Last month I blogged about my new charging case, and how excited I was to build it and put it through its paces. The charger is working 100% flawlessly, and I could not be happier. But it was missing something. I was wasting the potential of this awesome piece of equipment, by charging only one battery at a time per channel.

Therefore, I decided to get with the program and start parallel charging. I purchased a couple of EC5 parallel board kits from Progressive RC, and got busy installing  them when they arrived on of all days.....Halloween.

I assembled the boards, and set them in place to make sure everything was going to work the way I planned before I mounted them in. Thankfully I did that, because the case lid would not close completely because the EC5 connectors were too high with the boards assembled.

No problem! I just disassembled them, and put the EC5 boards beside the balance boards and now the lid closes, and all the connectors are easy to get to.

In addition to the boards, I purchased four 12" balance lead extensions from Progressive, and build four 12" charge lead adapters to go from the EC5s on the boards to the XT-150s on my batteries. The last thing I did, was to add an on/off switch....which I should have done in the beginning. Hind sight is always 20/20, I guess.

Building this case has been a lot of fun for me, and has definitely been a rewarding experience. Who knows what I might decide to add to it in the future....maybe a tablet?

For four years, I have been using a Dynamite Ultra Duo battery charger to keep my machines flying. The Dynamite charger has been a wonderful piece of equipment, but it recently gave up and needed to be replaced.

Instead of buying another Ultra Duo, I decided to get with the program, and build a real charging case. The project started with a Plano brand handgun case from Walmart, which is very similar to the more expensive pelican cases. They are high quality cases and I use them for everything...battery cases, transmitter cases, and charger cases and more.

Next came the power supply and charger. My husband noticed I was looking at them online, and took it upon himself to order a charger and power supply for me for my birthday....how cool was that?

The charger is a Revolectrix Dual powerLab PL8, purchased from Progressive RC. The power supply is a Juice Box (made by Strick Model Products) 1800 watt, 75A, 24volt power supply.

I received the charger and power supply in a few days, and immediately got to work on the case. For the deck lid, I used 1/4" sanded birch plywood. I carefully cut the deck lid out to the shape of the case, test fitting and trimming until I had a perfect fit.

Next, I measured the charger and fans so I could start laying out the holes I would need to cut to mount everything in the deck. Once all the holes were cut, I covered the plywood deck with carbon fiber vinyl wrap which we purchased on Amazon.

Now came the installation and wiring of all of the equipment in the case. That was actually the easy part. Since the charger is flush mounted in the deck, I had to install banana jacks in the deck to be able to plug in my charge leads. I used 60mm 24v fans, which work amazingly well at keeping the air moving through the case,.

The power supply was very easy to secure. I just made a couple of aluminum brackets, padded with loop side self stick velcro to clamp it to the bottom of the case.

I think it turned out fairly well for my first attempt at building a charging case, but I`m sure I will be making a few changes as I discover better ways to do things. So far, it seems to be working great, and I can`t wait to use it at the next helicopter event.

Here is a list of all the components I used:

Case: Plano Gun Guard

1/4" birch plywood

Carbon fiber vinyl wrap

FMA Dual PowerLab PL8X2

Juice Box 1800W, 75A, 24V power supply

Two 60mm 24V cooling fans

Two sets of banana jacks

Two standard balance boards 2s-6s

Today, (July 4th 2016) I got to the field at about 07:30 and immediately started flying my NX7. By 09:30, I had already put six flights on it with the YS96 SRX Tareq engine and YS Power Pipe.

I am still running the engine very rich, and even though it is not completely tuned yet, it is still making a ton of power. I spent from 07:30 til about 15:00,  flying it back to back. Pausing only long enough between flights to let the engine cool down. I lost count of the number of flights I got in today, but I did burn almost two gallons of 30% Rotor Rage....the second gallon has maybe one flight worth of fuel in it.

I don`t have a flight timer set in my transmitter, but I`m guessing the flights are somewhere around 5.5-6 minutes on a blubbery rich engine. I hope the flight times will increase once the engine is tuned for power, but if not, I won`t complain. I do plan to run it a tad on the rich side anyway, since YS engines don`t mind running rich.

I have heard some say that the YS96 is a hard engine to tune, but I really have to respectfully disagree. I`m finding that it is quite easy to get and keep a tune on it. It also starts up very quickly and easily as well, using 30% nitro and an Enya #3 glow plug.

I really like this engine and pipe combination, and I think I will like it even more when I get it tuned. Once I get the tune dialed in, I will post my needle settings in a new blog post. Gaui NX7+YS96SRX Tareq engine+ YS Power Pipe= a winning combination.

I finally got the YS Power Pipe to complete the engine change in my Gaui NX7 yesterday. I got around to installing them and the helicopter up today, and I`m really happy with how the pipe looks on the helicopter.

I have to say that the finish on the pipe is a lot nicer than the finish on the Hotri pipes I have been using, and I hope it works as good as it looks. One of the nicest features of the YS Power Pipe, is the fact that it has a solid mount instead of a header. Also, the mounting screws go through the pipe mount and screw into the engine`s exhaust port. Which makes mounting the pipe a whole lot easier.

I did not get a chance to run the engine today, due to rain. But I will try and get to the field after work tomorrow to set/fine the throttle end points, and possibly make a few flights with it. Weather permitting, of course.

I will post more about the pipe and motor as I get it dialed in over the course of the next couple of weeks.

After seeing the new YS96 SRX Tareq engine in action at the Orlando Helicopter Blowout in December 2015, I had to have one. I originally ordered one from RC Japan, along with a YS 96 Power Pipe. But they have been delayed for a few weeks, due to a slight manufacturing issue. I was checking out the for sale listings on a major helicopter forum a few days ago, and found one with a handful of flights for a great price. I bought it, and I just received it yesterday ( Monday June 13, 2016). I am now waiting for a second YS96 Power Pipe to get here from HeliDirect. As soon as that gets here, I can get the engine installed and proceed with the break in process.

The YS96 is an amazing piece of engineering, and displays the quality that YS is famous for. One thing that I found interesting, is the fuel regulator is mounted on the engine housing below the carburetor instead of on it like the 60SR.

Another thing that I thought was strange, but at the same time kind of neat, is the way the pipe mounts to the engine. Instead of the pipe mounting holes going clean through the engine housing, they are threaded. Which means the screws which hold the pipe on, will go in through the flange on the pipe and screw into the engine housing.

I do kind of wish that the back plate was not steel lined though, because I like to use back plate sensors for my governors. I guess I will be using a magnetic sensor on the NX7 now, which is ok.

I should get the Power Pipe by Friday, and maybe....just maybe I can get them installed and start breaking the engine in this weekend. I can hardly wait to get it going and broken in, so I can feel the power of this awesome new engine from YS.

*One other point that should be addressed, is an error in the manual. The manual says for break in, to set the Hover needle to  1.75~2.0 turns open and the high needle at 1.50~2.0 open. These settings will be way too lean for break in, and it was suggested to me, to set both needles to 2.5 turns out for the break in flights.*