To CNC or not to CNC.....

[Bigpyro]

What are the benefits of upgrading to CNC rotor head parts? Has anyone found that they reduce your long term cost of repairs or do they break before they pay for themselves in plastic parts. I guess it all depends on how much you crash but I just want to determine if they typically last long enough to recover the cost.

I am a newb and have had a few crashes. Should I just stick with plastic until I can fly better or should I switch to CNC so the parts do not break as easily?

If I do switch can you upgrade piece by piece or do you just have to buy the whole enchillada? Thinking about starting with the swashplate and working up...

Thanks for all the info everyone. I look forward to the days I can answer questions for all the silly little newbs.

[chaos]

For my 2-cents, apart from looks, I mostly don't think it's an especially good investment. The Hirobo phase guide is a plastic part I will soon replace simply because it's a bit frail, not because of any crash consideration. I would rather replace a broken plastic part than a bent metal part. Cheaper. I've never been able to straighten out a piece of bent metal worth a dang. If I ever get so good and so demanding that the "sponginess" of the plastic is a drag I'll get metal. Till then, plastic is good enough for me. However, if I were to win the lottery, I might go with metal just for the looks.

[hawkman]

If its an annoying breakage then a metal part might be a good idea.....but a whole rotorhead (for example)? better to get loads of flight time and spend that extra cash on parts and tools/gadgets to make maintaining your heli easier.

I spent good money on carbon blades.....they lasted a couple of flights until they got broke (my gyro mode was messed up) for the price I could have bought 2 or 3 sets of wooden blades.
Rob

[uneverno]

Having come from an RC car racing background, I would say that anything you can replace with CF or Aluminum you should. Gram for gram, it's stronger and will take more punishment without breaking than injection molded plastic. (On the other hand, when it does come apart, the results can be quite spectacular.) In addition, plastic can develop unnoticed weaknesses over time which are readily apparent in aluminum. CF simply shatters, but it takes a lot more force to get that to happen. (I mention the racing part, because it was important in that situation that the car either work or be so broken you may as well buy a new one, with no in between those two options. I kinda feel the same way about heli's)

I did just install aluminum swing arms and can say that the assembly is much smoother than the stock plastic was. The other huge benefit on upgrading my heli was in the tail rotor assembly. The stock plastic assembly and blade clamps were sloppy and loose and adjustments were virtually impossible to make. If I could get it just right, it wouldn't hold.

So, 2nd benefit to aluminum is that you can locktite it, which plastic isn't so friendly with. I like my moving parts to move, but not where/when they're not supposed to.

Third benefit, and this is a minor point at best, is that converting to aluminum has allowed me to get rid of all those annoying phillips head screws and replace them with hex. If you like to tinker with your machine, which I do, hex screw heads don't strip like phillips will. Aluminum threads won't strip like plastic eventually will either. (Unless you're really tough on them )

I do concur with Hawk with regard to the blades. It seems to me, that unless you're a really good/competitive pilot (of which I'm neither), you won't notice a performance difference and that money could be better spent elsewhere. When I have a spare $ 40-50 laying around I'll test that theory.

All that having been said, I purchased my heli on ebay with most of the rotorhead already aluminized, so I really didn't pay the additional coupla hundred bucks it would've cost to do that. That would definitely have been a consideration had I purchased the heli stock.

As far as the investment is concerned, I'm not sure. I haven't broken much in the way of plastic parts on my stock FP machine, so I'm not too concerned with the replacement costs of aluminum when the CP bird gets airborn. That's just me though.

Anyweigh, that's my 2¼ ¢. Sorry for the long-winded post. As chaos has said, I'm old and that's what I do

[Bigpyro]

Thanks for the great information everyone! One thing I am still curious about is if it is an all or nothing conversion. Could I just replace the swashplate and keep everything else plastic or would I have to go all CNC? The swashplate is my biggest concern, everytime I have so much as a light blade strike one of the ball joints on my swashplate will break. Its a little annoying when you consider 13 bucks for the swashplate and another 20 for some new blades.

[uneverno]

Originally Posted by Bigpyro

Could I just replace the swashplate and keep everything else plastic

Absolutely - no need to replace the whole head. My heli comes stock with aluminum swash, the rest of the head parts are plastic.

The only unfortunate rule of thumb there is that if you eliminate the weak link in the chain, you tend to expose the next weakest link...

[hawkman]

You might get a deal on some items.....I noticed on a TRex bling advert that you could buy a set of things....like a swashplate and the rotor head with blade grips etc.....This would seem to increase the helis worth.....but I would only consider the extras if its a heli I plan to keep for a long long time.

I doubt the resale value would match what money you out into your machine......I am only saying this as a point to consider.

Blades? with carbon blades you get lighter weight...they are nice and smooth which gives more power.....but you would need to be careful doing autos because the inertia wouldnt be so good.

Rob

[uneverno]

Resale value on bling is really not much. Whether you'll get your money's worth out of it is even questionable. However, I would say that replacing the swashplate if it's breaking that often is a worthwhile expenditure, even if you do plan on selling the heli. Downtime is kind of a cost as well. Sorta. It's just that flying costs more...

I'm not convinced of the efficacy of CF blades yet, woodies are fine by me. On the other hand, the guys that make the belt drive tail mod for mine are in the process of making a CF frame for it. If it's priced as I expect, it'll prolly be in the $ 100 to $ 150 range. I'll drop that in a heartbeat for the added rigidity and strength, not to mention the weight savings over the current aluminum/plastic combo. I'll never get my money back out of that, 'cuz it's a one off mod by a small, independent mfr. (read high risk on longevity of the business = ?? on long term parts availability) on a heli that's not very popular, but hey, it's my heli and I want it. (and I'm gonna hold my breath until I get it) That alone justifies the cost to me