the fingers tips cut off can also work well.

If you absolutely must fly and it’s freezing cold outside, know your boundaries. Keep in mind that the higher you go, the colder the temperature gets. If the temperature on the ground is close to freezing, the air temperature where your heli is at could be well below the freezing point. This could actually cause your helicopter to ice over when flying if there’s any moisture in the air, or get the electronics wet, so be sure to dry things out indoors when you’re done flying.

For the most part, flying in the winter is no different from flying in the summer… except for the fact that your helicopter will fly better and you need to make just a few changes to your normal routine. But if you make these changes, there is no reason to put down your heli till spring time and suffer all winter from withdraw.

If you can’t bear the cold, you can always get a bunch of people together and rent a gym or indoor soccer field.

If you have any other cold weather tips, feel free to post them below:

The mechanics of how a turbine engine in an RC helicopter works is really quite simple. Air is sucked into the turbine and compressed. Fuel is added to the air and the mixture is ignited. The result? One powerful little heli engine!

When the compressed fuel and air mixture is ignited it expands quickly, and of course raises the temperature of the air. Since there is already more compressed air at the front of the turbine engine, the hot air and fuel mixture is going to take the easiest way out, which is through the back of the engine, creating thrust.

(Single stage turbine engine diagram)

The movement of this hot air and fuel mixture is forced through the back of the engine by the turbine blades. This movement will result in the turbine spinning, which will then cause the compressor to spin by way of a shaft that connects the turbine blades to the compressor blades. The entire process will continue to repeat itself over and over, creating power for your turbine RC helicopter.

The amount of power you get from your turbine engine depends on the fuel/air ratio that you have. The more fuel you add to the air, the quicker the turbine will turn. The quicker the turbine turns, the quicker the engine sucks in air to complete the process.

There are two types of turbine RC helicopter turbine engines for you to choose from, though one only really fits the bill. There is the single state and the 2-stage turbine. The single stage, or direct drive turbine, is the less expensive form of turbine engine used. However, this form of turbine does have some disadvantages. Much of the thrust that is produced is wasted because it is simply pushed out of the engines exhaust nozzle.

(Two stage turbine)

A two-stage turbine engine on the other hand, is much more effective. These are the types of turbine engines that are used on most RC helicopters, and provide a higher level of power to your RC helicopter. There is no thrust wasted with a two-stage turbine. Instead, the thrust that would be wasted with a single stage turbine is used to turn a second set of turbine blades which helps to produce rotational power for your helicopter.

Installing a turbine engine in your RC helicopter is easy, especially if the helicopter you purchase is made for a turbine engine. It is possible however, to also convert a gas or nitro heli to a turbine by way of a conversion kit. While most of the mechanics and controls of a turbine heli are the same as that of a gas or nitro, there are a few parts required by a turbine that are different.

(Turbine installed in RC helicopter frame)

To install a turbine engine into your RC heli, you will also need a Full Authority Digital Engine Control, or FADEC, which is a small computer system that helps to control various functions and monitor your turbine’s performance. You will also need to add an electric fuel pump and valves, an auto start motor and a larger fuel tank. Since many of these additional features will create the need for additional electrical power, you will also have to install several dedicated batteries in addition to your receiver battery.

As with any RC aircraft, there are of course both advantages and disadvantages to flying a turbine RC helicopter. For many pilots that have already owned gas or nitro helicopters, making the switch the a turbine heli is often a nice change of pace that offers a new challenge. On the other hand, those that have difficulties in flying may want to consider waiting a bit for making the switch. A turbine RC helicopter can be quite costly, and if you are apt to crashing, you could be looking at spending a small fortune each time your heli takes a nose dive.

For those pilots that are more seasoned however, switching to a turbine RC heli can actually save money. The basic upkeep of these helicopters is rather minimal, and costs about the same as any large model gas or nitro model. Furthermore, even with turbine engines burning quite a bit of fuel, the fuel is less expensive compared to nitro helicopters, though it is a little more costly then a gas heli.

Turbine RC helicopters are great for those looking to add a little spice to their flying experience. But, as with anything RC, it is important to make sure you know what you are getting into, before you decide to make your purchase.

Time: n/a

Tools Required: Soldering iron, solder, stand, wire cutters / strippers, cleaning sponge, flux, qtip or cotton swabs, tip tinner. Optional – heatsink, fine grain sandpaper, alcohol

Parts Needed: Something to solder

Difficulty Level: Moderate

(Things needed)

Whether you fly an electric, nitro, gas or turbine RC helicopters, at one time or another you’ll come across parts that need soldering. It might be as simple as soldering on a battery connector or joining a broken wire together or something a little more complicated like replacing a component of a circuit board.

