I will first give you some background about me, this is a precursor to what I am about to say after. Please, get yourself a drink, this will be a bit long…
I started my life journey (Part-2) as a computer software programmer in 1974. Yes, a long time before at least some of you were not yet even on the drawing board… I continue doing it until today in retirement, for Not-For-Profit organizations. Before I retired, I ran a small software business with some 20 employees.
We had a rule in this company (not original mine, Microsoft and all the large software companies are practicing the same concept). A software programmer who designs a software application, IS NOT the right person to do for that software after he / she completed it:
1) The final testing and quality control
2) Nor is that person fit to write the instructions / user manual for it
The reasons for the above are simple: the person who wrote the software, is a skilled person in his field, he / she knows a lot about the topic, he / she is unable to get down to Layman level to write a user manual for the new commers. To that person, too many things seem “Obvious”, too many things seem a waste of time to point out, sure everybody knows that. We all have some experiences in life of say, an excellent Math teacher, a genius in his field, but a lousy teacher…
Well friends, there are two types of “New-commers” here:
1) Those new to Spirit
2) Those new to the RC Helicopter world, therefore also new to Spirit - I am one of them!
Well, as our software business started growing, I became more and more involved in administrative activities, less in actual software development (I got back into it in 2007 when I retired). We employed a dedicated person to do the Quality control and another one (a woman in this case, a professional technical writer) to write the user manuals.
I become involved in that part when the back-log became too long to ignore. You can notice my tendency to be an explicit writer here (maybe too verbose…), but you can also understand that I am very suitable to ask all the “Stupid” questions, that no doubt at least some of you thought that when reading some of my queries…
And last, before I get to the “Spirit”. Many instruction manuals are trying to look short and brief, the “Writers” don’t usually like writing them anyway, they also know how much most people dislike reading manuals. Hence, the writers are condensing the text into one long block, make it harder to read and absorb the various aspects of the topic.
More specifically to my case… All my findings are related to the Spirit setup wizard. Before going into details, I will make the following comments:
1) It seems this product is a fantastic and superior product, well done Thomas and team.
2) One of the main attractions of it for me was the idea of being able to configure it through a software program.
3) Due to the product being so versatile, there is no choice for the user manual to jump between topics, depending on the individual case… Tx, Rx, Helicopter model etc…
4) While waiting to the item to reach me – during this COVID-19 challenging times, I read the manual back to front twice. But, without the Spirit in front of me, this “Dry-run” didn’t reveal any of the problems I faced along the way.
Now to my observations:
The wizard asks in Step-2 to select the position, swashplate configuration and then, is trying to be helpful by letting me select the model type I have. I selected CCPM- 120° Reversed – this is the Trex-600 that I have. Then, the next step it offers a selection of the Helicopter model I have, when Selecting the Trex-600, it switched my Swashplate configuration with CH-2 / Elevator pointing downwards – the wrong direction in my case. This wasted TWO days of my time, I didn’t notice it did that switch to the wrong swashplate. If you look at my support topics, I started by saying that my Tx strangely behaves as if I am using Mode-2, when the problem was a reversed swashplate.
Next, the video clips on the Support section are outdated, they do not present the current software version, nor the order of steps in the setup. Especially for new commers like me, it is very likely that I get the latest product and the latest software version. Watching those video clips is just another source of confusion (and wasted time), and none of them is very clear. In my opinion.
Some people trying to help me along the way made some statements which were completely incorrect. The Trex-600 Electric went through at least 5 different versions, so – what was the case for one version is not necessarily correct for all.
For example, the length of the main shaft… The genuine Align Trex-600 DFC shaft according to the manual states 163.3mm length. I got a genuine Align Trex-600 DFC pair of shafts, the length of those is 172 mm, where is that coming from? The Gartt complete head + shaft + swash plate came with a shaft of 162mm long… I tried it, didn’t work. In fact – the travel distance become impossible to move up without hitting the head itself.
One other MAJOR topic – the terminology. There are in this game 4 Parts to be adjusted:
1) 90° servo arms, once done, not to be touched – right?
2) The initial length of the TWO pushrods from Ail / Pit servos to the swashplate
3) The TWO blade pitch control rods – part of the DFC head
4) The Sliders in the software.
For all the time (for a whole month), until 2 days ago, I was under the wrong impression that all the setup in Step-7 must be done in the SOFTWARE only… The only explanation for this is from the fact that the user setup instructions are NOT clear.
I have probably stumbled along the way into more traps, but that should do it to describe my frustration and wasted time. Thomas, if you want – I can re-write the Wizard section for the future customers, just say so.
My savior – yufasa – has come to my rescue, gave me a clear script of Step-7 onwards. Following this, I completed the following:
1) 90° of the 3 servo arms.
2) Leveled the swashplate by adjusting the TWO pushrods. The Elevator control arm served as a reference point, since I can’t adjust it.
3) There was hardly any need to correct with the software sliders
4) Used the blade pitch control of both blades to get to ZERO at mid stick. Needed jus a bit of adjustment on the slider
5) Once done, I moved to Step-8… Surprise, I was now able to adjust to the elusive 6°
From here to the finish line, it was simple….
I am attaching here a document with some examples of the Detailed instructions I received along the way. Thank you to HeliMLM for a good set of steps to setup the Coaxial / rescue modes. This is what I call a detailed set of steps.
Thank you all again. I am almost ready to try to hover, but not before I go and undo all the links to add some thread lock…
Cheers
Alex
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