On this web site I was trying to stay with general information on a wide range of heli topics. Being a member of the Heli fever forum has given me a lot of exposure to people with detailed questions on common heli issues as well as specific question on helis I own.

            Ok, so I’m going to get down to details with the Blade Cp Heli. This heli is a fun to fly, easy to learn heli. I’ll start here with the basic stock Blade Cp. In stock configuration it come with a 9.6 650mah Nimh battery, flat bottom blades, some form of a charged and a 10T motor. In this configuration it is not 3D capable. I had little use for the stock battery. I instead used a 7.4 1500mah Lipo, which gave me about 30 – 40 minutes flying time on the 10T motor setup. If you do this you must have a Lipo charger, You can NOT use the stock Nimh charger for any Lipo battery.

            Straight out of the box most of these helis will fly. This does not mean you can fly it. That will take some time, if you are new to RC helis. Even with this heli being able to fly right out of the box doesn’t mean it’s setup perfectly. Before you try it out, you should learn your new helis needs. Start with the manual, get to know it well, it is well written. 

            Now I’ll take you on a tour of your heli and do my best to explain it in simple terms. That the very top, is the rotor head assm. made up of some parts you need to get to know well. The list below is a top down list, so follow alone in that order.

1. The rotor button  (ie the screw on top)
2. flybar paddle assm. ( Stick with two paddles on it passing though a plastic oval)
3. Rotor head ( widget  in the center)
4. Ball link arms  ( two black doodads going downward)
5. Blade grips ( the place were the two doodads went to)
6. Main rotor blades ( two thingies connected to the blade grips)
7. Control frame arms ( two black gizmos running to the fly bar assm)
8. Center hub  ( as the name implies gadget in the center)
9. Swash plate ( strange thing a mabob at the bottom)

These parts are the main stay of your helis flying capabilities. At the tail is your tail motor and tail rotor blade. I see the eye rolling as you read this and your mind saying I knew that. 

To start out, hopefully by now you have gone back and read the manual, while your waiting for the battery to charge. After the battery is charged turn on the Tx and plug the battery into the heli. Make sure your Tx trims are centered except for the throttle trim, that for now should be all the way down.  Remove the canopy and look at the swash plate (9). Is it level front to back and side to side? If not you will adjust it in small steps. On the Swash plate (9) there are three servo link arms. Carefully disconnect the arm that looks too high or low. In ½ to 1 full turns, adjust linkage till the plate appears level. To  adjust the side to side, you may have to turn one link arm down and the other up. Look closely at the white arms mounted on the servos. These arms you will  also want to be level, this gives you the best travel and is a must for 3D flight.

With your Swash plate (9) level you can now check your blade tracking. Weight the heli down, a board across the skids and a brick on each side works well. Step, back a few feet and watch the main blades as you give the heli some throttle. You should see one blade, and if you have balance tape on the blades you will see blended colors.  If you see a set of ghost blades (ex. One set high and the other low) your tracking is off. As before if you have taped blades you’ll see one color higher than the other. To correct this, adjust the ball link arms (4). You can adjust either way bring one blade up or down. My preferred method is to adjust one blade up 1/2 turn and the other down. Do this and recheck the tracking, it may take several tries to get it right.

With your heli tracking well you can do some test hovering. If you find your heli just getting light on the skids at half throttle or above and not lifting off you’ll need to add positive pitch evenly to each blade. To do this just go back to each ball link (4) and add length to it in small steps.

 Get the heli into a stable hover, if you find the heli drifts in anyone direction, set it down and adjust your trims on the Tx to correct the drift and retry your hover. Once you have a stable hover with the trims set, now we can fine tune the swash plate. Remove the canopy again and look at the trim setting on the Tx. Any aileron or elevator trim at is not still centered is the servo arm that is in need of adjustment. Count the number of clicks to make the trim centered. If need be write it down. Now adjust as before the servo arm that corresponds to that trim. After each adjustment return the trim to the start point you counted from. Do this till your plate looks level with trim centered. Do test hovers till you get a good stable hover with the trims all centered ( except throttle trim !) 

The gyro is up next in your setup. With the heli in hover notice any drift circling to the left or right or twitching back and forth of the tail ( known as hunting.) To correct left or right circular drifting increase or decrease tail input on the Rx adjustment screw. For gyro tail hunting reduce gyro gain. On the Rx these adjustments are tail input, front screw, gyro gain is the back screw, In, either case do very small adjustments at a time, Clockwise is increase counter clockwise to decrease. Fine, tuning these settings is a matter of balancing the two forces.

Doing these adjustments will give you a well balanced flying heli. As a closing statement, any time you crash or replace blades and or parts repeat these steps to get your heli back in shape.                              

Written by CaptKDS

Walkera # 4 Setup

The walkera # 4 I have found to be an easy to setup, as well as being a stable flier. I use it to teach my wife how to fly a heli. The #4 comes with a 4-1 Rx controller; a 370 brushed motor and is a fixed pitch heli.

Setting up a # 4 is fairly simple. With your battery changed power up your Tx and than plug your battery in to the heli. Note the position of your swash plate. It needs to be level front to back and side to side. As well your Tx trims should be centered for your elevators and Ailerons. To adjust the plate if it isn’t level is a matter of rising or lowering the links of the swash plate. This should be done in small steps. If you’re new to heli’s and can’t hover yet just level it by eye, this should be close enough till you have gained the skills to hover.

 Once you’re able to hold a stable hover you can fine-tune the swash plate. To do this get the heli in a stable hover and note where your trims are to hold it there with out much input from the sticks. If you find any trim to be off center adjust the link that is related to that trim, till it’s centered. Getting this right makes flying better and will help you know when your heli is having and issue. After a crash or hard landing if you find you need to add trim to make it fly right again, that’s your heli’s way of saying I have a problem Huston.

Adjusting the tail gyro is a matter of adding or taking away gain. If your heli tends to turn one way or another without you adding tail input you need to make this adjustment. Another indicator you have to take out gyro gain; is in a hover you notice the tail wagging at you. This is called hunting and is corrected by reducing gyro gain.

With time and skill you’ll find this becomes and easy heli to deal with and a good trainer to learn on. The setup and adjustments in this article assume your heli is undamaged and all you motors are in good shape. I believe training gear is a must for beginners starting in on there first hovers. I also think Radds flight school if followed works wonders for new pilots. You can find the link to Radds on this web site. Good luck to all and have fun doing it.