Something as simple as not soldering on your battery connector properly can lead to loss of power and complete devastation of your RC helicopter, so proper soldering is quite important in this hobby.

Whatever the need, soldering is also a great skill to have.

Besides your RC toys, there are a ton of other things around house that might need soldering. You can repair jewellery, fix kids toys, get an electronic device working again or even fix a leaky pipe.

Once you master the basics, you’ll find it’s kind of fun and not really all that difficult. So, in this ‘how to’ article, we’ll be discussing some basic soldering skills as well as some more advanced soldering tips and techniques to make soldering easier and ensure a solid connection every time.

Choosing A Soldering Iron

Regular cheap soldering irons cost anywhere from $5 - $15 and will generally run anywhere from 15 watts to 50 watts. The higher the watts, the hotter the iron usually gets and the more heat it can transfer to the parts being soldered. More expensive soldering irons usually have the ability to adjust the temperature depending on what you’re soldering.

For most jobs, a 25 watt or 30 watt iron will suffice, though more heavy duty soldering (like soldering deans plugs to a thick battery pack wire) will work best with a 50, 60 or 80 watt iron. I’ve never made the splurge to purchase an expensive variable heat soldering iron, but I do keep a bunch of different wattage ones on hand for different jobs.

(Soldering irons from left to right – 30 watt, 40 watt, 60 watt, 80 watt)

Tips Size & Selection

Always try to use a good quality tip. One of the first irons I owned cost under $10 from Radio Shack, but had a $15 tip from an electronics shop that outlasted the soldering iron by a long shot.

Lower quality tips won’t last and will oxidize and rust away in no time and need replacing, so in the long run, a good tip is a great investment. Solder also won’t stick to oxidized tips which can make soldering a lot more difficult than it needs to be – more on this later. Just be sure to get a good tip – even if you have a cheap iron.

Ideally, you want to as big as tip as possible, but not one that’s so big it’s larger than what you’re soldering to. A larger tip helps to transfer heat faster and acts as a larger reservoir of heat so the tips doesn’t cool off while the connection is being made.

For most soldering you’ll want to use a chisel tip. Chisel tips will also heat the surface you’re soldering to faster than conical tips because there’s a greater surface area available to heat the parts you’re soldering.

The only time a conical tip should be used is for fine circuit board work where you need a small point so as to not disturb any other joints besides the one you’re soldering.

Selecting Solder

If possible, always use 60 / 40 rosin core solder. The rosin core contains flux which is the stuff that helps it stick – you’ll see more on this later.

Solder comes is different diameters from super thin to super thick. I keep a roll of thin stuff and thicker stuff on had depending on if I’m soldering surface mount components on a circuit board or something a little larger that requires more solder.

The thickness doesn’t really matter too much - you just don’t want a big hunk of thick solder for delicate work and for more super-sized soldering, using thin stuff can take a while to build up enough solder to complete your work.

Also, despite common misconceptions lead based solders are best and it’s not going to poison you. The fumes from soldering are from the flux in the solder boiling, not the lead. Lead boils at over 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit while most soldering irons don’t exceed 750. Though, that doesn’t mean the fumes are good for you – over extended periods they’ve been know to cause asthma so try to avoid inhaling them if at all possible.

Lead free solder also takes longer to make a solid connection and it won’t cling to it as well which can lead to other problems.

How To Make Solder Stick

Probably the hardest part of soldering is getting the solder to adhere to the parts you’re soldering.

Put simply, solder won’t adhere to parts that are dirty, so make sure you clean what you’re working on (with water or alcohol and a cotton swab) and that it’s free from oil and dirt prior to soldering.

Tip: The oil from your skin is especially good at making solder not stick, so be sure to clean anything you touch before soldering.

Solder also won’t stick to cold parts, so be sure to use an adequately heated iron and heat up the parts briefly prior to applying the solder and make sure that you’re using the right sized iron.

When you’re ready to solder, you also need to make sure there is a good physical connection between the parts to transfer heat and melt the solder easily and evenly.

For example, if you’re soldering two wires together, twist them tightly first. If you’re soldering a component to a circuit board, bend the leads before soldering to help hold the part in place and clip it in advance. Clipping it afterwards can cause a crack in the joint and lead to a flaky connection.

