Heli question?

[SMaxxin]

Looking into buying a Heli but I have a question. What is better, direct drive, gear drive or belt drive for the tail rotor? Should I look into one that doesn't have a tail rotor? I'm thinking about getting a GWS Mini DragonFly II, mainly because I can just order parts from Tower. What do you guys think. Oh by the way the only thing I have flown is an rc truck...I do it very well too LOL

 

[rocknbil]

Sorry I've got absolutely nothing to offer on tail rotor helis but had to post this, it loaded like this when I came into your thread. lol . . . so you want a serious heli or have you looked at the blade CX??

 

[Candyman]

Bill is onto something basic. What kind of heli do you want, and where do you plan on flying? If you want a hover machine that you can fly indoors pretty simply, the Blade CX will fit that bill. It's a coaxial machine so there's no tail rotor. That makes it very stable to hover. You can do some slow forward flight from what I understand, but nothing real tricky.
If you're looking for something more sophisticated, but still flying in confined spaces, consider the Blade CP or the Venom Night Ranger 3D. These are dual motor rigs so the tail is direct drive. That works fairly well. Good enough on a basic copter like they are.
From what I have read, belt drive is the way to go on the bigger machines. I have read threads on other boards that don't think to highly of the cheaper shaft drives out there.
I guess it all depends on how serious you are and how much you want to spend.

 

[SMaxxin]

I just want it to mess around with, inside/outside. I was never interested in flying until I saw a mini Heli's, they look awesome. Thanks for sharing, I'll take a look at the Blade and the Night ranger.

 

[Rotorxhead7]

the venom Nightranger 3D chopper is really hard to fly!!! Not for a first time pilot!!! my 2 cents

 

[jmarzilli]

I have a Blade CP and it is hard to fly. I've flown the Blade CX and it is much easier. They are both fun and addicting.

 

[Nitrobuzzard]

I too have flown both the Blade CP and the CX.........CX hands down is extremely easy...........if you want one with a tail rotor.........go with a belt drive, may cost a little more now but will be worth it in the long run. Belt drives are alot quieter and require alot less maintenance. Depending on how much you looking to spend you can get the CX for like $190 RTF or go with a MX400, T-Rex or Shogun all RTF for around $600, depending on what you may have already or need to get.......The shogun I've flown as well......handles as smooth and precise as the .30 nitro heli I've flown............I want the MX400 now......hehe

Good luck with whatever you choose and if you haven't already got one, get a simulator.........you'll save yourself alot on repair costs if you've never flown anything other than your truck.......LOL


Nitro

 

[SMaxxin]

Thanks for all of the input, I have got some reading/thinking to do. I know I'm not spending $600.00 for one..not yet anyway. I have looked at a few in the $250 range that seem to have more than I can handle. As for a sim....Whats the fun in that, besides working on it is 75% of what I like LOL.

 

[Nitrobuzzard]

Well one of the biggest decision factors, in anything RC, is what does your LHS carry or keep parts in stock for.

As far as the sim, trust me, I like wrenching on things but 2 minutes of flight and then 20 minutes of repair gets old quick..........been there and done that......LOL (with the Blade CP)

Good luck bud...........


Nitro

 

[SMaxxin]

Well one of the biggest decision factors, in anything RC, is what does your LHS carry or keep parts in stock for.

This is a problem for me. The closest HS is about an hour away and they don't do Heli's. So anything I break will be ordered on line. I understand what your saying about the sim and I have heard /read it from many others but I won't sit at the pc long enough to learn squat so I'll just break a lot of stuff. Besides from Tuesday-Friday 8:00 am to 3:00 pm I sit home with nothing to do....It shouldn't take to long to learn.


Thanks for the info

 

[rocknbil]

...You can do some slow forward flight from what I understand, but nothing real tricky.....

Oh contraire! This thing pretty well hauls ass in forward flight, once you learn to stop crashing. Also I just picked up one of those cheapie spycams, it works GREAT and will be posting a vid when my sound cap card gets in. I need to find a different powering solution though, the 9V battery is far too heavy for it, going to experiment with running it off the flight pack this weekend.

Candyman is correct about the limitations though, the fixed blades of the CX don't allow inverted flight and don't teach you how to fly a heli with a tail rotor. But you can still do pattern flying precision landing, and get the feel for the sticks so, and it is a HELL of a lot of fun. You can also do all sorts of mods to it, it's pretty much an open book. I dont know if I'll ever step up to the cost of a new rotor heli, seems like this one's all the fun I need.

I just want it to mess around with, inside/outside.

Look a little closer at the blade CX. If you get one, you are going to need at LEAST two packs each of upper/lower blades, at least one spare battery pack, and a spare center shaft/top rotor head, and are wise to pre-order the aluminum center shaft (coming in mid-March, horizon.) The one weak point is that top rotor, it wil break off on a hard landing. See this thread for details and mods to keep it airborne.

The BCX is so light it's really recommended for indoor flight, but I've been playing outside in light breezes. BREEZES, not winds. A stiff wind will blow it right over, but breezy days are kinda fun, you learn to tack against the wind, land in the wind . . . when I say "breezes" I'm talking "I see the wind chimes moving but they're not ringing."

 

[truthseeker]

i also have the cx. i think you can learn a lot about the basic flight characteristics of a heli by flying it. i spent a lot of time on the simulator before i flew my cp and it didn't really help as much as actually flying the cx. i've seen kind of a trend down at the LHS where people are starting to learn basic flight on the cx and then they come back and buy the cp when they get a better feel for it. one thing that will help you get a better feel for hovering a "real" heli is hovering the cx just a few inches off the ground. it gets squirelly just like a conventional heli will do when you try to hover the first time. i think you might want to consider doing sort of a 2 step process. get a cx or something easy like that, then sell it and get a more advanced heli. it'll probably ease the hit you take on parts in the long run and the cx shouldn't be hard to sell at all when you get finished with it.