Help with gains

[willieanderson911]

2 questions
1. what is heading in as3x gains exactly
and is anyone familiar with what my gains should be in the 80mm A10 from free wing?

[jasmith41]

2 questions
1. what is heading in as3x gains exactly
and is anyone familiar with what my gains should be in the 80mm A10 from free wing?

i'm interested to what people have to say. i think heading (it explains it in the manual for the rx, but hard for newbies to understand) has to do with what it does if the signal is lost. as far as gains go, i was defaulting them to 30 in a lot of the planes but found most still oscillate at that level, but it was hard for me to tell if it was gyro doing it or my shaking hands, or both, but i've since turned them way down. you may want to try them at 20 and go from there. i have the 80mm F5 and noticed it doing a little porpoising the last time i flew it so i turned that one down, but haven't flown it yet.

[xviper]

This my take on it. I use a lot of these SAFE select / AS3X RXs, some of which are programmed from scratch.
Unless you are flying 3D planes, you only need RATE gain. Heading gain will hold the plane's direction of travel when you let go of the sticks. This is helpful when you are for example, doing hovering maneuvers or knife edge maneuvers, particularly with a 3D plane. This is not to say you can't use heading gain (or heading hold) for non-3D planes but more bad things can happen if the gains and priorities are just a bit "off" and not applicable to that particular plane or type of flying.
I don't fly 3D, so all my gyros have the heading gain set to ZERO. A badly set up heading gain for a fast plane can result in the plane heading for earth in an uncontrollable dive resulting in a dirt nap.
As for what gains/priorities to use on these AS3X RXs, it depends on the speed capabilities of the plane. If the gain is too high, as the plane reaches it's higher speeds, the control surfaces begin to twitch or oscillate. The plane can shake itself to death. AIL is the most susceptible to increasing gain, next is ELE and the least affected by increasing gain is RUD.
For a Freewing A-10, you might start with a low set of gains on one flight mode and another higher set of gains on another flight mode. For the 3rd flight mode, you can either leave it at ZERO gain or use that mode for SAFE where you have the "recovery mode" and bank and pitch limiter. Priorities can be set at 150 to 160 across the board. Priorities dictates the amount of stick movement away from center where the gyro begins to have less affect. Gyros such as HobbyEagle and the like, do not have the option of priorities that can be dialed in. They are usually pre-set and that's it. Suggestions for the A-10 gains: AIL - 30; ELE - 35; RUD - 40 for the low end. Try AIL - 40; ELE - 45, RUD - 50 for a higher position. Test these settings on a high throttle fly by about 2 mistakes high and watch for AIL oscillation. Once oscillation begins, flip to a lower gain position or slow down. Continue to experiment with increasing the gains little by little till you see the oscillation start. Then back off the gains a bit and you should be done. Usually landings can handle higher gain because the plane is much slower. Higher gain for landing can help with crosswind stabilization.
SAFE settings don't use gain extensively and the RX generally has pre-sets for gains and bank angle even on a new, blank RX that offers SAFE. You can change the bank angle and pitch angle limits (SAFE doesn't use RUD limiting) if you like but you might not want to go beyond 50 degrees. Because SAFE limits bank angles, the plane can take a very large area to make a turn. Learn to back off the throttle a bit when flying in SAFE. It's more for panic recovery but some beginners feel more secure flying in SAFE all the time.
PS. Slow, trainer type planes can have rate gain set as high as 80 without any problems.

[willieanderson911]

xviper you are the man…this site has been most helpful

[kallend]

2 questions
1. what is heading in as3x gains exactly
and is anyone familiar with what my gains should be in the 80mm A10 from free wing?

AS3X "regular" gains relate to the tendency to damp out unwanted motions (such as being hit by a gust of wind) but do not restore the plane to its previous attitude. Heading gains additionally give the tendency to restore to its previous attitude before the unwanted motion. Also useful in 3D flying to hold a specified attitude in, say, a hover.

As far as gains for your A-10 are concerned, you are more likely to get help with that in the A-10 thread.

[willieanderson911]

So not using heading at all is wise right…just set my as3x gains low to start with correct?

[xviper]

So not using heading at all is wise right…just set my as3x gains low to start with correct?

"Wise", yes, but if you plan to do a lot of knife edge or high alpha flying with your A-10, you can give heading gain a try but start very, very low gain, say no more than 15. Make sure you have it on a switch so you can take it off heading hold if something weird happens. Try it up high. For non-3D and non-acrobatic flying, heading gain is a "can of worms".