You also need to make sure there’s no oxidation (similar to rust) on the parts you’re soldering or the soldering iron itself or the solder won’t adhere properly. If the surface is overly oxidized or extremely shiny, use a fine grit (600) sandpaper to rough it up a little. Be sure to wipe away the dust prior to soldering.

Here’s a pic of a tip that was so heavily oxidized, it took a couple of pairs of vice grips to get it out:

If it’s just a little oxidized, you can use a little flux. Flux is a weak acid that removes oxides and acts as a place holder to keep oxygen away until it’s replaced by solder. It also reduces the surface tension of solder to help it spread more evenly

Flux can also be purchased in paste or liquid forms and can be applied to the joint prior to soldering. For small jobs, it’s not necessary to use extra flux if your solder has a core of it, but for larger surface area’s it may be impossible to make the connection without adding a little extra flux.

To use it, just apply it to the surface you’re soldering, heat it up then apply the solder.

The other secret to soldering is keeping your tip tinned. Having a small amount of solder on the tip helps to transfer heat to the part you’re soldering and is essential to get it to stick.

Clean the tip every time you pick up the iron and always keep it tinned by adding a small amount of solder to the tip to prevent oxidation - even when you unplug your iron.

Soldering Tips & Techniques

When your iron is hot, the parts are clean and you’re all ready to solder, here’s how to do it:

When you’re ready to solder, clean the tip using the sponge, then tin the tip with fresh solder. Then use the iron to heat the solder joint and then touch the opposite side of the joint with the solder. Solder runs towards the heat and around the part to get to the iron and it ensures that the part is hot enough to make a good connection.

Never touch the solder directly to the iron when soldering. When the joint is hot enough, it will flow freely. If you put solder on the iron tip first, the flux boils off before the solder even touches the joint.

You want to use enough solder to clearly cover the joint, but not so much that you can’t see the outlines of the wires or sides

Solder each connection as quickly as possible… 2 to 5 seconds per joint should be more than enough. Keeping the heat applied to the joint for too long can destroy some electrical components from the excessive heat.

Just don’t push too hard, especially when working on circuit boards. Excess pressure can cause the little tabs to break off or pull away from the circuit board.

The solder should flow freely and make a smooth and shiny connection like this:

If joint is dull and solder isn’t smooth, chances are you have a cold solder joint where the solder didn’t meet smoothly and bond with the surface.

For this reason, it’s really important that you don’t move or disturb the joint while it is cooling.

After it’s cooled off, clean the parts you just soldered with alcohol (or water for water based flux) using the cotton swabs. The excess flux may corrode the connections over time and cause them to crack or come loose which in most cases isn’t good.

In cases when soldering sensitive electrical components such as transistors, you may want to use a heatsink (pictured at top of page) to dissipate extra heat.

To remove excess solder, you can use a copper wire braid or solder sucker (both pictured at top of page). I prefer the braid because it’s easier to use and more precise, but both will work. The solder sucker or de-solderer uses suction to suck up excess liquid solder. The copper braid sucks the solder through it and the solder adheres to the braid thereby removing it from whatever your de-soldering.

By the way, if you need help to hold things in place, you can use a helping hand type device. For things like soldering Deans plugs, I’ll often just take a pair or pliers and wrap a rubber band around it to hole the plug in place while I solder the connection to it.

You can also use electrical take to tape wires and such to the surface you’re working on while you solder the connection.

That’s mostly all you need to know. As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask by leaving a comment.

Here are a couple of video soldering demonstrations:

Time: ~ 5 mins.

Tools Required: CA (superglue), hex driver, loctite, scale (optional)

Parts Needed: Nuts or wheel collets

Difficulty Level: Super easy

(Things needed)

Many RC helicopters, especially the smaller micro, mini and 450 sized ones can be a little sensitive and hard to control, especially in windy conditions.

Enter flybar weights.

Adding flybar weights to your RC heli helps to create a heavier rotating mass on the flybar which slows down cyclic response and the sensitivity of your helicopter.

Flybar weights also help keep your heli more stable and can make hovering a lot less difficult, especially if there’s a breeze and you’re in the learning stages of flight.

Flybar weights are generally attached to the flybar on the outermost edge right next to the paddle, though they can be anywhere along its axis. The farther out they are, the more they slow cyclic response. The more you move them in (closer to the center) the less of an effect they’ll have and the more responsive your heli will be.

Obviously, slow cyclic response and hard core 3D flying don’t go together well, so if you’re in to 3D you probably don’t want to use flybar weights at all - you want your heli as fast and responsive as possible and slower cyclic response and 3D style moves can = crash.

