[urrl]

There is a process of setting the limits of the rudder blades, ailerons, elevator and some other stuff which may take about a half hour. The heli itself is pretty much all assembled though. All screws must be checked; just this morning my V450 with the A109 fuse was acting twitchy when doing a right turn; the right servo was coming lose so I tightened it. Don't depend on the factory and especially don't over tighten; bolts may break off after being overtightened at the factory. Walkera quality control is not the best IMO but once the kinks are ironed out the V450 can be pretty dependable.

[urrl]

Here I removed the A109 body and replaced it with a blue Bell 222 Airwolf body.

You Tube

You Tube

Hopefully I will get a full maiden flight with it this morning.

[xviper]

Does the airwolf fuse come with all the necessary hardware for fully functional retracts?

[urrl]

It does not come with the digital servo but it should come with everything else.
The one I ordered came with a lighting kit.

It is very important the servo is digital otherwise there will be overheating issues. To be safe I would recommend a servo from here:
http://www.wowhobbies.com/hm-v450d01...3servos-3.aspx
I am using a cheaper walkera stock V450D01 plastic gear servo which seems to work fine.

The instructions you download from Heliartist can be confusing but this video helps a lot.

You Tube

You Tube

If you do intend to put one of these V450D01's into a full fuselage you should be aware that you will have to make a few relatively easy alterations to the gyro and rear servo positions. The mechanics will not go back into the fuselage far enough if you do not do this alteration. I reversed the two servo brackets to tuck the servo under the boom rod, then moved the gyro.

Also some fuselage styles other than A109 or Airwolf/Bell 222 may require more drastic alterations.

To get that receiver/gyro under there you may have to dremel out an obstructing plastic or carbon fiber protrusion piece. Also you should have some double sided sticky tape to secure the gyro once it is moved.

Another small problem I came across was that the gear retract servo wire was not long enough to reach the receiver so you will need either an extension wire
http://www.scaleflying.com/Servo-Extensions_c_81.html
or the gadget that I have that slows the landing gear deployment; it has extension wires already. I will try to find a link if you really want to do this.

[urrl]

Also you should be aware I had to dremel out certain areas of the body to insure there would be no obstructions to the linkage rods, especially the main rotor head rods. It's up to you to decide how much. if any, for the tail piece but I strongly recommend you widen out the main rotor areas; I had a crash caused by a jammed linkage rod once.

[urrl]

One other thing; this morning the blue Airwolf overheated a few times in flight and I barely escaped a crash as it slid onto the ground the third time after losing a portion of control, but no damage whatsoever. I figured it must be one of two things so first I disconnected the landing gear retract servo. That was the third time it still began to lose control and I slid it to the ground like someone sliding into home base. I then took it home and connected the lighting system into the gear input instead of the Battery input on the receiver. I went thru two flights after that without incident so that was my problem I think. You see I have a landing gear retract speed reducer which plugs into the gear input on the receiver but has two output leads; one I connected to the landing gear servo and the other now connects to the lighting system. Hopefully I will have no further problems.

[xviper]

Thanks you very much for the detailed information. This thread will come in very handy should I decide to do this.
I've always wanted an Airwolf. I had a 200 size one but the mechanics wasn't strong enough to lift the weight. I shelved that idea for a while. At the moment, I'm gathering information to determine if I'm willing to go to the expense and effort to do this right now. The Walkera 450 looks very promising to me but as I'm currently working on a couple of other scale helis (5-blade Cop X into a Hughes 500 and a swinging 4-blade Blade 400 into an EC-135), this is not of high priority. It may be a future project. Not sure if I want to drop that kind of money for another heli until I find the time to do anything about it. Your thread got my juices flowing for an Airwolf again.

[urrl]

Good to hear; I like the Airwolf aerodynamics; the mechanics should perhaps be what you have on hand. Why spend more than you have to? I like the Bell 222 fuse so much I already have two. Hope you eventually get one.