Model
Helicopter Gyros Explained |
By
Jeff Barrington - Mid Devon Heli Club
The purpose of the gyro is to stabilize the tail, without it the model would
be almost unflyable. Early gyros had a motor and two flywheels inside and
at the time worked quite well but they are no match compared to piezo gyros,
which have no motor but use an electronic sensor.
Piezo
Gyros
Modern
piezo gyros have never been so good and are no longer an expensive alternative
but an essential part of the radio system. Modern peizo gyros can cost
anything from £40 to £300. So how much should you spend and
which one should you buy?
Well
at the lower end of the scale the gyro will be single rate adjusted on
the gyro itself and will not have pilot authority, while at the top of
the range it will probably be dual rate in both normal and heading lock
mode (sometimes called heading hold or AVCS), selectable from the transmitter,
and it will also have full pilot authority.
Modern
piezo gyros have a very fast response, and will need a servo, which can
keep up with the gyro output. Servo speed is measured by the number of
seconds it takes for the servo to turn 60 degrees so a digital servo with
a speed of 0.12s/60 to 0.08s/60 is the ideal but you will have to pay
around £60 to £125 for it.
Gyro
Gain
The
best way to adjust gyro gain is to turn it up until the tail wags in forward
flight then turn it down a little. You should be able to get near 100%
gain, if you cant then try changing the length of the rudder servo arm,
there is no point spending serious money on a good gyro and then only
using 50% gain.
Pilot
Authority
On
a standard gyro when you input a rudder command the gyro will try to correct
the tail back to the centre, the higher the gain on the gyro, the less
tail authority you will have.
With pilot authority the gyro gain decreases as you input commands so
you can have 100% gyro gain and still have full tail authority.
Heading
Lock
With
the gyro in normal mode the tail will weathercock to some extent so when
flying circuits or hovering in to wind the tail will tend to follow the
line of the model. In heading lock mode the tail stays wherever you put
it, so it is quite easy to fly the model sideways or backwards at speed
without losing the tail position. The only downside to heading lock mode
is that you have to steer the tail all the time as it will not naturally
follow the model, and if you enter a manoeuvre, say a loop, with the tail
offline it will stay offline throughout the manoeuvre. If you are not
sure which mode the gyro is in, with the radio on and without the engine
going, move the rudder control fully to one side, if heading lock is selected
the servo will stay at one end until you move the stick back to the other
side.
Mixing
Makes
I have used Futaba, JR, and CSM gyros on JR radio systems with no problems
at all but I would advise the use of a matching rudder servo in the case
of JR or Futaba, as they would have been designed to work with their own
servo.
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