How much weight should you add?

It depends on the size of your helicopter and your personal preferences, but here are some guidelines.

On my Trex 450, I like the way 2g per side feels, though if you’re just learning to hover, you may want to bump that up to 4g’s per side. On heli’s smaller than a 450, they usually come with some kind of flybar weights in the kit, but incase they don’t anywhere from 1 to 4 grams could suffice.

On a larger 500 or 600 sized helicopter, you really need to get up to the 5g or 6g range to really make much of a difference - though most people that fly this size of heli don’t use flybar weights as the helicopters are inherently more stable than their smaller predecessors. (It helps if you have a scale available to adjust the weight.)

However, that being said, the larger the RC helicopter is, the easier it is to learn on, so adding some flybar weights will help to shorten the learning curve especially when learning hovering orientations.
The goal you want to achieve is to keep up a reasonable level of responsiveness but also dramatically increase stability.

If you want to experiment a little, you can slid them inwards or add less / more weight. If it’s too sensitive when you reduce the weight to more them in, you might want to try adding a little expo to soften the sticks around the center. Start with 25% or 30% and adjust from there until you get the feel you like.

Also, it’s common sense, but make sure you add the same amount of weight to each side of the flybar and place it the same distance from the paddle. If the weight or position is off balance, it can casue the head to be unbalanced and will cause a sever vibration that can make flying very difficult and cause a crash – not to mention it’s bad for your RC helicopter.

How Do You Make Your Own Flybar Weights?

It’s not really that difficult. Actually it is one of the easiest modifications you can do to your heli…

When I went looking for flybar weights, there were a couple of choices:

1. You can buy them online at a cost of $15 - $25 (including shipping) or…

2. You can make your own.

Since I wasn’t even sure if I would like the way they made my heli feel and I enjoy ‘do it yourself’ projects, I opted to make my own. Plus, I didn’t really want to shell ~$20 and wait a couple of weeks to get them, especially when I could make them in under 5 minutes with things I had around the house.

So how do you make flybar weights?

Since flybar weights by definition are weights that are on the flybar, anything that’s got a round hole in it and weighs something could be used as a flybar weight. Here’s what I used:

The first time around, I simply used a bunch of nuts I had in the garage, super glued them together and stuck them on the flybar near the paddle. All that was needed was a dab of CA to hold them in place and I had myself a pair of flybar weights.

It looked a bit rough around the edges, but served the purpose well enough. It also gave me the opportunity to try them out and see if I liked them.

- OR -

If you’re near a hobby store, you can simply pick up a pack of wheel collets. Wheel collets are simply round brass collars used to hold under carriage wheels on planes in place. They’ll run you $2 - $5 and come with a set screw you can use to attach the collets to the flybar so they can easily be removed at a later date. Just make sure you buy the right size and that they’re on tight – if there’s any play, add a drop of CA to secure them in place. Also be sure to loctite the set screws.

That’s it! I told you it was easy

If your RC helicopter is too sensitive and jumping all over the place, or you’re learning to hover but can’t hold your heli still, you may want to consider using flybar weights. They’re easy to make and will dramatically increase the stability of your RC heli.

By the way, if after making your own flybar weights you find you like them, then you may want to consider purchasing a commercially available set. They’ll look a little nicer and are generally more streamlined for smoother flight characteristics.

When I was a kid, I couldn’t understand why someone would spend 100’s of hours building a scale model then get up the nerve to fly it.

That was until I put together my first RC helicopter and realized building them is as much fun as flying them.

Planning, creating, machining, building and sculpting a scale model RC helicopter from scratch is a lot of fun and the sense of accomplishment when everything fits together and looks just right is huge.

Scale RC helicopters are simply RC helicopters modeled after a full scale real life helicopter.

Scale RC helicopters can come in all sizes from 1/30th scale to 1/4 scale. The larger it is the more realistic you can make it look and the more realistic it will fly, but as the size increases the costs to build it increase significantly.

Some popular scale RC helicopter models you’re likely to come across are the Airwolf, Chinook, Bell UH1, Jet Ranger and the Huges 500.

Good scale RC helicopters aren’t only designed to look like a full sized heli, but they’re also designed to fly and perform like one as well.

Around the country and across the world there are scale model competitions where scratch built scale models are judged based on how closely they resemble the full sized helicopter they’re modeled after.

Many competition scale modelers will even get every single detail perfect not just on the outside, but on the inside of the cockpit as well.

