General Feathering shaft bearings

[treff]

Hi all.
I took my old head off today and examined the feathering shaft, taking it all apart. Bent of course. I was quite surprised to see all the bearings wee sealed. You could not grease them. Is this a sign of cheapness or a new design. All the videos I have watched so far regarding this clearly shows that the bearings need greasing but on this set that is impossible or am I missing something. On each grip there is three bearings each a different size, 4 thin washers and two things called cups but even the Align drawing does not show which way these are fitted. On the ends 2 small screws with small brass washers. The head is trashed but I was just getting to know how these things fit together. Are they all different? I suppose makers and designers have their own ideas. Is it worth keeping the bearings?
By the way new heli arrived today so I wil start stripping it down and putting it all back together. Cheers.

 

[pvolcko]

What heli are you talking about?

 

[Lee]

I answered this last night, but the internet ate my reply. its out there somewhere.
They are call thrust bearings. You have the inner washer> the bearing > the outer washer.
The bearing must have the cup facing the centre of the head, to hold the grease in. If its the other way around, the grease will be lost to centrifugal forces. On most helis, but not all clones, the washers have two Internal Diameters (ID) if so, the larger goes to the inside and the smaller to the outside.
There should also be two radial bearings in the grip. One behind the thrust bearing, and one on the other side of the grip next to the headblock.

 

[Tony]

I had the same issue with the interwebz eating replies. Been looking for the cause, and may have found it in a crashed database table. Should be fixed now. Sorry about that.

 

[treff]

Thanks for the reply Lee but you missed my point. There is no thrust bearing in this head. It is different to the Align drawing. All the bearings are enclosed bearings which surprised me. The heli is HK 450. It's not an important question I am just curious to why it is different.
Tony this site has been down to me on a number of occasions. I put it down to net congestion but last night it was down for a very long time. What do I read when I can not Sleep LOL

Just one last point. Like I mentioned the new heli kit arrived yesterday. OUT OF THE BOX................................the main shaft is bent. IT is also a rip off, the head itself is mainly plastic and not as good has the cheaper HK450 which is mainly metal. All they have done is to spend more on the frame and less on the head. RIPOFF! One side of the main frame is broken(delaminated) The canopy is all scratched and damaged and I have not looked at the tail yet. It will be repackaged and sent back. I SHOULD HAVE LEARNED. BUY CHEAP YOU GET CHEAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Tony]

I have not seen the forum go down for quite some time. However, they are working on the servers and my uptime is only showing about 7.5 hours. But, that is just from a restart they did last night after a change. I try to keep the site up and running all the time, but every site goes down from time to time.

 

[Slobberdog]

theres been alot of complaints about bent main shafts, was looking at reviews on the dfc head they do, and people say they are coming with bent shafts, and replacement shafts are bent as well, another reason I bought Align spares.

go on to thier on line help and open a complaint, they will probably ask you to send pictures of the damaged parts and then maybe do something about it, you never know and they are good at wasting time,

 

[Westy]

I will never buy another HK as long as I live! .... oh hang on .... I never have ... but it feels like with with all the dramas I have had with other peoples ones! Still got a shabby 450 Pro GT that is giving me nightmares ... I just want it gone.

 

[Lee]

The head on it should be all metal.

Did you get it from the UK warehouse? Can you show us a picture of the heli?

When you said the bearings had two cups, i thought it was part of the thrust bearing. So you have four radial bearings and no thrust bearings?

 

[treff]

Yes all the bearings are radial, no thrust bearing hope the pic is clear enough. One of the thin washers has gone walk about there should be 4.

 

[Slobberdog]

treff what does the featering shaft look like?

 

[treff]

Picture of feathering shaft and main shaft The main shaft will fit a right angle heli, well almost LOL A engineering friend said it can be straightened or a new one made so that will be here next week.

 

[Slobberdog]

your head was plastic on the heli wasn't it, my best guess is that they have replaced the thrust bearings with radial bearing cos its cheaper and easier to install, the stepped down feathering shaft is off a v2 head that should have thrust bearings, the thrust bearings are in there to help with movement under centrifugal/lateral load, radial bearings will do the job, but are not desinged to work under lateral load, thats why manufacturers use thrust bearings now, my head is v1 and has no steps and no thrust bearings, and it works,

main shafts from align are only about a tenner for three, so i would order them if i was you.

 

[Lee]

The thin washers are shims Treff to get the right spacing on the feather shaft. If when you tighten the screws down on the feather shaft, the bearings become gritty, then you can remove a shim or two until the screws are tight, but the bearing is free.

 

[treff]

Thanks for the reply Lee. I was not aware that the design differed so much from the Align drawing after all they are supposed to be clones. I will get on and build the new heli kit pointless sending it back, be more trouble than it's worth. I will replace parts I feel are a bit iffy. I'm only going to crash it after all. LOL.
One more question....................it's about binding the TX to the RX. Do you rebind every time you fly to make sure or just switch on TX first then RX and fly after doing all flight checks of course. I ask because a friend of mine who has been flying for years, mainly like myself on 35MHz always rebinds before flying, belt and braces, is it necessary or not? Thanks again

 

[Lee]

No you only have to bind once. Sometimes if you find issues happening with the RX, you can rebind to see if that helps. But a RX loosing its bind is a sign of something near terminal.

 

[treff]

Thanks Lee that is very interesting to say the least. Cheers