#mcp x

[darvos-blog]

space is the key

This hobby really wants a large space. At least in the beginning. You can start a death star trench run only after you dusted crops on large open farmland. Since my mQX is down at the moment, I have no choice but to fly the mCP X. The little quad has built enough confidence to make me attempt to fly the mCP X the same way. It almost did fly the same way. It is definitely a step above the mQX. It's faster, less predictable, and does more damage in a crash. But these become less of an issue when there's more space.

[darvos-blog]

mCP X spins on the ground

Something weird to my mCP X today. I was messing around with the head since I bought a swashplate leveling tool. After I put everything back together, it would spin out of control on the ground. Looking at it closer, I noticed the tail motor would spin for a second, then stop completely. Since rebinding it seems to fix a lot of weird behavior, I decided to give it a shot. To my dismay, it would not bind. I tried and tried, the led would always go from flashing rapidly to flashing slowly. The controls kind of work, but the blades will not spin up. I tried using a fully charged battery, tried giving it full right rudder just in case it had some kind magical over the air update turning it into a V2 (I wish). Nothing made any difference. In the end, I started all over. I reset the model memory on my transmitter, reprogrammed all the settings, and tried again. Finally the solid blue light came back on. Everything is ok once more.

[darvos-blog]

right turns

I spent a few batteries doing side in hovering with rates set at 50%. That really helped me immensely. I can now do clockwise circles slowly. I wouldn't call it flying yet. It's more like moving it 1 inch at a time along a circular path. I find that I have to constantly give back cyclic to keep it from going to fast. Right rudder also seem to require a bit right cyclic to make it not slide out to the left. I think I have to get over my fear of crashing to start flying it smoothly. It reminds of riding motorcycles. To corner, lean aggressively and go for it.

[darvos-blog]

mCP X maiden flight

Finally it happened. My first experience with a CP helicopter. With 3 months experience on the mSR and about 10 minutes of sim time (with a xbox controller), I survived my mCP X maiden flight without any major disaster. One little bump into a chair caused the main gear to be knocked loose. Tugging on the blade grips seems to show no bearing trouble. I also ran into a problem in the beginning I want to mention. I just could not get any lift at all. It turns out that you have to reverse the pitch channel using the dx6i with mCP x. This is of course listed in the manual, but I was mostly focused on all the numbers. The video below is made using the low rate settings. I think I will lower it further to 50% for a while. It is much more responsive than the mSR. The rubbery underwater feeling is gone, controls all feel sharp and crisp. I like it and will recommend it to all mSR owners thinking of moving up. I might have to clear the furniture a bit more though due to my average middle-aged reflexes.

[darvos-blog]

new blade grips for mCP x

Horizon Hobby has issued a new bulletin on the mCP X blade grips situation here. Anyone that has the original blade grips(ones without a B on the blade grips) can submit a replacement request form and a new head will be shipped free to you. Dribbe has a post on rcg explaining how this new design works. Basically even if your bearings do fail, the extra plastic in the blade grips will prevent your blades from flying away. They are also working with their bearing suppliers to ensure the quality of the bearings. Since this is a hot item, the replacement head might take awhile to be shipped out.

I think this is a satisfactory to the problem. Stepping up the QC to make sure they do not fail as easily, and changing the design so when they do fail they do not become a safety hazard. We will see if the overall quality of the bearings improve when the second batch goes out. Now all I need to do is wait for my radio and replacement head to be shipped.

[darvos-blog]

mCP x acquired

I finally picked up a BNF mCP x for $175 ($192 after tax) at RCX. I also picked p 2x Thunder Power 160 mah batteries for $6.75 each. Thunder Power do not have replacements for the mCP x yet, but they are working on one. Unfortunately everyone seems to be out of stock on dx6i or dx7 currently. They had dx8 there for $399, which is probably a decent price but I don't think I'm ready to spend that much on a radio yet. The new dx6i with dsmx comes out on 3/28/2011. I will probably wait until then. Another hot item there was the Trex 100s. I saw a stack of them early in the morning and they were all gone in a few hours.

I had the opportunity to speak with James from Horizon Hobby at the show. I believe he is the project lead on the mCP x. He acknowledged the bearing problem and said they are working hard on a solution. He thinks its not even a bad batch of bearings, but just a few bad ones. These bad bearings tend to fail very early, so it is a good idea to check your blade grips after the first few flights. The way to check is to pull on the blade grips to feel if there is any play. James was nice enough to open up my new mCP x and go over it quickly to see if mine has any problems.

Here's a video of his flight demo, James is the white guy in blue shirt on the right. Sorry about the poor quality, maybe it's time I invest in a better video camera. The thing can really move so the video is also a bit headache inducing.

[darvos-blog]

you're holding it wrong

The German Horizon Hobby site has posted this little bit of information regarding the latest accusations of possible defect on the mCP x. Here's what Google translate tells me:

It is bereichtet that there is a problem with the blade grips and bearings. understand that we have tackled the comment, and unfortunately have the problem either in our laboratory in the U.S., in service in Germany or in our production facility in China. We have a tensile test performed on the rotor with a load of 35kg and could pull off the blade grip in any case of the camps. In flight, in accordance with existing calculations maximum tensile kg of 3. We want to ignore the two cases, not known to us, are they investigate further, because the time is unclear whether the helicopter in question previously had a crash and so a base damage as a result of that could be developed. There are scattered wild theories that claim that the bearings have been installed incorrectly. These theories are groundless. The Blade mCP X has been developed to the best of my knowledge and belief of Horizon and represents the state of the art dar. There is certainly no unsafe product, and the pilot is much enjoyment, when operated with due caution.

Basically denying there is a defect and blaming the user. I wonder if they read my previous entry and decided to borrow the reality distortion field. There are just too many reports of blades flying off to be ignored. Some even happened on the maiden flight without any crashes. Blaming the user works well in a level 1 tech support environment. However, this being a CP pretty much eliminates complete clueless n00bs making these claims. You have to at least know what a bearing is and how to spot a failed bearing. At the same time, this is the internet where things tend to get blown out of proportion. It could even be a well coordinated industrial sabotage led by a competitor(s). I think I will side with my fellow enthusiasts just wanting to play and have fun for now. I do like that they posted a little bit of detail in their tests though. We'll see how this plays out. A certain fruit company first blamed the users then started to issue free cases. Maybe Horizon Hobby is trying to mimic a seemingly successful strategy.

[darvos-blog]

mCP x launch trouble

With the US finally receiving their shipment of mCP x, the same bearing problem reported by the Germans have started to be reported in the US as well. Just browsing some threads here and there (those threads are HUGE!), it seems that this is an assembly line issue. The bearings can take different amount of load in different directions, but they are installed randomly. The result is those that are installed wrong falls apart and the blades come flying off. There's already a picture with a facial injury out there. Since a bearing can go in blade grips two ways and there's two blade grips, there is a 75% chance of a incorrect configuration if the factory really provided no instructions on how to assemble the blade grips.

Mistakes happen from time to time, but how we deal with these mistakes shows character and integrity. Horizon Hobby will certainly be under close inspection on this one. So far, it is disappointing that there are no official communications on this issue. In my opinion, even a simple we're looking into it is better than nothing. Unless you're a rock star executive possessing the reality distortion field, then you can say your customers are holding it wrong.