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Motor selection
Go to Tower Hobbies and get the Kyosho Magnetic Mayhem(Reverse) for USD18.99
with 13T pinion on 8 cells. Cheap economical and you can get around
8-10minutes.
I do have a brushless (Kontronik) together with a matching Kontronik controller. It is a 3SLE 40-6-12. I made some measurements of current and voltage with a DSO. The values can be found here: http://www.logictools.de/modell/heli/bec/index.html Maybe babelfish will help you with German. :-) Nick Mueller
When properly powered and set up, it is one of the top electric helis. However, it is fragile and does require a number of upgrades to get to great flying status. If youve never flown helis before, I dont recomend the ECO 8 because it is so fragile and parts arent cheap. With help and enough time you could learn on the ECO 8, but it can become more costly than many .30 sized glow helis! If you go for the ECO 8, there's some things you need to know. Firstly you MUST buy the upgrade auto hub. Its $45 and has a one-way bearing to keep from stripping the main gear when you throttle up and down quickly....it also allows for autos. Without it, the first time you jerk the throttle, youll strip the main gear and crash the heli. For motors, you have a few options. The cheapest and one of the best options is the Kyosho Magnetic Mayhem RC car motor (Buy the one in reverse rotation since it runs backward in the heli). The motor is about $25, and youre best bet is to use the JETI 30 amp helicopter ESC at $70. Then, you use either 8 cells for good power to hover and crusie around, or 10 cells for good aerobatic power. For more power on 10 cells, buy a 16 turn RC car motor. For top of the line power and flight times, youll want a brushless motor. With the cheaper motor and ESC, youll get about 6-10 minutes of flight on 8-10 2000-3000 Mah cells. The brushless motor gets 8-14 minutes....with more power! One of the best motors is the Hacker 480 10L....you can get the brushless motor and ESC for about $300. Thats $200 more than the car motor, but its the way to go for more power and flight time. For servos, the best are the Hitec HS-85BB metal geared. They have plenty of torque, great speed and you wont strip the gears in a crash. Youll need 3 of these for cyclics...see below on the gyro. Any small sized piezo gyro will work very well. The Futaba 240 heading hold is also an excellent gyro choice. Use Hitec HS-85 servos for the cyclics, and use a Hitec HS-81 metal geared for the tail servo....its faster and holds better than the 85s. I also suggest after your first mishap where you lose the blades to buy the carbon upgrade blades. These bring flight times up 1-2 minutes, and make for a smoother heli. The stock wood blades are $35 a set and you have to cover them....the ready to go carbons are $52. Youll also need a GOOD quality battery charger for the 8-10 cell packs. The cheapest I suggest is the $80 Hitec CG-335. But for $29 more, the Dymond Super Smart charger does a lot more....plus it can cycle packs with dischaging to keep them in the best of shape. You can see it here: http://www.rc-dymond.com Best of luck, if you have any questions, let me know! If this will be your first heli, I suggest the JR Voyager E instead. Its a LOT more robust and a little cheaper to fix. They both fly just as well. You can see the JR here: http://www.horizonhobby.com Jason lvrcflyer@aol.com Check out my Electric R/C Helicopter Column "Vertical Charge" here: http://www.ezonemag.com
Updated 10/5/2001