Micro Blade 180 / AR6335 Stabilization Issue

[USAF_Ret]

Hi all,

My Blade 180 has recently developed a stabilization issue that has me perplexed.

Essentially, over some time it developed a bad tail wag after making some high-speed runs with some aggressive figure 8 moves. After entering the turn, the tail would begin to wag violently. Now the bird is highly unstable in hover. It doesn't seem to make any difference what FM I am in.

Prior to this development all of this, it was very stable and I could hover almost hands off the sticks. Now it drifts left and right and I have to input lots of stick control to keep from crashing.

I haven't had any crashes but knowing that things wear, I have gone through the complete mechanical setup and replaced both the main shaft and spindle in thinking that perhaps they were bent.

After powering on the transmitter, and the heli the gyro appears to be working correctly as I tilt the bird and the swash plate and tail blades respond correctly.

I am running the stock AR6335 and did check all of the PID settings are all at 100% per the default values.

My current assumption is that the AR6335 gyro is / has gone bad.

Has anyone else had any similar experiences with the Blade 180 / AR6335?

I don't have the cable that allows you to make adjustments to the AR6335 and am trying to avoid just buying and replacing parts in hopes that something fixes it.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Paul

 

[Tony]

Hey Paul, what Tx are you running with this bird? You may need to adjust your tail gyro gain. If it is a slow wag, you will need to raise the gain, if it is a fast wag, you will need to lower it. If you can post a video it will help us better to know what exactly is it doing. And sorry for the late reply, been a little crazy around here lately.

 

[Admiral]

Hi Paul, with mine I occasionally get a violent tail wag coming out of a maneuver, but corrects itself after a second or so. I put this down to the fact that I have replaced the tail servo with a metal geared slower one as I got sick of replacing the standard one, but mine is still stable in a hover.

 

[USAF_Ret]

Hi Paul, with mine I occasionally get a violent tail wag coming out of a maneuver, but corrects itself after a second or so. I put this down to the fact that I have replaced the tail servo with a metal geared slower one as I got sick of replacing the standard one, but mine is still stable in a hover.

Admiral, what servo are you now using with your Blade 180? I too got tired of the DS76T constantly failing. I have been running a DS426M, It's a little bigger / heavier but works great. The DS426M is a bit slower (.03 vs .05 seconds). I also had the violent tail wag before this more recent issue but now it happens as soon as I spool up / go to stant mode and now I have cyclic instability.

In response to Tony's comment, I haven't changed the tail gyro gain, so unless something has dramatically failed electronically, I am not sure that's the issue.

I still suspect the AR6335 has issues but don't know how to test or maybe reset it. Any ideas on how to test its function.

Paul

 

[USAF_Ret]

Hey Paul, what Tx are you running with this bird? You may need to adjust your tail gyro gain. If it is a slow wag, you will need to raise the gain, if it is a fast wag, you will need to lower it. If you can post a video it will help us better to know what exactly is it doing. And sorry for the late reply, been a little crazy around here lately.

Tony, I have a DX18. Not sure why that makes a difference, but am willing to listen....

I will check the tail gyro gain setting. Any thoughts on what it should be?

Paul

 

[Tony]

The reason for wanting to know the Tx is so I can give you the correct gyro gain starting point. With your transmitter, start with a +45% on the gear channel. Select any switch you wish to change the settings if you want.

And also, with some of these Tx's that can control the bird, the gyro is set automatically with the cheaper Tx's. Not sure about this bird in particular, but some have Tx that have no adjustments. Just FYI. Let me know if adjusting the gain helps at all.

 

[Admiral]

Hi Paul, I'm using an old Align DS420 MG that I recovered from another model, it needs a little bit of trimming on one end of the mounting plate on the servo and make up an adapter cable from an old servo lead.

The only other thing is the servo operates in the opposite direction so you need to reverse the servo arm and bend the tail push rod to match, you can't just reverse the servo it will conflict with the Gyro then.

 

[USAF_Ret]

I thought I would give you an update on the progress ( or actually lack of ) related to this issue. As I stated earlier, I suspected the FBL had gone south on me and went through the process of swapping out the AR6335 with an IKON micro which I had installed in my Trex 250. Long story short, the cyclic instability still exists so it must be something mechanical. Just to remind everyone who reads this, everything was fine and then poof, the cyclic instability happened. I have rechecked everything and the only thing that I can find that has any slop is the swashplate. It is the stock swash, so if I upgrade will definitely get one of the metal upgrades. Does all of this make sense or am I missing something.

