Beter be safe than sorry and check your helicopter once in a while

A RC-helicopter is not a toy. The machines have a lot of kinetic energy when operating. So check your helicopter periodically. Personally I always have a pre-season checkup and during the season (when the model is not new) I do visual checks to see if the tolerances are as expected and all parts have enough grease.

Today I checked the RigidII (Speed), love to write speed behind the name ;-). In the beginning everything looks perfect but taking a closer look I saw that the nick servo steering had a lot of tolerance and also the other two swashplate servo’s. A closer inspection to all screw and I found that some had no loctite. After reading the manual I now put some loctite on the screws and tightened them as mentioned.

I use loctite 243 (blue) this fixed the screw just enough so that it can handle vibrations and stay fixed during operation.  Even more important, you can now also unscrew the screw when needed.  Don’t use other types of loctite (green or red), because the screws in a RC-helicopter are so small you will not be able to loosen them.

Make sure you use a very small amount of loctite, the idea is not to fix the screw but to prevent it from becoming loose by itself!

TIPS:

• Squeeze the bottle just a little bit, all that loctite that comes out is enough to build a couple of RC-helicopters. You need just a few!
• Buy 5ml or 10ml and not 200ml this is enough for 10 years!

 

• If the screw is fixed, try to heat it up with a soldering iron, loctite 243 becomes loose when it gets heated. Be aware that if there is plastic around the screw, this could melt.
• Use a torq screwdrive when the hex screwdriver has become round.
• And when a torq does not work, then use tools such as screw extractor

However, we are not finished yet!

Because I was busy checking up the complete helicopter I also greased all the bearings and gears. For this, I use DryFluid a special oil and grease for heavy duty machines like RC-helicopters.

Now I know the RigidII Speed is ready for the season..