Esky Honey Bee FP Setup

Esky Honey Bee FP

Once you have your new Honeybee and have read the manual while the battery is charging, here are some things to check.

Servo pushrods - These should be adjusted so the servo arm is horizontal when the swashplate is level. You can adjust the length of these by unclipping the ball joint and screwing it up or down the metal rod.

Flybar - The flybar also needs to be balanced. This is achieved by loosening off the screws on the main motor and pushing it away from the main drive gear, creating a gap between the pinion and allowing the main gear to move freely. Remove the rotor head and blades. Hold the helicopter by the tail so the main shaft is horizontal and spin the flybar and mainshaft. When it's balanced it should stop in a different position when spun...the heavier paddle will find its way to 6 o'clock if the balance is out... gravity works.... There are 2 grub screws that secure the flybar into the paddle control frame and these may need to be loosened to slide the flybar to one side or the other to achieve balance.

Alternate quick method: remove the rotor head and run the motor. Add a little tape to one paddle and try it again. If the vibration is worse, move the tape to the other side. Try it again with another bit of tape. If you need lots of tape you should use the previous method.

Paddles - These need to be at 90 degrees when you look at them side on to the main axis of your heli (some of us find it easier to learn to hover with a little positive pitch on the paddles but they must be equal and you definitely want them level for forward flight).

Main rotor balance - This can be achieved in a number of ways; the easiest is to pop off the the whole rotorhead assembly and put it between two glasses, think see-saw...add tape to the lighter blade to achieve good balance.

Tail rotor balance - Again the glass trick works, add tape as required.

Centre of Gravity (CG) - Suspend your heli by its fly bar with the battery mounted in its holder, you may need to modify the airframe to allow the battery to be moved forward toward the nose of the heli to achieve good balance.

Tracking - Clamp the helicopter to a bench and run the motor at hover speed. View the rotor disk edge on - you should see both blades going around at the same height. If one is higher than the other you can make it make less lift by holding the root in one hand the the tip in the other and twisting the leading edge of the tip down for a few seconds. A little heat from a hair dryer may be required to make large adjustments. Identify which blade is which by a piece of coloured tape on one blade.

Mesh - To properly set the mesh between the pinion and main gears, loosen off the screws that hold the main motor to the airframe, take a strip of paper and fold it in half then insert it between the main gear and pinion. Push the motor back towards the main gear and move it back and forth a few times until the paper is compressed between the gears. Tighten the screws up and remove the paper... Et voila!

Proportional mix and gyro gain

Turn gain to below half way. (Note: Full clockwise is max gain.)

Plug in 4in1 and wait for solid green light. (Make sure helicopter does not move during this stage)

Fly heli and note the direction of yaw.

Land and unplug the 4in1. (Must unplug 4in1 for changes to take effect.)

Adjust the proportional pot.

If the nose was yawing right then decrease pot (counterclockwise).

If the nose was yawing left then increase pot (clockwise).

Repeat steps 2 to 5 till the yaw is gone.

Fly the heli and increase gain till you experience some tail wag. (No need to unplug 4in1 when adjusting gain.)

If you do experience tail wag then decrease gain a bit till the wag is gone.

Changes in the gain may reintroduce some yaw. If so, repeat steps 2 to 5 again with the new gain setting.

Note: Make sure not to move the helicopter while the 4in1 is initializing. Always wait for the solid green light before moving it, otherwise the gyro may not calibrate correctly.