I use to fly my 450s quite a lot. For me, it was the sweet spot. When ever it seemed I was in a spot where people could see it, they would flock to me and want to watch. It is a cool thing but I would sometimes get people asking me if they could try flying it.
lol
People do not understand the amount of training and skill it requires to actually fly an RC heli. It’s like balancing a metal ball on a table. Only as soon as the nose is pointed at you, everything is backwards.
I spent tons of time in a simulator but I never got to the point where I could do any crazy maneuvers. I have flipped a few of my helis but crashed once and just never wanted to take the chance again. I crashed an Align 450 because it got too far away from me and I lost track of its orientation near some trees. Boom! Tons of money gone in an instant.
Hey at least now you can spend a grand and not worry about it falling out of the sky and then then exploding into a million pieces lol it’ll just be in or on your ears.
I can totally see how crashing can be really disheartening and off putting when just getting into the hobby, especially back then when flybarred helis were so complicated to setup. Nowadays crashing can range from no damage whatsoever to full rekits. Plus most kits now are built to withstand most crashes with minimal damage with piling the heli into the ground being the outliers.
But if you ever did want to get back into the hobby Horizon hobby has a line a helis under the “blade” name that are extremely beginner friendly. Edit: nvm you know about blade Also seeing that 550e now shows it’s age. Flybarred “style” head being really tall but with no flybar mechanics.
What are you flying? I had a few smaller Blade helis that could take some hits that I loved. Actually, that Blade 450 with the flybar was my favorite heli to fly. It was awesome.
You can see from my pics that the 550 I still have is flybarless. Something about the flybarless sytems I could never get on with. Flybars are a pain in the ass but they feel fantastic to fly.
Again, I’m filling @Rikudou_Goku thread with useless off topic stuff. Sorry. I’m having a vodka and tea right now and feeling… nice.
Oh… FUN fact!!! You guys will get a kick out of this. I enjoyed building the kits but doing the actual set up of the heli always scared me, so the buddy I would fly with would usually help me. When I was building my first 550, and I was starting to working setting up the electronics and servos, I mistakenly had the blades locked back like in my photos. When I plugged the battery in for the first time, I forgot the servos all zero themselves, yet I had them locked-in with the blades the way they were. The servos cranked and tried to move but couldn’t and immediately shorted the entire electronic system in the heli and smoke started pouring out of the ESC. A lot of smoke! I had to purchase another entire kit. I hired a local hobby store to re-do all the electronics and set up for me.
It was around that time when I started asking myself if all of this was really worth it. lol
Depends on how hard you go in. Not under power? Can range from maybe some broken blades and bent linkages to a bent/broken tail boom or a stripped servo. So nothing crazy. Going in under power is a different story. Blades, linkages, most likely tail boom, maybe servos, possible bent head spindle shaft, maybe even frames. If its really bad then it could almost be worth it to just buy a brand new kit and pull parts from that.
Nowadays rescue can really help with avoiding crashes, not all but most. Early flybarrless systems were kind of clunky but the modern ones are great. Most systems now have full integration with radios so you can do a full setup from the radio. No computer required. Most also have telemetry so you can get what headspeed you’re at, battery consumption, amps drawn, current voltage and a bunch of other stuff.
OH NOES!!! That’s a cringe worthy moment for me lol
So about the same ol stuff. You can’t expect to walk away from a crash with anything 450 and above.
A concept I am very well aware of.
To bring this all back around to the audio hobby, it does really help to put things into perspective financially.
What it boils down to is entitled idiots like myself are throwing away stupid money on expensive flying machines running them into the ground when I probably should doing something to make a difference and help others less fortunate. I really am an asshole.
You’d be surprised. I’ve had my 550 fall out of the sky (literally) because of a bad battery and I just picked it up, replaced the battery and kept flying.
$ 300 and then $ 1300 and up. $ 400- $ 1,000 pointless spending of money! I came to this conclusion. After you enjoy your $ 300 headphones, buy a Mest or similar !!!
Thank you for the recommendations guys. The SONY tips not only seal for me, I think I prefer their comfort vs Spinfits. The Mangird Tea has new tips. Now to roll some tips on my other sets and see what happens.
I will be ordering more of these for sure. As always, thank you @Rikudou_Goku
I just had a deja vu. Hated when that happened… I would just go home play some WoW or PoE and not go back into college for the next day I was a terrible student because of that.
These are my largest helis I still have…
it’ll just be in or on your ears.
Also seeing that 550e now shows it’s age. Flybarred “style” head being really tall but with no flybar mechanics.
I was a terrible student because of that.