Scale RC helicopters and other aircraft are also often used in movies, especially lower budget productions, because when they’re up in the air, it’s nearly impossible to tell the difference in real life, let alone on film.

Putting together a scale model can be as simple as buying a scale model kit from your local hobby store or as complicated as creating everything from scratch and modeling it off a real full scale helicopter right down to the chipped paint.

If you’re going to go the route of purchasing a scale model kit or scale fuselage some come 100% ready to go with paint schemes and all – you just need to install it.

There are also kits that provide the bare bones and it’s up to you to put it together, make the proper cutouts and prime and paint the fuselage.

If you’re just starting out with scale heli’s or want the look of one without the work, a pre-assembled and painted kit may be the way to go.

But if you want a more custom look without the cost and time needed to fabricate a custom design a good base kit may be the way to go.

Or if you’re skilled and up for a challenge you can build a scale model from scratch.

Extreme scale modelers have been know to design the entire scale model RC helicopter from scratch, but most use an existing airframe as a base and design a fuselage around it.

Building a scale RC helicopter model from the ground up often involves finding a picture of a full sized helicopter to model everything off of right down to the paint scheme and wear and tear.

Everything from the main rotors to the skids to the tail rotor must be proportional to the rest of the helicopter. So, if you’re working off a picture, often you can find the sizes of the helicopter you’re modeling online somewhere, though sometimes you’ll only be able to come up with the length, width height and main rotor diameters of the helicopter, so you’ll need to use those measurements as a reference to calculate the size of the other parts.

Building a scale RC helicopter model from scratch might include everything from making fiberglass molds to machining aluminum, steel and carbon fiber using a CNC machine or hand tools.

Wood is also often used as structural reinforcements because of its strength, elastic properties, light weight and because it’s easy to work with.

Another important thing you’ll want to work into your scale model is proper realistic looking lighting. Many hobby stores, both online and offline sell lighting kits that can be plugged right into your receiver to accomplish that, or if you have a little soldering and electronics skills, you can pick up a few LED’s at an electronics shop and make your own.

Dimension Engineering sells a switch called the pico switch that can be hooked up to your receiver and controlled from your radio to turn lights on and off. They also have LED lighting kits available for scale modeling.

The basic RC helicopter needs a 6 channel radio: three channels for the cyclic, one for the rudder, one for the gyro gain and one for the throttle.

Because scale RC helicopters often have extra’s like landing gear and lights that you’ll want to be able to control from your radio transmitter, as a minimum you’ll need a 9 channel radio, though a 12 channel would be preferable and a 14 channel would be super.

Because full scale helicopters don’t use flybars, many scale model RC helicopters use flybarless systems like the popular Mikado vBar flybarless system or the Skookum Robotics SK360.

If you can afford it, a turbine powered heli makes a great scale RC helicopter model because it works and sounds just like a life sized helicopter.

If a turbine RC helicopter is a little out of your price range or skill set, there’s a company called Aerosound RC that produces sound systems for your RC heli that sounds just like a turbine powered helicopter. It even connects to your throttle channel and gives accurate spool ups and downs.

Most scale RC helicopter pilots set their gyros to rate mode because it lends itself to a more realistic looking flight experience.

Unless you’re using an off the shelf fuselage to fit on the frame of your existing RC heli, most scale RC helicopters aren’t set up for 3D flying. There’s a copy of reasons for this:

1. Full scale helicopters don’t do 3D.

2. Often custom built scale helicopters are heavy and can’t stand up to 3D flight.

Powerful buy slower servos are usually used when compared to your average RC helicopter and the cyclic speed, range, pitch curves are often a fraction of what you’ll find on an all out 3D RC helicopter. If you’ve every tried flying a scale RC helicopter in a simulator, you’ll note how slow and sluggish it is when maneuvering.

There’s another reason for the slower response times and pitch ranges - you’re a lot less likely to crash. A simple crash can mean 10’s or 100’s of hours of lost work or complete devastation of your model.

If you’re considering going to scale, something to keep in mind is its addictive, very addictive, and once you go scale model building, it’s hard to go back

So what’s a gyro? In lamans terms, it’s a device that can sense and measure rotation or how quickly an object turns.

In helicopters, gyros are typically used to dampen the tail movements or in the case of the heading hold gyro, to keep the tail in a constant position.

However, the modern RC helicopter gyro isn’t really a gyroscope at all – it’s an accelerometer. Accelerometers produce a signal as they’re rotated about an axis just like a traditional gyro and the more it accelerates, the stronger the signal is.

