I found that some of the gears - if wobly - did not "appear" to have a big effect. IE it just looked bad..

 

Right..... I was more concerned with it being noisy than anything else. Aside from flying well, I want the thing to look good and sound good too. Noises tend to indicate something is not right in my experience.
Where appearances go, I'm still working g on that as well. Tonight I routed the servo wiring. What I could not hide inside the frame, I sheathed in heat shrink tubing (not heated) as well as the ones inside the frame where they run past the mainshaft. I have yet to shorten them.

 

Well..... This may work out well. I sent an Email to EHirobo about the incorrect model being "SE" instead of "AE", and that the pinions were missing. I also said that I was willing to overlook the incorrect model issue if they would send me the pinions by "express shipping" as I need them to complete the model.
They emailed back just now that they are processing the order. I'm still going pinion hunting at the LHS tomorrow, just in case it takes 20 days for the ordered ones to get here.

 

It's a good idea to protect your wires with some double sided velcro like the image (buy align strips), it stops the cable tie wearing through the wires under vibration (keeps @Crash Heligod at bay)
See image - no need to worry about the cable sheath, that's for aesthetics. And hot glue the servo pugs into the FBL as well
Simon

 

Very nice! I can`t wait to see some flight videos. Here is another crash immunity, just for good measure.

 

Ah! The Heligods smiled upon me today!
I went to the LHS to find pinions, and there were none out on the part racks. But the owner just happened to have a set of 11 and 13 tooth pinions in a little stash box behind the counter.

 

I find the LHS lack of Align 450 parts........ Disturbing.
They have dozens of TT gears though. No good to me.
They have Blade parts falling out of their..........ears.
If I was into Traxxas ground vehicles, I'd never have to order parts.

 

EHirobo is sending me the 11/12t pinions from their USA warehouse. I already have 11/12 pinions, so all said and done I'll have a full range of 11/12/13t pinions to play with. I'm thinking of starting off with the 11t so the heli shouldn't be too squirrelly as I get acquainted with it. Is my logic sound here? (Keep your comments to yourself, @Crash Heligod)

 

You understand gearing, you have the bits, now go play and enjoy. Be aware that align (and I'm guessing clones) don't like a low headspeed, indications of this are nodding - so don't go to low
Simon

 

Initial calculations put headspeed at 2850rpm at full throttle (idle up) using 11t on 150t main gear with 3500 Kv motor and 11.1v pack at 38850rpm motor rpm. Of course that will be less under load I assume.
I toyed with headspeed on the 450s in the sim. I didn't like it below about 2500.

 

A high head speed will give you more responsiveness but too low will cause the heli to feel like a sponge - ie your in a difficult position but you cannot recover because your heli cannot respond quick enough. Its really the Goldilocks syndrome here. Not to low, not too high - you must use what is right. That way you end up with just the right amount of responsiveness. This again is subjective based on your flying ability. If you can fly a nano, you will be fine using the standard pinion. Infact you will be amazed how stable and in control it feels. You only have to overcome the mental aspect of it. And this can only be overcome by experience and flight sim practice.

 

Standard...... as in the 13t? That one puts headspeed at about 3360 by the math.
Hmmm.... (thinking)....... You might be right. That fast twitchy Nano response has helped me avoid many collisions with walls.... and I have been running about 3500 on the sim. I'll start with the 11t just to see how it goes. It will only take about 5 minutes to change to a 13t pinion.

 

Ugh! That main gear..... out of concentric just enough to be annoying when setting the pinion to the maingear.
Anyway, motor set, ESC installed finally. Now to tame those servo leads.

 

I spooled up the rotor to full throttle and gently lathed the high spot on the main gear with a box cutter blade, then used a small wedge file to correct the pitch depth of the teeth. It's nice and even all the way around now.

 

??? Uh..... Thanks. .......

 

Your correct @Beaver 3360 rpm wont be a dynamic rpm. It will be around 3100 - which i think will be ok.... You may find the 11 tooth a bit under responsive - but on the upside it might give you more confidence. The thing is, a simple pinion change can make a world of difference

 

Ground test, no main blades:
Everything seems to work as expected. I don't like the vibration in the tail rotor. I'll be looking into that next. Blades could be out of balance, I'll spool it up again shortly without tail blades and see if anything changes. It's close to being ready.

 

So that tail problem may have been that the tail blades were binding on the grip screws. Installation of the last few items such as boom supports and battery, all bearings properly lubed, the bird is now complete.
One final run of the Kbar to finalize the setup by setting the gains, increasing the swash agility a bit closer to what I was accustomed to with the Nano CPx, and duplicate copying all the memory banks the same.... for now.
Weather permitting, maiden flight will be tomorrow.
Weather not permitting, it might only be a few minutes of hovering in the shop. Either way, the bird will fly tomorrow.
Merry Christmas, Seasons Greetings, Happy Heli-days to you all.

 

Good thing I decided to do maiden flight in shop. 3:45 minutes in, the one-way bearing started slipping in the hub. ........... Red Loctite setting up right now, will try again shortly.