I use a Spektrum radio to fly my planes and helis, which has the ability to save model memories from the transmitter onto an SD card. A while ago this lead me to think it might be useful to create a website whereby people could upload saved model files and share them easily with others using simple web links. Building on this idea I thought it might be nice to offer some sort of visualisation of the saved model file on the web.

I’ve had an attempt at building this, it is early days yet but so far you can register, login, upload a model and view some basic information about the saved file. The site is at http://spektrum.riviera.org.uk/ at the moment the only model uploaded is a file from my DX8 which is used for my Edge 540QQ, you can view that here.

I just noticed the Blade 450 page hasn’t been updated since 2011! The little heli hasn’t been forgotten about, I’m currently flying it about twice a week thanks to moving house and finding a lovely field on the way to work. It would be rude not to put at least a couple of packs through. The guys at work find this very amusing, often asking how many packs I put through it each morning, and in the case of the one recent crash, guessing I had stuffed it from my mood on arrival 🙂

Following on from the video I shot onboard Roo, I took my new Dynamic-S on maybe its tenth flight at Bratton Camp in Wiltshire. Normally I fly off the slopes to the east and south, but the wind tonight was light and northerly so I used the flat field behind the slopes.  I had the 808 camera with me so I used some velcro to attach it onto the left wing and shot a little video.

We are down in Wiltshire at the moment and as ever we brought the boat I built for Edward last year. He loves to take it down to the pond in the pleasure gardens. This time I brought my 808 camera and attached it into the cabin in the boat. The little video we shot is below.

Few little updates:

• Made a page for the flying sites map, that’ll be the perm home for it.
• Moved the S-Pou and the LiddleRod to the historic page, reflecting their semi-permanent retirement
• Created a page for the Pulse 25, my new ARTF hack.

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, the Blade 130 had a little argument with a patio and stripped a couple of teeth from the  bevel gear which feeds power to the tail rotor. Thanks to quick delivery from Fast Lad (Broken link http://www.fast-lad.co.uk/store/) a new, upgraded metal gear has arrived.

Tonight I sat down to fit the new gear and tail, this is where I made a small mistake which cost me about an hour of time, but thankfully no damage to the heli. I now know that to replace the bevel gear you can simply disconnect the swash from the head, remove a couple of screws and yank the head and main shaft straight out of the heli. I tried this, but it didn’t feel like the main shaft was going to part company from the main drive gear at the bottom. So I decided the only way forward was to separate the two chassis halves and take the shaft out that way.

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DON’T DO THAT! Of course does work, but it is one hell of a job. The proper way is shown in the video below, oh well it’s back together and flying OK. At least I learnt a bit about how it is all held together 😉

Between house moving noise and a silly busy period at work, I’ve not been getting out much. The Tuc is seeing some progress in the evenings, but that has been about it. The clocks went forward a couple of weeks ago, bringing lighter evenings but since then we have had seriously strong gales. This week however we have been graced by a nice spot of low wind and sunshine.

As a result I’ve been getting out into the garden with the 130x almost daily, most times putting all three batteries through it.  I’m getting a pleasant 6 mins out of the two Overlander batteries, with the charger reporting about 300/350 mAh going back in so they could be pushed even more.

Last night I had a little crash which snapped off the lower 2/3 of the tail fin, so I’ll have to order a new one and I have stripped a couple of gears on the main bevel gear which feeds power to the tail shaft. I’m going to replace it with the metal optional part (BLH3735). Even with a few teeth and the fin gone she flys just fine though!

Well, I’m pleased to say that after 8 months she is finished! Weighing in at 550 grams gives me a little under 100 watts per pound, so that should be plenty for a little vintage model. I took her over to the flats today for a maiden but it was a bit too windy for me to want to chance it.

I’ve sort of fallen out of love with it over the months, it was a struggle to push myself to finish it. The covering was the final annoyance, the Litespan not shrinking enough for some of the curves, and then after I added the blue trim to the front of the fuselage I ran out of balsaloc. Being too tight to buy a new tub just for a few strips on the wings and tail I ended up painting those, which moderate success!

I’m pleased I’ve finished before starting on the next one, I don’t want to end up with a few unfinished models hanging around the place, beside which, I’ve got no space for the ones that are finished as it is 🙂

I’ll write some more once she has flown.

Right, NEXT!

This is a custom search box which restricts google.co.uk to the modelflying.co.uk/forums/ url.

If you want your own Google custom search just click here. Anybody can make one and either publish a public URL or host it on their site like I’ve done.

I just discovered I have the copy of Radio Modeller where the Jiffy was given away as the free plan. I’m not sure why this pleases me as much as it does, but there you go! I’ve scanned the article and bunged it up on the Jiffy page, here.