Tips                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                Home Here is a new thing I am going to try for awhile...Each month I'd like to post in this section a small tip relevant to our helicopters that I have learned along the way... If you come across a useful tip, please email it to me for the site.. Thanks,  Jason   January 2003  Keep your antenna safe and out of harms way.  Some people choose base loaded antennas, that's fine.  My experience with them was unpleasant many years ago in the R/C car circuit... Today I use the stock antenna that came with my receiver the way I believe it was mean to be.  I like to initially use a section of fuel tubing to cover the first 8 inches of wire as I route it down to the skids of the heli... Here the fuel tubing gets slipped on the end of a very long plastic antenna protector.  If you look under your landing gear, you probably have little eyes that this plastic tube will fit into.  Use small pieces of fuel tubing to keep the straw from moving fore and aft inside these little eyes... as your antenna exits the back of the tube, slide one more half inch piece of fuel tubing over the wire.  Now using a rubber band, you can loop your wire thru the rubber band and use the fuel tubing to secure the antenna to the rubber band.  Now attach the antenna to a fin... You will find in a crash as the boom breaks, the rubber band probably will also.  This is a good thing, but the long plastic straw will keep your antenna away from spinning parts as your heli tries to dig a hole.  When in doubt about a damaged antenna you may already have, send the receiver back to the manufacture for proper replacement.  There they will perform crucial tests to be sure it is operating at max efficiency... Total cost?? about 10-15 bucks... Much cheaper than crashing!!!  Jason   February 2003   People often speak of having to set "Phase" when it comes to R/C helicopters.... What does this mean?? How does it effect our little machines and more importantly, how do you set it? This month my chosen topic is Phase.  I am not an expert, but I am going to share what I have recently learned... Physics is not my strong point so I will spare you boring details and get to the nuts and bolts.  While in a hover we know every action acting upon the helicopter is somewhat in a stable condition.  By adding a slight amount of forward cyclic (swash tips fwd) the heli will begin to move into forward flight... ((So it says in fine print)) But somehow you are watching your machine not move off straight ahead, instead it moves forward and lets say to the right... Assuming all things being equal, let me try to explain why.  The swash plate might not be EXACTLY tipping forward as you had thought, just the slightest amount of it tipping to the right will give a mixed input and you will not go straight.. Something you might wish to check is your Phase...  MOST instructions will give general information about setting phase during building and that should be all you need... Setting it isn't really that difficult either... Begin with your flybar parallel to the boom and look at the swash plate with zero degrees pitch on your main rotor. Where are the balls on the upper half of the swash located?  They should be initially set perpendicular to the flybar. If they are not, loosen your radius block and rotate it until they are. This part will apply to all helicopters more or less depending on if your machine is CCPM or standard mix.  Now test fly and gently move ahead fwd very slowly.. See if you notice the machine trying to move left or right.  Repeat several times until you are sure it wants to favor a specific direction.  Now, assuming your helicopter blades spin clockwise, you can adjust this even further.  Back to our example.  Our machine moves fwd and to the right, adjust your phase (upper half of your swash plate) a millimeter counterclockwise to counter the effect of it moving to the right... and of course, clockwise if it tries to go to the left.. I hope you find this little article interesting and helpful for beginners as I believe, Knowledge is Power.... Jason   March 2003  Coming soon... Basic Blade balancing April 2003 Coming soon... Blade tracking Muffler polishing           So you're muffler or special high power exhaust pipe isn't looking so hot these days... Here's an easy tip anyone can use. Find an old cooking pot large enough to hold your pipe... Get something you will NEVER eat out of again from maybe a garage sale or junk shop.  Now, you can either use antifreeze or Cascade automatic dishwasher soap.  It is important to tell you antifreeze is extremely dangerous and highly flammable, but works well.  I choose to use the dishwasher soap myself, less caustic and safe to use inside the house.  Boil your pipe in about a couple of tablespoons of soap and some water and watch the burnt on oil fade away.  Once the pipe is clean, wet sand the pipe with 400-600 grit sand paper.  If you can find 1000-2500 grit, even better.  Use mothers aluminum polish if your pipe is not steal or cheap pot metal.  I have had outstanding results with a buffing wheel and rouge mounted on the average bench grinder... Much faster... below is a few pictures of a pipe I recently did that was almost destroyed from castor oil.. (yet another reason to run synthetic based fuel) pipe at the beginning pipe in a pot on the stove pipe after 400 grit beautiful results..... :-)   Here is a handy way to compare the heat of different glow plugs ......