DX7 battery pack

For a while now, my DX7 battery does not keeps its charge for a very long time. I used to get easily 10 flights with a single charge and now I almost have to charge it everytime I go out.


So I started looking for a replacement battery for it and apparently, the easiest (and cheapest) solution is to buy some AA cells and make another pack myself. I will go to my local costco later today and see if I can buy some NiMh rechargeable AA cells to make another pack.

Stupid fuel magnet

Today I was flying my 600 and all of a sudden, the engine started to act weird. The sound wasn't right, but I couldn't tell what was wrong and as I was approaching to land the heli and look at it, the engine just died! Luckily, I was able to handle this first forced autorotation from about 25 feet without any problem.


I tried to start it again and it wouldn't start unless I gave it a lot of throttle. Then I just couldn't make it to idle, it was like if the needle was suddenly like 1 more turn leaner....

After looking at everything on the bench, I easily found the trouble, my fuel magnet foam simply desintegreted and a lot of it was stuck in the fuel filter.. making the mix somehow a lot leaner because it was preventing fuel to pass freely through the filter!

I pulled the whole fuel line apart and cleaned everything. I was happy to find that the align 3-way filter can be dissambled and cleaned.

So now I will throw this fuel magnet away and get an OS bubbleless instead. I don't want to think of what could have happened without the filter, foam in the carburator/engine can't be a good thing!

I figured that while flying, the governer was trying to maintain headspeed, but it was suddenly so lean, that it had to lower the throttle so low that it just cut the engine.

So it was my last flight with a stupid fuel magnet!

Repaired blade

There's nothing like knowing something is wrong to begin to worry about it. Sometimes it's better off not knowing!


Since I noticed the chip on one of the main blades of my 600, I started to worry about it. Many people adviced me not to fly this particular blade and a lot also told me that a helicopter blade just can't be repaired, but I couldn't help it and I gave it a shot anyway.

I cleaned it very thoroughly and I filled the hole with some epoxy. After it was dry, I sanded it and polished it with my dremel tool and some compound. Here is a little before/after:

I admit it's not pretty but it looks good and feels very good. I'm very confident that repaired this way, the blade is almost as good as it was at first. I may have lost some performance, but probably not that much and certainly not anything that I could notice.

So even after doing the repair, it took me a long time to decide myselft if I would fly it again or not, but I finally made my mind and decided to go for it. After all, I repair things all the time and I never hesitate to use it when I'm confident in my repair.

So after rebalancing the blades and making sure one more tme that everything was fine, I gave it a shot. I actually had 4 flights with this blade today and it flew just right! On the first flight, I only hovered it from a safe distance and landed it many times to check the blade and everything looked fine everytime. I then flew the heli for real and did my usual routine.

So even if I must admit I'm still not 100% confident in those blades, I decided I will keep it as a spare set and I will continue to fly it while I'm waiting for the new blades I ordered.

Lipo alright

After my last flight with one of my lipos for my T-Rex 450, I reported that it was really hot and a little puffed after landing. It also did not last as long as normally. So I was a little worried, but since it's a AirThunder which is supposed to be resistant to puffing and over dischargind, I still had a little hope.


I recharged it and after testing it again, it looks like it's back to normal again. It flew normally today and it wasn't too hot of puffed when landing. So I guess so far so good, I will continue to monitor this pack closely, but I think it' still good after all. I have about 40 cycles on both of my pack now, but with good care, it's supposed to be able to handle over 100.

First replacement parts on Trex-600

After a few more flights today, I noticed that the tail blades on my 600 are now busted. Those were the original tail blades that came with my NSP kit, so it was Align CF tail blade, btu because of the rocky ground where I fly, the heli sometimes lifts some tiny rocks while spooling up and I think I also might have accidently touched the tail blades down while trying some autos, so the tip of one of the tail blades is now split open. CF is a great material, but not really resistant.


Also, after practicing some moderate high autos, I noticed that I lost the two back landing skid rubber grommets.

So this afternoon, I went to my LHS ready to order some tail blades and skid grommets and to my great pleasure, they had it all in stock!

So I just installed some brand new K&B neon yellow tail blades and I replaced the missing skid nuts. the tail blade they had were only 84mm instead of the original 95mm, but it said fits any 30-50 nitro heli, so I'll give it a try. Anyway, they were pretty cheap and I though that plastic tail blades would probably last longer than CF in my flying grounds.

One more thing that begins to worry me a little is that a few flights back, the main blades hit smoething pretty hard (probably a little rock) while the heli was on the ground. I heard a weird noise... Since then , this is a little crack on the edge of one of my main CF blades. I didnt worry at all at first and I flew several flights with this crack since then, but I'm just scared that this crak can grow bigger with time. I'll try to see if it can be repaired, I heard of some epoxy blade reparations for minor cracks, because I'm not really in the mood to spend another 100$ on some new main blades only because of this minor crack, but I also want to be sure it's ok to continue to fly it like that...

A few more flights

Yesterday, I was out with my 450 and my 600. I flew my 2 450 packs and then I started the bigger one. It was a wonderful day outside and 5 wonderful flights as well. I am now up to speed with my T-Rex 600 and I can do everything that I was doing with my 450. The engine is now well tuned and I really love my new heli :)


It was also my 100th and 101 flights with my TRex-450! So far so good...

Only one drawback of my day, my first lipo pack ofr my Trex 450 didnt last very long and after the flight, it was really hot and a little puffed, even though it's a Air Thunder and not supposed to puff ever... I charged it this morning and I will give it one more try soon to see if it's really dead or it was just a glitch. It was it's 40th cycle...

SOLD - Kyosho SandMaster II

I sold my old Kyosho SandMaster II nitro buggy. I didnt useit in the ladt few years so I decided to sell it while it was still worth something. It was still in perfect working order so it wasnt too hard to sell it for a reasonnable price.