MK Heliclub's night flying pioneers guide to setting up your heli for night flight

During the winter months when it gets dark early and everybody is going home your flying could just be starting. This is a beginner’s guide to night flying; a step by step on how we did it. All information is based on a TT Raptor 50, MS 600 night blades, rope lights and drivers supplied by www.glowire.com

Which lights to use? Glow sticks or light rope?
I did use glow sticks first of all but I've found the rope lights to be much better. Glow sticks are the cheaper option but are best suited to the more experienced pilot who has a lot of confidence and enjoys the challenge. For the beginner, my suggestion is to use rope lights if they are within your budget. You'll feel more confident, especially when first starting.

Mounting the lights
My first suggestion here is that before you start work on the canopy remove the window. This will make it easier to pull cable ties through at the nose end of your canopy. Use a washable marker pen or something similar and mark out where you want your rope light to go. Follow round with a length of string; this will give you a measurement for your rope light. I used a 2mm drill bit and made holes either side of the line and used small cable ties to secure the rope light. You can buy rope light and make up your own lengths or you can buy rope light ready made. I opted for the ready made rope lights that come in 4 ft, 6 ft, 8 ft and 10ft lengths.
You will need to work out where you start and finish your rope lights. For example the rope light on the canopy window shows the cable going through the nose of the canopy and I have used a small piece of fuel tube to stop the cable from chaffing. See below
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As you can see, I have added a rope light to the canopy window, this completed the shape of the canopy from side on and added a feeling of width when nose in. We also found it improved orientation on turns. See below
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You will also need rope light along the boom and around the edge of the tail fins. The pictures below show how the rope light is fitted to the fins to get maximum visibility from all angles
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Finally you'll need light on the undercarriage, after all you're hoping to land it. To prevent damage to the rope light I drilled holes in the skids so that the rope light could be secured off the ground. On the point of damage, make sure you do not kink the rope light or squash it by over tightening of the cable ties, as this could cause it to fail.

All together I used 26ft of rope light; 8ft of green on the canopy, 4ft of yellow on the canopy window, 6ft of green on the boom and fins and 8ft blue on the undercarriage and boom supports.

Rope light drivers
For 26ft of rope light I used 2 x rope light drivers and 2 x PP3 NiCads, 9V 120mAh. Each driver is recommended to run a max of 14ft of rope light. It's a good idea to run 2 drivers anyway, if one fails you still have lights to make a safe landing! I have fitted both my drivers away from my receiver as there have been reported cases of interference between the two. I have used a piece of carbon plate to fix one driver to one side of the heli frame^* (left side) and have used cable ties to fit the other driver inside the canopy with the on and off switch near to the ventilation hole (right side). See below
Raptor 50V1 mounting (click for larger image)			Raptor 50V2 mounting (click for larger image)		(click for larger image)
^* Mounting positions on the frame are different between the Raptor 50V1 & the Raptor 50V2 because of the differing frame design
Put it all together, wire it up and switch on and you'll get results like below
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All together 26ft of rope light, 2 x drivers and 2 x PP3 NiCad’s will add approx 8oz of weight to your heli. With a 16 hour charge I get about 4 flights from my 2 x 120 mAh NiCads. But watch out when the rope lights start to dim they go quickly!!!

Night Blades
I use MS Night Flying blades. They have integral lights, NiCads and switches. Along with the MS Blades, I purchased a MS Blade charger. This connects to the root end of the blade and plugs into a 12v supply. The red light on the charger stays on all the time when everything is connected. It does not tell you when the blades are charged .The recommended time to charge the blades is 12 hours.
I left blades on charge overnight and then switched them on to see how long they would last before going flat, which was approximately 6 hours. The purpose of this was to see if they got to a certain point and just went out or if they got dimmer with time. The latter applies.
Be careful not to lose your pins that switch your blades on. I keep mine in an old servo box and always have a torch handy as they are very easy to drop and lose in the grass. You do get a set of pins with your MS 600 night blades.
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The Final Results
After all that work I've now got a night flying heli as seen below. I have had a few flights now and everything has stayed in place with no problems.
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Where to buy the bits
There is a list of modeling suppliers on this website. From the main menu click (links) and then (shopping links) for model shops. Most model shops stock night blades but other night flight equipment is limited, so here are a few other websites you could try:

www.glowire.com		Recommended very helpful Email Janet with any questions.
www.surelight.com		Different ideas
www.theglowcompany.co.uk		The cheaper option
www.helifreak.com		Information
www.nightflying.co.uk		Recommended. UK dealer for Glowire. Tel: 02088701555 Ask for Andrew.

TOP TIPS
Use washable marker pen to mark out your canopy Use a length of string and follow round your mark as a measurement for your rope light. When choosing your rope lights go for the brightest colours. Do not kink or squash your rope lights as this could cause them to fail. Consider a remote landing light that can be assigned to a spare switch. Don’t fit your drivers near your receiver you could have interference Fit your night equipment securely especially near any moving parts Hover – give your eyes time to adjust The darker, the better for maximum effect Don’t look into torch light before or during flight Have someone on standby with a torch to help you with landing or loss of orientation Start with basic manouvers When landing keep a constant slow decent Set the timer on your transmitter so you don’t run out of fuel Always have someone with you to help Take your time
A final thought
In an ideal world a spare heli for night flying would be great, but not always possible. An idea would be to buy a spare canopy, second hand if possible. This would allow rope lights to be fitted securely and you would have a lot less to do and more time to enjoy your night flying experience.
Hope this helps in some way and enjoy your night flying Regards BAZ helibaz.rap@ntlworld.com Photos by Phil Emerton