PS. Now going through the process of reinstalling the IKON micro into the Trex 250 and am having issues getting the Pitch travel to set at - 100%. I will post this on a separate thread to see what folks think.

Paul

 

[Tony]

How many flights are on the servos?

 

[USAF_Ret]

many.....

now that you mention it. I did notice that there appeared to be some 'binding' on the swash when moving the pitch up and down. Like a small catch on the main shaft. I slide the swash and the leveling tool up and down the main shaft and there was no noticeable catching or binding....

Servos..... that makes some sense, but I hate shotgunning parts trying to find a solution....

Paul

 

[Tony]

I wouldn't just throw parts at it, but it may be a good idea to get a servo tester and run them for about 5 minutes to see if they chatter.

 

[Admiral]

Servos were my biggest issue until I went to metal gears.

 

[Smoggie]

Tail wag in fast forward flight is gain too high... that's the easy one to solve, the instability is a bit trickier.

Gyros pretty much don't 'go south'.. or at least if they do they usually stop working entirely, so I think you were always likely not to improve anything by changing the FBL. So if it checks out mechanically, and if it used to work fine then 'changed' for no obvious reason it sounds like it might be either a servo (or servos) on their way out... or possibly a 'human factor'. Servos should be easy enough to spot, slop in the arms, jerky movement, sticking in position or not returning accurately to centre would be signs of issues (put FBL in setup mode to test the servos).
I've no idea what your experience level is but sometimes some event (like the violent tail wag) can shake your confidence and all of a sudden the heli seems much harder to control. I'm not saying this is the case here but I've seen it many times before. The 180CFX can be a fidgety little beast, having to constantly correct actually sound perfectly normal.

 

[USAF_Ret]

Tail wag in fast forward flight is gain too high... that's the easy one to solve, the instability is a bit trickier.

Gyros pretty much don't 'go south'.. or at least if they do they usually stop working entirely, so I think you were always likely not to improve anything by changing the FBL. So if it checks out mechanically, and if it used to work fine then 'changed' for no obvious reason it sounds like it might be either a servo (or servos) on their way out... or possibly a 'human factor'. Servos should be easy enough to spot, slop in the arms, jerky movement, sticking in position or not returning accurately to centre would be signs of issues (put FBL in setup mode to test the servos).
I've no idea what your experience level is but sometimes some event (like the violent tail wag) can shake your confidence and all of a sudden the heli seems much harder to control. I'm not saying this is the case here but I've seen it many times before. The 180CFX can be a fidgety little beast, having to constantly correct actually sound perfectly normal.

Smoggie,

Nice feedback. I hadn't thought about servos before but am beginning to lean that way after the responses from this thread.

Not sure how to classify my experience level. I might classify myself as a intermediate sport flyer. I don't fly crazy 3D stuff but can do loops, rolls, figure 8s, etc. Beside the 180CFX, I fly a Trex 250DFC, Goblin 350, and Trex 550L while trying to figure out the challenges with the 180.

Prior to this event, the 180 was very solid and would hover almost hands off. Something has changed (servos ???) and working to figure out what it is.

Paul

 

[USAF_Ret]

Well. it has been a bit since I responded to my initial post on my 180 stabilization problem but something called work got in the way so it has taken a lot longer than I had hoped for to get this bird back working. so here is the process I had to go through.

In general with Blade Heli's (aka plastic parts), when I replace them I typically do so with better / upgrade parts.

• Went through all the mechanics and insured nothing had been damaged or worn. Nothing relevant noted but I replaced the head dampeners while I had it the head apart. RESULT: still same issue, unstable and drifting all over.
• Changed main and tail blades. RESULTS: still unstable
• Changed all three cyclic servos with MicroHeli MG servos. RESULTS: still unstable
• Replaced both the main head and swash with Lynx upgrades. RESULTS: still unstable
• Replaced AR6335 with IKON micro. RESULT: Flies rock solid again

This was a lot more expensive and time consuming than I had planned for, but I have it working again.

And I have a much upgraded 180 now through the process.

Paul

 

[Tony]

A 180 with an ikon, yup, it's going to be stable now lol. And that is what matters!