For the purposes of this article and real life, we’ll still refer to accelerometers as gyros because they function similarly and the end result is much the same.

On your RC helicopter, gyros work by measuing yaw or rotational acceleration, then mixing that with the pilots rudder commands to add dampening to your helicopters yaw axis rotation. For example, if a gust of wind makes your helicopter turn counterclockwise in the yaw axis, the gyro senses this and moves the tail rotor in the opposite direction to slow or dampen the rotation.

The are three main types of gyros:

1. The first is the mechanical rate gyro uses an electric motor to spin a small disc or flywheel that can pivot on one axis and has springs to return it to center. When the gyro was moved about the axis that it’s sensitive to, the spinning disc tilts and this tilt is picked up electronically by a ptentiomenter.

The faster the gyro is rotated, the greater the deflection is and based on the deflection, the corrective signal can be fed into a servo.

(Mechanical gyro)

2. The second type of gyro is the piezoelectric gyro which uses a quickly vibrating crystal. As the crystal vibrates, an applied rotational force will casue disturbances in it’s wobble which create a small, but measurable electric current proportional to the rate at which the gyro is rotated.

The piezo element is similar to that used in a gas lighter system like those found on a barbeque.

Piezo electric gyros are much more sensitive than a mechanical gyro and because there are no moving parts, they are a lot smaller.

(Piezoelectric gyro)

A disadvantage of piezoelectric gyros systems is that they’re very temperature sensitive and going from hot to cold or vice versa will casue them to act erradictly. Most have built in temperature protection circuits, but they’re not perfect, so if you’re going to take a gyro from warm your car and fly in cold weather, give it 10 or 15 minutes to adjust before flying.

3. And the third and most modern type of gyro is the MEMS or Micro Electric-Mechanical System gyro.

MEMS are molecule sized machines that are fabricated on top of a piece of silicon, along with the electronics to interface to them. They vibrate at a high rate just like the piezoelectric gyro and the As the gyro rotates, so does the displacement of the mass and the signal generated by the gyro.

(Mems gyro)

Besides the different makups and types of gyros, there are two primary ways that gryo’s operate, rate and heading hold mode.

Rate Mode Vs. Heading Hold Gyros

There are two types of gyro functions, rate mode and heading hold.

Rate Gyros

Rate gyro’s are often used in scale RC helicopters because they lend themselves to a more realistic flying experience, while heading hold gyros are used by almost eveyone else because they make flying easier.

Rate gyros only sense the turn rate or angular acceleration of your helicopter, not the absolute orientation of the helicopter and do not provide a heading hold capability. For example, once the helicopter has been turned, it cannot return the helicopter to the original orientation, nor keep the helicopter facing a constant direction.

Rate gyros will simply control your RC heliecopter’s tail servo so as to resist rotation in the direction they measure. In other words, it “dampens” the tail movement.

Because a rate gyro “slips” when trying to counteract the main rotor’s thrust, it can’t effectively counteract the main rotor’s thrust on it’s own.

The amount of thrsust provided by the tail is set by the revo mixing function on your radio transmitter.
Revo mixing allows you to set the tail rotor thrust to match the throttle curve so that it exactly counters the main rotor’s thrust. There’s no formula for setting the values – they must be set by experience and trial and error.

Heading Hold Gyros

Heading hold or heading lock gyros are a conceptually simple extension of rate gyros.

In a heading hold gyro, a built microprocessor that keeps track of and remembers how far the helicopter has turned from its set position. Based on the deflection from the set position, the gyro will control the rudder servo such that the gyro returns the helicopter to the set position.

Therefore, as you increate the throttle or headspeed of your heli, the holding hold gyro will counter the main rotors thrust automatically keeping your heli’s tail in its original position.

Heading hold gyros are very popular and pretty much standard amoung RC helicopter pilots for that very reason - they’ll hold your tail in a constant position no matter what you’re doing as long as you don’t input a rudder command, even if you’re doing 3D aerobatics or flying in a strong wind.

With a heading hold gyro, the rudder signal from your transmitter no longer directly controls the tail – it simply tells the gyro how many degrees to turn per second. It will also reset the gyros stored position to the new position you move your heli to. Revo mixing on your radio must be disabled when using heading hold gyros.

In conclusion, unless you’re going scale, and are looking for the more real characterstics often associated with scale RC helicopter flight, you’ll want to purchase a heading hold gyro, preferrably of the piezoelectric or MEMS variety unless.